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n September, posts began circulating on social media raising concerns that labor rights activist and journalist Feng Rui (冯睿), known also as Xiao Wu (小五), had gone missing. Over the course of several weeks, independent outlets and social media accounts began reporting that Guangzhou police had detained him on September 14 for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” (寻衅滋事), an often arbitrary and politically-motivated charge used against individuals who challenge Party rule through speech or demonstrations.
The Hong Kong daily Ming Pao (明報) confirmed on October 4 that Feng had been detained and had met with a lawyer, but did not specify charges. Some reports circulating online claim that Feng had become ill amid relentless interrogation by investigators and needed a wheelchair to be taken to and from questioning. According to Ming Pao, Feng was released on bail last week, but no official reports by Chinese authorities have been released as of this writing.
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Feng’s detention seems to be part of a broader crackdown on labor rights-focused media and reporting in the past several weeks. In September, Hong Guangyu (洪广玉), a former reporter for Beijing Sci-Tech Report (北京科技报), was detained at his home in Xiamen by authorities from Dalian, also on suspicion of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” (寻衅滋事). In a now-deleted report originally published on October 7, the business and current affairs outlet Caixin (财新) cited sources suggesting that his detention may have been linked to his efforts to defend the rights of farmers in Dalian, who had alleged that pesticides from a local agricultural company were responsible for the death of their cherry trees.
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The crackdown is hardly exceptional or surprising. Labor-related protests have been among the most-documented grassroots mobilizations in the country. China’s economic liberalization created a host of new problems for Chinese workers, and a new class of migrant workers who left their countryside hometowns to pursue work in the cities; social benefits became dependent on precarious employers — or else were tied to their place of household registration. While labor conditions in factories have improved considerably over the years, wage arrears, unpaid overtime, and long working hours without breaks remain among the most common problems faced by Chinese workers today.
The rise of the gig economy — which now represents more than 40 percent of China’s overall workforce, according to one study — brought its own issues documented extensively by workers themselves online and by investigative journalists. A 2020 investigative report in Portrait magazine (人物), for example, found that food delivery apps were driving a sharp increase in driver accidents, injuries, and deaths through algorithms that placed unreasonable, even impossible, demands on riders. The government issued broad directives toward delivery app companies to ease the intensity of work schedules almost a year later, though extreme conditions continue to be an issue in the sector. Feng’s 2025 report, mentioned above, documented several problems among couriers and food delivery drivers, including sudden deaths after working consecutive excessive shifts.
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The combination of a slowing economy and the growing number of highly-educated graduates that far exceeds job vacancies has driven many to gig work — yet even that sector is becoming overcrowded as both blue- and white-collar workers are losing their jobs to automation. After China’s youth unemployment rate rose to 21.3 percent in June 2023, the National Bureau of Statistics suspended the release of figures for several months. When new figures came out in early 2024, the official calculus had changed — with students removed from the count, lowering the headline figure.
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This poor situation facing workers in China has made spontaneous labor unrest more likely, said Li Qiang (李强), the founder and executive director of China Labor Watch, in an interview with CMP. Now based in the U.S., Li had advocated for worker rights inside Chinese factories before fleeing his country of birth under fear of arrest. He now represents one of the few remaining organizations documenting labor incidents in China.
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China’s suppression of labor mobilizations goes hand in hand with pressure on publications and NGOs that document labor incidents across China. The Hong Kong-based China Labour Bulletin, which had documented collective worker actions and strikes across China, shuttered suddenly in 2025, citing financial issues. Lu Yuyu (卢昱宇), an activist and journalist born in Guizhou, documented over 70,000 “mass incidents” (群体性事件), China’s term for protests, including labor strikes, through his outlet “Not the News” (非新闻). Lu was detained by authorities in 2016. He spent four years in prison for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble,” the same charge Feng is allegedly facing.
Lu believes the reason the CCP is placing such significance on Feng’s case — despite his relatively small platform — “is precisely because it is extremely fearful of his ability to ‘piece together’ fragmented and isolated labor incidents" .... “By cracking down now, [the Party] is attempting to cut off information channels before workers’ anger gains broader social consensus, ensuring it retains control over the narrative.”
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A Xinhua think tank report paints a romantic picture of benevolent low-wage workers through their online creations “rooted in the soil of reality,”
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These recent efforts in the arts and media seek to co-opt workers’ voices, making them part of a narrative of personal sacrifice for the glory of the nation. The unfortunate reality, however, is that the CCP, which places China’s working class at the heart of its founding narrative and legitimacy, remains very keen to ensure that worker voices from below stay fragmented. Documentation of worker exploitation, or online campaigns to improve working conditions, are highly likely to be censored.
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