4. The Context of Toleration (2): Interconnected Social Networks

This chapter explains the emotional basis for toleration. The author shows that, due to living in the mountains, isolated from the outside world, workers at Jinjiang Factory seek their friends and marital partners within the factory. In this process, they become interconnected in one way or another. However, this interconnection does not occur in a random manner. It is constrained within the subgroup that the worker belongs to. The author further indicates that workers at Jinjiang Factory are divided into three groups: transferred workers, Returned Educated Youths, and demobilized soldiers. This division of workers is strengthened by their occupational niches in the factory and reinforced in day-to-day interactions inside and outside the workshop. Based on the illustration of social relations at Jinjiang Factory, in this chapter, the author also explains how the interconnected relations in the Third Line Enterprises differ from their counterparts in urban areas.