Social money? Digital money and migrant labour in China

Abstract

Scholars of Chinese society have predominantly regarded the region’s money to represent an unusually “social” artifact. In recent decades, China has seen a dramatic proliferation of “digital money” services within social media platforms, providing various tools for transactions, savings, and investment. While such innovations would seem to confirm the assumed social character of money in China, we present a comparison of the views of Chinese migrant laborers’ views on different social media platforms which suggests the contrary: migrants attribute a greater degree of trust to the digital money platforms which they perceived of as being comparatively less social in nature. We posit that these attitudes should be understood in the context of migrant laborers’ technologically literate yet financially precarious existence, which gives rise to their strongly held fears over becoming the victim online deception designed to part them from their savings. This paper thus argues that while money may indeed be viewed socially in China, this should not be confused with a desire for it to always act socially. The broader implications of the increasing embeddedness of everyday exchange within personal media forms will also be discussed, highlighting the importance of acknowledging how cultural and platform specifics must form part of our understanding of these new monetary technologies and practices.