Abstract: Scholars in the field of rural migrant labor study have proposed the concept of “dormitory labor regime” to describe an important labor organizing system used by the Chinese enterprises to house rural workers in dormitories and thus exercise a full control of labor. This paper examines another probable outcome of the “dormitory labor regime” by examining the labor dormitory construction under the Republic of China. In its pursuit of modernization and new cultural customs, the republic government promoted the workers' dormitories as a way to introduce modern civilization to rural workers. Modern-minded entrepreneurs actively involved in the cause. Tianjin Dongya Wool Textile Company and Chongqing Minsheng Shipyard are the two examples in this study that illuminate the issues of workers' education, collective unity and labor self-governing in dormitory sites. It is argued that with good practices, labor dormitories could be a ground for the transitional “resocialization” from rural farmers to modern workers. These two exemplary cases and their social implication offer us an opportunity to contemplate an alternative to the “dormitory labor regime” problem and seek for new possibilities of migrant workers' living space at this junction of the socialist transitional period of China.

Key words: dormitory labor regime, migrant workers, workers'dormitory, modernity