The particularity of domestic labor is that although the alienation of emotional labor is inevitable under the control of enterprises, emotional labor is indispensable to domestic labor. In other words, it is impossible to address alienation by eliminating emotional labor from domestic work. Therefore, the study of emotional labor has remained in the stage of academic criticism for a long time, which makes it difficult to promote the adjustment and improvement in practice. This issue is the theoretical problem when cooperating with social work institutions to carry out the emotional labor group activities of domestic workers. Bearing this problem in mind, we began to capture the difficulties of emotional labor and experiences faced by domestic workers in group activities, aiming to extract general experiences that can be shared by workers in the industry.
However, we found that difficulties and experiences are not evenly distributed among domestic workers. In other words, some workers can always share their experience solving other people's problems. They do not have obvious difficulties in emotional labor but work in a friendlier working atmosphere. In subsequent research, we interacted with more domestic workers and found domestic workers with such experience. Therefore, we have gradually realized that the sharing offered by these people is not only based on individual “experience” but could also reflect the experience of a “type” since their perspective of perceiving and addressing problems is quite different from the business perspective; therefore, they have established an interpersonal relationship with the customer's family that goes beyond an instrumental employment relationship.
Previous studies on business emotion models have focused on the ternary analytical framework of the capital featuring customers and workers. In the specific emotional interaction mechanism, capital is regarded as the core and leading subject. On the one hand, capital has constructed the stereotyped image of hegemonic consumers in the labor field who demand unilateral emotional labor based on the pursuit of interest and a one-sided understanding of consumers' needs; on the other hand, capital disciplines workers to follow the business emotional rules of “consumer first” to achieve the profit goal. In this mechanism, capital is the main body that plays a shaping role, and customers and workers are the objects being constructed or disciplined, with obvious passivity. In the interaction, workers mainly provide labor, and emotion is instrumental to achieving service and interest goals. Compared with the core mission of service work, emotion is dependent and will end with the completion of the service interaction, which is the temporary characteristic of business emotion in terms of the time dimension. Based on cases of the automatic emotion mode, this paper focuses on customers and workers who were originally in a passive position and investigates the formation, maintenance, and reproduction of the automatic emotion model between these two sides and the potential impact of capital to sort out the characteristics of the automatic emotion mode and the multiple interaction mechanisms of these subjects.
The growing up: the acquisition of the automatic emotion model
Domestic workers with automatic emotion models in emotional labor have grown up under similar backgrounds as other domestic workers at the macro-level. They are all from economically underdeveloped rural areas. Most of them have an education level of junior high school, and some have graduated from vocational high school or high school.
My mother just lives like this. She is very good to us. Every morning, we can get up very late. She cooks and asks us to get up and eat breakfast. My father never beat us. He is very good to me. When there is a meeting, there is some meat for them to eat. But he didn't eat it all. He packed some for me. (domestic worker JC, 2018).
My family doesn't value boys over girls. I finished primary school and got good grades. I just played poker too much then and failed to get good grades. Since I was 12 years old, I have stopped studying. There are many children in my family. I am the youngest. My parents have not asked me to work or do chores at home. I just stayed at home. (domestic worker EH, 2017).
The reflections of the above two domestic workers show they have not been influenced by the traditional idea of son preference. Even if their families were not rich, they grew up in a loving, open, and relaxed environment with their parents. Their feelings toward and relationships with their families and friends were generally positive. On the one hand, they learned how to establish and maintain a stable emotional relationship in their family life. On the other hand, they acquired the interpersonal communication mode of the traditional acquaintance society in the socialization process in rural communities. In other words, the local culture and its structure left a deeply rooted and active mark on the early life of these domestic workers. This background is the local cultural foundation at the macro-level of the automatic emotional model formed in the process of domestic work.
At the beginning of work: the formation of the automatic emotion model
The previous section showed that this group of domestic workers is not distinct in terms of their upbringing. Why, however, have other domestic workers not formed an obvious and unified automatic emotional model? The existing empirical research has offered some answers; the main reason concerns the labor process, especially in the initial stage when workers enter the workplace. For example, some scholars suggest that the initial interaction experience between workers and customers at the beginning of work is the key to determining whether the original interactive mode can be continued (Su and Ni 2016).
Especially for live-in domestic workers (including nannies, babysitters, and maternity matrons) who need to stay at the customer's home, working and living alone in a strange home makes them feel the pressure of the unfamiliar environment on the one hand and look forward to establishing a good relationship with the customer to ensure everything goes smoothly on the other hand. Therefore, at the beginning of their work, domestic workers are generally careful. It is fortunate for domestic workers to establish an automatic emotional model with customers. Therefore, when talking about a good relationship with customers, a domestic worker will mention that it is “fate” (缘分); that is, establishing the automatic emotional model is a process of chance and luck.
For customers, this choice is made after deliberation. According to customer interviews, customers would only establish a long-term automatic emotional relationship with domestic workers when they meet the customers' basic requirements in the initial stage of work. These requirements include the following:
I saw that her handwriting was very good. She graduated from high school, according to the resume. She also worked as a substitute teacher for grade one and grade two of primary school in her village. In fact, when she first came home, I found that she didn't cook very well, and her working ability and efficiency were average. But it is very important for the domestic worker to have a stable mood and a mild personality. So I thought she could do the work. After I got along with her for about two or three years, our relationship changed from a customer-worker relationship to a quasi-friendship. Now, after ten years, I think she is family. (Client Ms. C, 2021).
We have changed short-term domestic workers several times. Some of them have grand plans but little skill. Some of them tried to fool you, quite unreliable. As for this sister, I think she really cherishes this job. Her family also needs money, so she works hard. She has a reliable personality and is good to [the] children. We don't have too many other requirements. I can do housework if she can't. (Client Ms. Y, 2021).
In summary, the basic requirements of customers have two main aspects. One is the subjective quality related to personality and emotion, and the other is the objective working ability. After a period of observation and evaluation, when customers think that the domestic worker can meet these two requirements, they will choose to establish an interactive relationship with the domestic worker as a friend and family member. This decision also suggests that the formation of such automatic emotion has a significantly instrumental basis; that is, workers need to be competent in both their subjective quality and objective ability to establish an automatic emotion model. This fact is an important difference between the automatic emotion in the work of domestic workers and the automatic emotion within families.
Obviously, customers have more influencing power in the formation process of this model. In addition to the empirical support provided below, their main construction approach includes forming equal status between the two sides.
When we travel on holidays, we book a separate room for her. We usually eat and live together. My brother and sister treat her very well. They don't take her as a nanny, but as an older [member] in our own family. They especially respect her. When my brother came, he did all the work he could do. (Client Ms. Y, 2021).
She could stay at this work because, first of all, I told her that everyone earns bread with their own hands. Her work is a kind of work, and the work of my husband and me is also a kind of work. Everyone lives on their own, without distinction between high and low. And I also told her that there was no special treatment of guests in this house. They were the same. She has a separate bedroom and uses the same daily necessities as me. For example, we use the same brand of quilt cover, just different designs, and colors. Then, I told her not to eat leftovers and not to use cold water to save money. Just do what she needs to do. So she has been treated equally from the beginning. (Client Ms. C, 2021).
In the domestic industry and, in fact, the entire service industry, both the service concept of “consumer first” emphasized by intermediary companies and the large gap in social status and material wealth between customers and workers ultimately manifest in the unequal interactive relationship between customers and workers, which is also an obstacle to the formation of the automatic emotional model. The customers quoted above are aware of this fact and intend to break it, which is an important response to the automatic emotional interaction of workers.
Therefore, the automatic emotion model is not accidentally formed but has preconditions. From the perspective of workers, it marks the continuation of the automatic emotions learned in their native families and communities. As the place of domestic work is the customer's home, out of instinct and habit, workers almost unconditionally and actively start their interactive model of automatic emotion. From the perspective of customers, this step has subjective and objective preconditions. The objective condition is that the laborer possesses basic labor skills and characters, and the subjective condition is that the customer intends to shape equal relations. In other words, customers' responses to workers' automatic emotional model are conditional and conscious. From the formation of this kind of automatic emotion model, the customer's family as the main workplace of domestic work and the relationship model in the acquaintance society are critical macro-foundations to generate automatic emotion in the micro-labor field. When customers and workers with the above characteristics meet in the family contexts, the formation of an automatic emotional model will follow.
Emotional interaction: the maintenance of the automatic emotional model
After domestic workers live together with customers in the process of labor, their emotional relationships with customers may be similar to their relationships with sisters, parents and children, and friends.
After working in a factory in Guangdong, EH came to Beijing and worked as a domestic worker. EH forged a deep friendship with the customer, Ms. Hong's family.
After three or four months, our relationship became very good. Later, when my husband came, they found that my husband was also a very honest person. So they told me, "When we grow old, the four of us can live together. We can live on our pensions, and you just cook." We're so close.
Two years later, I went back to my hometown because I was pregnant. A month later, Hong was also pregnant. "Come back and cook for me. Let's live together," She said. So I went back. Apart from cooking, I did nothing. Hong's mother and mother-in-law did all the other household chores. I was paid 500 Yuan a month. At that time, it was a high salary.
I wanted to eat strawberries so much when I was pregnant. Five Yuan a kilo is too expensive. I looked at the strawberry for a long time, but I still didn't buy it. I went back and complained about the price to Hong at night. Later, I couldn't help but buy a kilo. You know what? Hong, her husband, her mother, and her mother-in-law each brought two kilos back. I finally returned to my hometown for eight months when I was pregnant. Hong asked my sister to come to Beijing, bought sleeping berth tickets, and said to my sister, "I entrust her to you. You have to take her home safely." Two or three months after giving birth to the baby, Hong called me to come back. So I live in Hong's house with my child. I only cook for them, and we take care of the children together. (Domestic worker EH, 2017).
The relationship between EH and Ms. Hong has gone beyond the general cooperative relationship between customers and domestic workers. EH and Ms. Hong have also established interpersonal relationships with high trust. EH and Ms. Hong live as sisters. Even Ms. Hong believes that she values their relationship more than EH's sister. EH continued her work during pregnancy and took her child to Hong's home after birth, showing that the emotion between the two sides is similar to that found in kinship relations rather than an exchange relationship of work. Moreover, it is not the unilateral provision of the worker or demand of the customer; instead, it results from the common understanding and maintenance of the relationship between the two parties.
EH did not perform in this relationship. The detail that she complained to Ms. Hong about the price of strawberries demonstrates that her behavior is by no means the behavior of domestic workers under the rational exchange mode but an automatic expression of emotion based on trust. It is not just Ms. Hong, the hostess, but also Ms. Hong's husband, her mother, and her mother-in-law who respond to EH. The relationship between the two sides is similar to family and relatives (even EH's husband has become a family or kin member) rather than a master–servant or employer–employee relationship in the sense of occupation and class. The interaction mode of both parties is not limited to the duration of the labor relations. Even though Hong's family later moved out of Beijing, the two families still met when Hong's family visited Beijing every year.
Domestic QB has the same story.
The couple is very reasonable. We are from the same place. We are good at communication and have the same living habits. The mother sometimes loses her temper with the child. I can say it to her frankly. I dare to do it. Indeed, they treat me like their own sisters. It is very comfortable for us to live together. (Domestic worker QB, 2021).
In the business emotional model, the emotional rules emphasized by capital are the hegemony of customers and the unilateral and unconditional obedience of domestic workers. QB points out the mistakes her customer makes in the process of education and criticizes her as an elder. This observation reflects not only a kind of equal relationship between customers and workers but also workers' determination of the sincerity of the relationship under the automatic emotional model.
JC also had another emotional experience when helping a single mother take care of her children.
The mother trusts me very much. Sometimes I take the baby to my home to take care [of the baby], and she doesn't mind. When she has to go out to participate in competition, I support her very much. I can understand her. Her life is good, and I am also inspired by her. I take care of the baby as my own child. I treat it as my own child and treat the baby strictly. The baby talks like me and will say “disobedient” sometimes, and her mother will laugh.
It's been more than 20 years. I still have a good relationship with my first employer. I will bring her things when I go home in the new year, and I will find her if I need to. (Domestic worker JC, 2018).
JC has empathy for the mother of the child and supports her in competitions in her spare time, even if she must undertake extra work. Of course, the other party returned the trust, and JC could take the child back to her own rental house for care and even take the child back to her rural hometown for some time. JC's understanding of customers does not reflect a unilateral emotion but is recognized and reciprocated by the other party.
Customers will also recognize and give feedback about this sincere emotion.
Because we respect her and regard her as our own family, the children regard her as their own family. They have grown up with this person's cook for many years. In the eyes of our two children, she is their relative. Although she is paid, she cooks three meals a day for the two children, accompanies them as they grow up, and treats them very well. If my two children want to take care of her in the future or be grateful to her in any other way, I think it is totally fine. (Client Ms. C, 2021).
In existing research, the majority of domestic workers who engaged in intensive care labor establish a similar “family” relationship with customers in a short time through strategies such as a deep performance of emotional labor. However, this relationship is only an expedient measure for workers to cope with work pressure, and it is difficult to obtain customers' responses (Mei 2020). Therefore, it is still an alienated emotion. Interaction between these domestic workers and their customers is characterized by a “zero-sum game,” and the two sides compete for control over labor. In this process, on the one hand, companies combine the discourse of suzhi under the development doctrine with professional ethics in training to make domestic workers finally “agree” with the status differences and unequal rights between themselves and their customers. On the other hand, the customer defines the marginal position of the domestic workers and forces them to undergo emotional alienation entailing body-mind separation through emotional management that constitutes an oppressive interactive relationship in which the customer is the absolute controller (Su 2011; Zhou 2019). Therefore, in the labor process of most domestic workers, automatic emotional relationships are rarely found.
In the cases examined in this article, another type of customer is found, who is not constrained by the concept of “consumer first” in the consumption ideology of modern society but holds the consciousness of equality and responds to domestic workers with sincerity, tolerance, and trust so that an automatic emotional relationship in labor can be established. This observation reminds us that customers and domestic workers are critical interactive subjects in emotional labor. If only labor is required to provide emotion, either this unilateral emotional provision without response is difficult to continue, or the laborer will be emotionally exploited and oppressed, resulting in emotional burnout, eventually changing the essence of emotional labor. The standardization process of Chinese consumers (customers) has occurred relatively late, and there are great discrepancies in service cognition and demand (Li and Liu 2017), which is an important basis for domestic workers to generate automatic emotions in the labor process. Customers who do not fully agree with the concept of “consumer first” and give corresponding responses finally construct an automatic emotional interaction and sustain emotional involvement. Therefore, although the encounter between individuals who can practice the automatic emotional model seems random, there is rich fertile soil under their feet; the cultural characteristics and code of conduct of the “acquaintance society” are still preserved in Chinese society.
In addition, the above cases show that the automatic emotion model has the characteristics of sincerity, continuity, and reciprocity. Workers can criticize customers, which reflects the sincerity of such emotional relations and the diversity of expression methods. This situation is not one of unilateral obedience under the business model; it transcends the instrumental nature of emotional relationships under the business emotional model. In terms of maintenance, customers and workers in the automatic emotional model can maintain good emotional interaction after the end of labor relations. This mode can continue independently of the working relationship, while a business emotion relationship will terminate at the end of the work arrangement, which is temporary and attached to the working relationship. In terms of emotional impact, the customer experience and the working environment of workers in the automatic emotional model are relatively better, and there is reciprocity between customers and workers, while the commercial emotional model is characterized by the emotional alienation and emotional exhaustion of workers, which will affect the results of labor.
Occupational mobility: the reproduction of the automatic emotion model
A good emotional relationship between customers and domestic workers under the automatic emotion mode is also reflected in the occupational mobility approach. On the one hand, the mobility of domestic workers is related to their institutional identity; on the other hand, it is related to changes in the customer's family, such as an increase or decrease in the number of family members and family migration. In this case, the domestic worker must look for another job. However, the next jobs of domestic workers discussed in this article are introduced mainly by customers and rarely through intermediaries.
She introduced me to her classmate to take care of their children. At first, I didn't think of it, but I agreed with her. This family is also very kind to me. Knowing there is no milk powder in the countryside, they bought us enough milk powder for half a year. Once my daughter washed her own clothes at home in winter. She told me that her hands were cold on the phone. The family asked me to buy a washing machine for her. I couldn't afford to buy a washing machine. Grandma (the mother of the family) called her two daughters, and three of them raised money to buy a washing machine for my daughter. (Domestic worker EH, 2017).
I haven't participated in training for so many years. I can always find a job. I'm very confident. The baby will go to school after the new year. A grandmother downstairs comes to see me. Her daughter-in-law is going to have a second child in October. They hope I can help with it. (Domestic worker JC, 2018).
The automatic emotion between customers and workers is not limited to the labor process. When a domestic worker needs to find a new job, the customer will introduce her to another customer and provide emotional “endorsement” for the domestic worker based on their personal network to lay a good foundation for the future emotional relationship between the domestic worker and the next customer. This process is very different from obtaining work through intermediaries, and it is easier for domestic workers to reproduce automatic emotions through relationship replication.
The maintenance and reproduction of natural emotional patterns also have the characteristics of gift exchange and reciprocity. In the above case, the customer presented the “washing machine” as a material gift to EH's daughter, which constitutes a rational return to EH and a subjective recognition of the family-like relationship. This action has the characteristics of both emotional communication and rational exchange, showing the characteristics of long-term relationships, such as lagging and continuous involvement. It is a typical emotional interaction in a relationship-oriented society. Particularly, the “washing machine,” as an expensive electrical appliance, has gone beyond the scope of reciprocity among ordinary acquaintances and is more akin to care and mutual assistance among family members. This case vividly portrays the “quasi-family” automatic emotion construction between customers and workers. After the termination of labor relations, customers maintain an automatic emotional interaction model with workers.
In fact, I take her as my family. Even when she didn't work in my house, I still cared about her. I called her and talked like a friend. When she was working in Beijing, she would come to my house on her rest day. She came to my home as if coming to a relative's house. Then we talked, had a meal, and she rested for a half day before leaving. (Client Ms. Z, 2021).
This quote reflects the independence of automatic emotion from another perspective. After the end of instrumental labor relations, the automatic emotions formed before can continue. Although the formation of automatic emotion needs an instrumental foundation and is attached to the working relationship, its continuation and reproduction are independent. This fact also highlights the difference between the automatic emotion model and the business emotion model.
Challenges and alienation in automatic emotional relationships
Of course, this group of domestic workers will also encounter challenges in their work in two main aspects. The first is the dilemma of labor payment negotiation in automatic emotional relationships.
Everyone talks about wages in different ways. I think we can talk openly, but she does not. In the previous family and my family, she does not. After the new year, she suddenly said that she couldn't come. Then I offered to give her a raise, and she came. (Client Ms. Z, 2021).
In traditional Chinese culture, the interaction between family members is based on automatic emotional relations, and the calculation of money is considered to be contrary to it. Therefore, the automatic emotional relationship with customers will, to some extent, restrict domestic workers from striving for higher labor payments from customers. This outcome reveals the negative impact on workers of the automatic emotional model formed in labor relations.
The second is “voting with feet,” when the reproduction of automatic emotions is blocked. When making lunch for a family, EH was scolded by the customer because of the regional difference in cooking the eggplant, and EH then chose to resign. HR also talked about the suspected theft at the customer's home in the group activity. Although the customer later learned that he had wronged HR and formally apologized to her, HR still resigned quickly.
The stories of EH and HR both show that domestic workers in the automatic emotion mode pay more attention to their interaction and trust with customers, and even “deep performance” is difficult to accept. Once the customer responds slowly or refuses to respond, both parties are likely to face a rupture of rationality and emotion, which makes these domestic workers tend to end the interactive relationship more quickly and decisively.
In addition, some customers in the survey cited cases in which their relationship with domestic workers changed from an automatic emotion model to a business emotion model.
She has been in the intermediary company for too long, and she will go there on weekends. What they communicate with each other is this house and that house, and they will compare with each other. They learned how to fool customers and how to make a superficial effort. Later, when I asked her back when I had my second child, I felt something change. (Client Ms. Z, 2021).
My Dajie's (domestic worker) sister-in-law has gained rich experience in the agency. She goes to the agency on weekends. Whoever offers a higher salary, her sister-in-law immediately resigns and switches to that customer. Then, she teaches my dajie to do the same. Anyway, the employer has to pay when she leaves. (Client Ms. C, 2021).
In other words, some domestic workers give up the automatic emotional model and choose the business emotional model under the influence of the overall atmosphere of the industry. This change also reflects the vulnerability of the reproduction of the automatic emotion model and further explains the main reason why the model is currently scarce. Of course, this situation also reminds us to further reflect on the negative influence of domestic intermediary enterprises on the overall normative rules of the industry. If capital acknowledges only the business emotion model, it will further eliminate the basis for forming the automatic emotion model.
Therefore, compared with the three main bodies of capital, customers, and workers in the business emotion model, the automatic emotion model is exhibited mainly by customers and workers in specific interactive situations without interactive space for capital. However, this situation does not mean that capital should be excluded or ignored in the automatic emotional model. When workers face challenges in the automatic emotional model, they must rely on the intermediary role of capital. On the one hand, capital can exercise a positive influence and regulate the wage system of domestic workers in terms of establishing and promoting general industry norms to solve the dilemma of labor payment negotiation between workers and customers under the automatic emotion mode. On the other hand, it can eliminate the negative impact if it can reflect on its one-sided assumption of “unilateral demand and control” emotional needs of consumers and admit the possibility and feasibility of establishing an automatic emotional model between workers and customers in training and management. By doing so, it can help the existing automatic emotional model avoid being eliminated by intermediary enterprises so that it can continue and expand the influence of the automatic emotion model and ultimately benefit capital, customers, and workers through good interaction and high work quality.