Precarious Working Conditions for Foreign Workers in Serbia: A Content Analysis of Online Articles from Daily Newspaper Danas about the Linglong Factory

This study aims to analyse the precarious working conditions experienced by foreign workers in Serbia at the Linglong tyre factory in Zrenjanin. It seeks to elucidate the nature of these conditions, particularly for labourers from Vietnam and India, in the context where numerous regulatory violations, misuse of public authority, and a blatant disregard for human rights have already marked the Linglong factory. The authors employ a content analysis method, focusing on secondary sources due to constraints in direct data collection from the foreign workforce. The empirical material of the research is articles accessed through a targeted query “Linglong workers” on the website of the daily newspaper Danas. The temporal scope of the analysis extends from October 2021 to October 2024, coinciding with significant media coverage of migrant workers’ hardships during the construction and inauguration of the factory. The primary units of analysis focus on article themes and concepts that reflect temporal, organisational, social and economic dimensions of precarity, such as the confiscation of passports, inhumane living conditions, irregular remuneration, unpaid overtime, failure to remit social contributions, denial of sick leave, prohibition of paid annual leave, obstruction of independent trade union organisation, and instances of belittlement. Additionally, the analysis seeks to evaluate the orientation associated with these themes and concepts, categorising them as positive, negative, or neutral. This research contributes to a deeper understanding of the precarity and multilayered vulnerability of migrant workers in Serbia, particularly within the foreign investment framework. By focusing on the Linglong factory as a case study, the research illuminates the broader implications of precarious labour conditions in global supply chains.