Vulnerable Workers and Labour Standards (Non-)Compliance in Global Production Networks: Home-Based Child Labour in Delhi’s Garment Sector

2014 ◽  
pp. 172-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Resmi Bhaskaran ◽  
Dev Nathan ◽  
Nicola Phillips ◽  
Upendranadh Choragudi
Keyword(s):  
Child Labour ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Home Based ◽  
Labour Standards ◽  
Vulnerable Workers

Corporate Social Responsibility and Standards

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandra Hughes
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Social Responsibility ◽  
Social Responsibility ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Economic Downturn ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Private Regulation ◽  
Labour Standards ◽  
Corporate Social ◽  
Political Economic

This chapter charts the contribution of economic geography to the field of research concerned with corporate social responsibility (CSR) and standards. Following explanation of the historical and political–economic context of CSR and the rise of codes and standards as tools in the private regulation of the global economy, it places the critical spotlight on studies of ethical and labour standards in global supply chains. Within this area, the different critical insights into CSR and standards offered by the global value chains and global production networks frameworks, as well as postcolonial critique, theories of governmentality, and sociologies of standards and marketization, are summarized and debated. Finally, the chapter discusses some of the recent economic, geographical, and regulatory challenges to the ways in which CSR and standards are operating and transforming in practice, from the global economic downturn to the influence of ‘rising powers’ and emerging economies.

Precarious Self-Employment in India: A Case of Home-Based Own Account Enterprises

2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-162
Author(s):  
Tulika Tripathi ◽  
Nripendra Kishore Mishra
Keyword(s):  
Labor Market ◽  
Minimum Wage ◽  
Labor Movement ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Classic Case ◽  
Self Employment ◽  
Living Wages ◽  
Home Based ◽  
Enterprise Surveys

Abstract A new thrust towards self-employment is seen in India where more than half of the labor class is fending for itself outside the ambit of any kind of employment. Global production networks (gpn s) have changed the structure of the labor market and extended precarity to almost every part of work and world. This has created a labor class that is neither proletariat nor bourgeois but a petty producer integrated in gpn s through mediators called ‘contractors.’ These producers are basically laborers who have been pushed out of the factory system and forced into self-employment. The paper has studied the trajectory of non-agricultural home-based Own Account Enterprises (oae s); a classic case of petty producers across gender and caste lines in various sectors of industry using state-organized enterprise surveys conducted in 2010–2011 and 2015–2016. It has found a vast majority of oae s earning less than half the proposed minimum wage (pmv)—a threshold similar to the idea of living wages rates. The most distressed oae s are in manufacturing, especially, textile, garment, leather, and chemical industries. The over emphasis on self-employment is shrinking the space for labor movement particularly in the global South.

scholarly journals Microenterprise development, industrial labour and the seductions of precarity

2017 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 201-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Prentice
Keyword(s):  
Women Workers ◽  
Industrial Workers ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Garment Workers ◽  
Microenterprise Development ◽  
Self Employment ◽  
Home Based ◽  
History Of ◽  
Market Relations

Microenterprise development is underpinned by an ideology that the solution to poverty is the integration of the poor into market relations. This article addresses the paradox that its ‘beneficiaries’ may be dispossessed industrial workers who already have a long history of participation in the capitalist economy. Exploring the transformation of garment workers in Trinidad from factory employees to home-based ‘micro-entrepreneurs’, I argue that working conditions and labour rights have deteriorated under the protective cover of seemingly laudable policies to promote economic empowerment via self-employment. Showing how microenterprise initiatives contribute to women workers’ ‘adverse incorporation’ ( Phillips, 2011 ) into global production networks, this article calls for renewed attention to the labour politics of microenterprise development.

scholarly journals Southern actors and the governance of labour standards in global production networks: The case of South African fruit and wine

2021 ◽  
pp. 0308518X2110333
Author(s):  
Matthew Alford ◽  
Margareet Visser ◽  
Stephanie Barrientos
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Global South ◽  
Trade Association ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Ethical Trade ◽  
Labour Standards ◽  
Multi Stakeholder ◽  
Space Of Flows

Recent studies highlight the emergence of standards, including multi-stakeholder initiatives developed and applied within the global South where supplier firms are usually based. This trend has created a complex ethical terrain whereby transnational standards flow through global production networks and intersect with domestic initiatives at places of production. The paper complements global production network analysis with the concepts of ‘space of flows’ and ‘space of places’ and insights from relational economic geography, to examine how some multi-stakeholder initiatives in the global South can shape the broader governance of labour standards in global production networks. The following questions are addressed: How is the governance of labour standards in global production networks shaped by dynamic spatial interactions between actors? What role have diverse Southern multi-stakeholder initiatives played in influencing the governance of South African fruit and wine? We draw on research conducted over seven years into two standards in South Africa, the Wine and Agriculture Ethical Trade Association and Sustainability Initiative of South Africa. Our analysis shows that these two Southern-based multi-stakeholder initiatives contributed to shaping the broader governance of labour standards through dynamic non-linear waves of interaction over time, involving both collaborative and contested exchanges between actors across space of flows and places. We further argue that despite the development of multi-stakeholder initiatives by Southern actors, commercial power asymmetries in global production networks limit their ability to promote significant improvements for producers and workers.

scholarly journals Leveraging Nordic links: South African labour’s role in regulating labour standards in wine global production networks

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 921-942 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Hastings
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Private Governance ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Global Production Networks ◽  
Worker Rights ◽  
Wine Production ◽  
New Approaches ◽  
Civil Society Organisations ◽  
Labour Standards ◽  
Multi Stakeholder

Abstract There are established difficulties in upholding private standards within global production networks (GPNs) through the use of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs). Taking the case of wine production in South Africa, the article examines labour’s role in leveraging new approaches to labour regulation in the interests of improved working standards and opportunities for labour organising. To do this, the paper adopts an extended take on the GPN framework which focuses on labour’s own networked capabilities. The role of worker agency in forging international connections and new relational geographies between unions and civil society organisations across wine GPNs (in particular between South Africa and Scandinavia) is explored. By applying pressure within and through these networks, workers are shown to encourage new approaches to private governance in the interests of improved worker rights on the ground.

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