Post on 18-Dec-2014
description
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Mobilizing Global Social Justice Mobilizing Global Social Justice Responsibility-TakingResponsibility-Taking
Samples from our book-in-progress
Michele Micheletti (Karlstad University)Dietlind Stolle (Michele Micheletti)
Project financed by the Swedish Council of Research
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Political ConsumerismPolitical Consumerism
Use of the market as an arena for politics
Three formsBoycotts – don’t buy for political, ethical, environmental reasons
“Buycotts” – do buy for these reasons
Discursive actions – opinion & value expression in communicative efforts
GOVERNMENT IS NOT PRIMARY TARGET FOR GOVERNMENT IS NOT PRIMARY TARGET FOR POLITICAL ACTIONPOLITICAL ACTION
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Paper HighlightsPaper Highlights
Focus: No-Sweat, Just Clothes, Anti-Sweatshop, Clean Clothes Movement
• Political Responsibility & Sweatshops: – Responsibility problems; responsbility models
• Short Overview of Anti-Sweatshop Movement
• Envisioned role of consumers in the movement
• What force has political consumerism?
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Examples
Problems in global garment industry in Logo SweatshopsProblems in global garment industry in Logo Sweatshops
“At the Hung Wah factory, young women work from 7:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., seven days a week, sewing Nike clothing for an
average wage of 22 cents an hour.”
“Keds made in China by 16-year-old girls applying toxic glue with their bare hands, the only tool given them, a toothbrush.”
“Timberland shoes are made in China by 16 and 17-year-old girls forced to work 14 hours a day, seven days a week for 22 cents an hour, often in temperatures over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The young women are threatened and coached to lie to any auditors visiting the factory.”- National Labor Council report 2004
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Why Problems Here?Why Problems Here? Globalization, Government, Corporations & Consumers
No Global Government “Earth has no CEO. No Board of Directors. No management team…” – UN, World Bank, and World Resources Institute
Conventional Model of Political Responsibility Nation-state government model out of touch with global times
→ → social justice responsibility vacuumssocial justice responsibility vacuums
Global Garment Corporations Fiercely competitive buyer-driven corporations “race to the bottom” to price themselves in the market
Consumers Demanding good personalized “mass” fashion at “good” prices
→ → mobile outsourced fashion manufacturing & sweatshopsmobile outsourced fashion manufacturing & sweatshops
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Anti-Sweatshop Focus on CorporationsAnti-Sweatshop Focus on Corporations
“[G]lobalization has generated layers of transactions and institutional practices that envelop and cut across the system of states.”
Globalization’s most visible manifestation Ca. 70,000 transnational firms in operation
with ca 700,000 subsidiaries and millions of suppliers connected through distributed networks globally
They are like “elephants standing in the center of rooms…”They are like “elephants standing in the center of rooms…”
Speech by John G. Ruggie, Professor of International Affairs, Harvard University and Special Representative on the Issue of Human Rights and Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises
October 2005
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Anti-Sweatshop Focus on Consumers & Consumption Anti-Sweatshop Focus on Consumers & Consumption PracticesPractices
“Choose it, colour it, sign it, buy it”
“Divided spring – real self, real style”
“The best style is your very own”
“Everyone is a star”
“Clothing and accessories that enhance personal style”
Who’s responsible for sweatshops?Who’s responsible for sweatshops?
Cause & treatment responsibilityCause & treatment responsibility
Everyone involved with garment consumptionEveryone involved with garment consumption“The social relations that connect us to others are not restricted to nation state borders. Our actions are conditioned by and contribute to institutions that affect distant others, and their actions contribute to the operation of institutions that affect us. Because our actions assume these others as condition for our own actions, …we have
made practical moral commitments to them by virtue of our actions. That is, even when we are not conscious of or actively
deny a moral relationship to these other people, to the extent that our actions depend on the assumption that distant others are doing certain things, we have obligations of justice in relation to them.”
Iris Marion Young, “Responsibility and Global Justice: A Social Connection Model,” Philosophy and Social Policy (winter 2006)
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Overview Overview Contemporary Anti-Sweatshop Political Contemporary Anti-Sweatshop Political
ConsumerismConsumerismFormative events for North American & European Branches
European Branch: Lockout of women workers in Philipine factory making
clothes for C & A for demanding legal minimum wage (1990)
North American Branch: Establishment of amalgamated Union of Needle, Industrial, and Technical Employees (UNITE!) & sweatshop raid in El
Monte, California (1995)
STRUCK A NERVE IN CIVIL SOCIETY STRUCK A NERVE IN CIVIL SOCIETY → →MOBILIZATION MOBILIZATION → → CONSOLIDATION OF ANTI-CONSOLIDATION OF ANTI-
SWEATSHOP MOVEMENT SWEATSHOP MOVEMENT
Transnational MovementTransnational Movement
• Teaming up of Old & New Civil Society
• Church groups, student groups, think tanks, policy institutes, foundations, consumer-oriented organizations, international organizations, local to global labor unions, labor-oriented groups, specific anti-sweatshop groups, no sweat businesses, business investors, and old & new international humanitarian networks and groups
• Figure 1 – 106 main groups, networks & organizations (CSR-oriented groups not included)
• All use “sweatshop” metaphor as their master frame
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Academic Consortium on International Trade Educating for Justice
Adbusters Ethical Consumer
Alberta Nike Campaign Ethicalshopper.net
American Center for International Labor Solidarity Ethical Threads
American Apparel Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI)
Asia Monitor Resource Center (AMRC) European Association of National Organisation of Textile Retailers
Asian Network for the Rights of Occupational Accident Victims European Fair Trade AssociationFair Labor Association
Attac Fairtrade Foundation
Behind The Label (UNITE) Fair Trade Center
Boycott Nike Fair Wear
Campaign for the Abolition of Sweatshops & Child Labor FLO-International (Fair trade Labelling Organization International)
Campaign for Labor Rights Gapsucks.org
Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Garment Worker Center
Catholic Institute for International Relations Get Ethical
Child Labor Coalition Global Alliance for Workers and Communities
China Labor Bulletin Global Exchange
Christian Aid Globalise Resistance
Clean Clothes Campaign Global Solidarity, Irish Congress of Trade Unions (UCTU)
Community Aid Abroad “Just Stop It” Global Solidarity Dialogue
Co-op America Global Unions
CorpWatch HomeNet
Development and Peace Hong Kong Christian Industrial Committee
Diamond Cut Jeans Human Rights for Workers: The Crusade Against Global Sweatshops
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Human Rights First
International Committee for Trade Union Rights
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
International Federation for Alternative Trade
International Labor Organization (ILO)
International Labor Rights Fund
Just Act: Youth ACTion for Global JUSTice
Just Do It! Boycott Nike!
Just Shoppers’ Guide to Sport Shoes
Labour Behind the Label
LINK Etc.
LINK-label
Maison Internationaa huis (MINTH)
Maquiladora Health & Safety Support Network
Maquila Solidarity Network (MSN)
Multinational Resource Center
National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice
National Labor Committee for Worker & Human Rights
National Mobilization Against Sweatshops (NMASS)
Nike Wages Campaign
Nike Watch (Oxfam, AUS)
North-South Institute
No Sweat. The UK Campaign Against Sweatshops
No Sweat Shop Labeling Campaign
Olympic Living Wage Project Starving for the Swoosh (2001)
Oxfam’s campaign “Make Trade Fair”, involved in Fair Play at the Olympics
Peace Through Interamerican Community Action (PICA)
People-Centered Development Forum (PCDF)
People’s Global Action (PGA)/
Play Fair at the Olympics
Press for Change
Responsible Shopper, Co-Op America
Resource Center of the Americas
SA 8000 (Social Accountability International)
Scholars Against Sweatshop Labor (SASL)
Smithsonian Sweatshop Exhibition
Stichting Onderzoek Multinationale Ondernemingen (SOMO, Centre for research on multinational corporations)
Students Against Sweatshops (SAS-C)Canada
Sweatshop Journal
Sweatshop Watch
SweatX, Union cut and sew shop
TCFU Austrialia
Thai Labor Campaign
Transnational Information Exchange- Asia (TIE-Asia)
Transnationale Organization
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Union Label and Service Trades (part of AFL-CIO)
Union Mall
Union Wear
Unite! Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees
United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS)
US/Labor Education in the Americas Project (US Leap)
Verite, independent, non-profit social auditing
Vietnam Labor Watch
Witness for Peace
Women in Informal Employment Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO)
Women Working Worldwide
Workers Rights Consortium (WRC)
World Development Movement
Worldwide Responsible Apparel Production
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Study of Key Anti-Sweatshop Movement Actors Study of Key Anti-Sweatshop Movement Actors
From old & new “membership-based” civil society groups & associationsFrom old & new “membership-based” civil society groups & associations
• Unions (UNITE, Gobal Unions) (UNITE, Gobal Unions)
• International Humanitarian (Oxfam, Global Exchange) (Oxfam, Global Exchange)
• Specific “no-sweat” groups (United Students Against Sweatshops, Clean (United Students Against Sweatshops, Clean Clothes Campaign)Clothes Campaign)
• Internet Spin Doctors (Adbusters) (Adbusters)
Sources: Interviews, documents and other materials from key actors, secondary sourcesSources: Interviews, documents and other materials from key actors, secondary sources
Different Envisioned Role for Consumers to Different Envisioned Role for Consumers to Play in Social Justice Responsibility-TakingPlay in Social Justice Responsibility-Taking
Work-still-in-progress
• Support group for other causes– unions: consumers are “broad, ideologically benign community” to mobilize “to
make the struggle for justice for workers more palatable to the public in an antilabor climate”
• Critical shopping mass- USAS & international humanitarian organizations: consumers can “use their purchasing power to tilt the balance, however slightly, in favour of the poor;” “Organizing communities of consumers can make sweatfree purchases dynamic and effective”
• Spearhead force hitting corporations where it hurts most– Clean Clothes Campaign: uses opportunities opened up by buyer-driven
corporate vulnerability: “Brand name companies compete intensely for consumer loyalty, and therefore consumers can influence how these companies operate.”
• Ontological agent of societal change– Adbusters Media Foundation: “the world can change if consumers change their
relationship to consumption”
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Envisioned Role for Consumers Affects Movement Actors’ Envisioned Role for Consumers Affects Movement Actors’ Campaign Strategies & TacticsCampaign Strategies & Tactics
Work-still-in-progress
Thematic campaigning penetrates underlying mechanisms leading to social justice responsibility vacuums; goal is change in predispositions, worldview, consumer outlook on role of consumption in their lives
Episodic campaigning focuses on particular issues, actors, puts responsibility claims on specific wrong-doers (Nike, Walmart, H & M…)
Preliminary Findings: (1) Support group, critical mass, spearhead force; more focus on episodic campaigning; (2) Most movement actors focus on episodic campaigning; event & actor focus (exceptions: Adbusters; UNITE’s Behind the Label Campaign)
(See Shanto Iyengar “Framing Responsibility for Political Issues” Annals, AAPSS 1999 for initial discussion on these frames)
Effectiveness of Episodal Campaigning and Anti-Sweatshop Effectiveness of Episodal Campaigning and Anti-Sweatshop ActivismActivism
Effectiveness Chain ModelSome Preliminary Results
Links Definition Effectiveness
Problem formulation Actors’ ability to create movement with common master frame
YES. 106 groups. Sweatshop metaphor. NO. Solutions
Problem recognition by others
Movement’s ability to convince relevant targets (consumers, civil society, politicians, corporations, media) about sweatshops as problem
YES. Sweatshop well-known problem frame; 2.7 million Google hits; newspaper reports, others’ acknowledgement
Agenda-setting Pushing corporations to put sweatshop on their policy agenda
YES. Corporations address it.
Policy-making Influence how corporations formulate their policies
YES after much struggle. CSR reporting, establishment of Codes of Conduct and improvements in them.
Policy implementation Are and how well are codes of conduct implemented in practice?
Mixed findings.
Problem-solving outcomes
Is anti-sweatshop improving garment workers’ lives?
Yes. In certain cases. No more small child labor.
How measure activist effects on market share and stock prices?How measure activist effects on market share and stock prices?
Builds on classical studies of power & influence, Keck & Sikknik’s work on transnational advocacy networks; mainstream political science analysis of public policy processes
Madison-Wisconsin Oct 20 2006
Force of Political ConsumerismForce of Political ConsumerismMicheletti’s ThoughtsMicheletti’s Thoughts
• Need to distinguish between light & thick political consumerism?– Thin version: better buying, supporting unions when
triggered episodically by mobilizing campaigns- Problems of price-sensitivity; fickliness; incongruencies between
saying and doing- Implication: harnessing consumer power is never-ending-task
– Thick/deep version: changing our consumption predispositions and deep values about role of consumption as social marker; long-term goal of ontological movement
- New “non-price-sensitive” relationship to consumption with staying power