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Contested Compliance Regimes in Global Production Networks: Insights from the Bangladesh Garment Industry
This article reports the findings of a field study on the emergence of collective agreements led by global brands enacting compliance measures to improve safety and working conditions in the Bangladesh garment industry. We explore how key actors in the Bangladesh garment sector who constitute the local production system of the global supply chain experienced the implementation of global agreements on factory safety. We argue that global safety compliance measures through multi-stakeholder initiatives provide legitimacy to multinational corporations and their global brands but do little to address the structural problems arising from exploitative pricing and procurement practices, which are the key reasons for deplorable working conditions in garment factories. Our findings indicate that neoliberal development policies of the state, where local economies are incorporated into global production networks, resulted in differential treatment and regulation of specific populations that comprise garment factory workers. The reconfiguration of state power to meet the demands of global supply chains also involved use of state violence to suppress dissent while undermining labour rights and working conditions. Our article contributes to the politicization of multinational corporations in global production chains by showing how contestations between workers, factory owners, the state, trade unions and multinational corporations create new private forms of governance and new regimes of compliance in the industr
Development or dispossession? An interpretation of global integration of public sector jute mills in Bangladesh
Purpose â This paper aims to discuss the discourse of globalisation and its implications in the case of state-owned jute mills (SOJMs) in the post-colonial state of Bangladesh. Design/methodology/approach â The authors draw upon a critical debate on the concept of globalisation and critical political economy to revisit the countryâs historical, political, social and cultural construction to discuss conditions of its conformity within the global order. Additionally, the perspective of subaltern studies underpins discussion of the context of the post-colonial state. Findings â A schematic analysis of the context surfaces issues that underpin the process of âtruth productionâ and that have contributed to global integration of the Bangladesh economy. We consider how this discourse benefits some people, while over time, the majority are dislocated, excluded and deprived. Hence, this discourse denotes a territorial power of globalism that leads us to conceptualise Bangladesh as a neo-colonial state. Originality/value â Through a case study of SOJMs, this paper contributes to discussion on the essence and implications of the globalisation discourse and on how its methods and techniques reinforce hegemony in the name of development and sustainability in the forms of liberalisation, democratisation and good governance in a state like Bangladesh
Economic inequality of the badli workers of Bangladesh: Contested entitlements and a âperpetually temporaryâ life-world
This article discusses the experience of economic inequality of badli workers in the state-owned jute mills of the postcolonial state of Bangladesh, and how this inequality is constituted and perpetuated. Nominally appointed to fill posts during the temporary absence of permanent workers, the reality of badli workersâ employment is very different. They define themselves as âa different category of workersâ, with limited economic entitlements. We undertake content analysis of the badli workersâ narratives to identify elements that they themselves consider constitute these economic entitlements. We consider their perceptions of discrimination and exclusion and explain how, in response to these feelings, they construct their survival strategy. From this, through the writings of Armatya Sen, we discuss the badli workersâ contextual experience and understanding of economic inequality in relation to extant theoretical understandings, seeking to contribute to the field and to empirical studies in the subaltern context