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Paper short abstract:

This conceptual paper explores how bottom-up considerations could improve companies' social footprint in Ready-Made-Garment industry in the global South. We take a closer look at the ways in which the local workers' perspectives and needs could be given more weight when developing CR practices.

Paper long abstract:

Increasingly, companies located in affluent countries source their products from the global South due to lower production costs. Local governments often support this interest as foreign companies provide employment and influx of investment in various ways. The garment industry is one of the industries which has been shifting production to low-cost countries en masse.

However, there are various systemic problems related to the garment industry, such as salaries below a living wage and exploitation of various forms is commonplace. Freedom of association often exists more in the letter than implementation of law and also in general there is little in the way of enforced legal or societal structures to address adversities in working conditions.

Because of this, we take a closer look at the ways in which the companies' operations affect the countries and populations: even when they adhere to their CR-guidelines, they may simultaneously create environments and situations in which the local factory workers are adversely impacted.

It seems that currently the bottom-up view carries little weight when analyzing and developing CR-perspectives. This is problematic, as in the global market place the mechanisms are often developed in locations, which are geographically and culturally removed from the loci of implementation, and therefore connection between CR-protocols and their impact can be hard to establish. While some of the CR-practices deliver benefits to the workers, what is needed are mechanisms that empower the workers to become active agents in the negotiations regarding working conditions rather than mere beneficiaries of these systems.