Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T03:07:05.172Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

3 - Does Private Compliance Improve Labor Standards?

Lessons from Nike

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2013

Richard M. Locke
Affiliation:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Get access

Summary

What role can corporate codes of conduct and private compliance programs play in improving working conditions in global supply chains? How does this system of private voluntary regulation relate to other strategies and regulatory approaches aimed at enforcing labor standards? This chapter builds on the more general overview presented in Chapter 2 and addresses these questions through a detailed case study of Nike, the world's largest athletic footwear and apparel company. Given the central and highly controversial place Nike occupies in debates over globalization and labor standards, it serves in many ways as a “crucial case” through which to explore the effect of private compliance initiatives on labor standards in global supply chains. Using a unique data set based on factory audits of working conditions in more than 900 of Nike's suppliers located across fifty countries, plus field research at Nike suppliers in China, Turkey, Mexico, and the United States, this chapter illustrates both the potential and limitations of this model of private voluntary regulation.

The core empirical analysis presented in this chapter addresses three basic questions. First, how bad (or good) are working conditions at Nike's various suppliers? Second, what determines variation in working conditions among these suppliers? (In other words, what accounts for the greatly differing working conditions across factories producing more or less the same products for the same brand?) We need to understand the baseline working conditions (and the determinants of these conditions) at these factories to assess whether private compliance initiatives have any effect on improvements in labor standards. And third, are working conditions improving over time at these factories, and if so, what role does private compliance play in these improvements? The case study of Nike will shed light on the limits of traditional private compliance programs and also elucidate how under certain conditions – long-term relationships, frequent interactions, and strategic partnerships between global buyers like Nike and their suppliers – these private initiatives can promote significant improvements in labor standards.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Promise and Limits of Private Power
Promoting Labor Standards in a Global Economy
, pp. 46 - 77
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Levy, Brian, “Transaction Costs, the Size of Firms and Industrial Policy: Lessons from a Comparative Case Study of the Footwear Industry in Korea and Taiwan,” Journal of Development Economics (November 1991): 151–78Google Scholar
Kagan, Robert and Scholz, John, “The Criminology of the Corporation and Regulatory Enforcement Strategies,” in Hawkins, Keith and Thomas, John M. (Eds.), Enforcing Regulation (Boston: Kluwer-Nijhoff Publishing, 1984)Google Scholar
Wilson, James Q., Varieties of Police Behavior: The Management of Law and Order in Eight Communities (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1968)Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×