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Global Labor Justice and the Limits of Economic Analysis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2015

Joshua Preiss
Joshua Preiss*
Affiliation:
Minnesota State University
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Abstract:

This article considers the economic case for so-called sweatshop wages and working conditions. My goal is not to defend or reject the economic case for sweatshops. Instead, proceeding from a broadly pluralist understanding of value, I make and defend a number of claims concerning the ethical relevance of economic analysis for values that different agents utilize to evaluate sweatshops. My arguments give special attention to a series of recent articles by Benjamin Powell and Matt Zwolinski, which represent the latest and best defense of the economic case for sweatshops. In the process, I challenge Zwolinski’s “non-worseness claim” (NWC), and the idea that opposition to sweatshop wages and working conditions fails to respect that the autonomy of would-be sweatshop workers. Ultimately, I conclude that even if the economic case for sweatshops rests on a solid empirical foundation, agents possess good reason to advocate for better wages and working conditions for sweatshop workers, and to prefer less exploitative or coercive relationships. Sweatshop labor undermines a compelling vision of free markets, according to both Kantian and republican conceptions of freedom, and the relationships formed by those who participate in such markets.

Keywords

sweatshopsexploitationbackground justicesupply chain ethicslabor rights
Type
Articles
Information
Business Ethics Quarterly , Volume 24 , Issue 1 , January 2014 , pp. 55 - 83
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Business Ethics 2014

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