Ruth Pearson

New Hope or False Dawn?: Voluntary Codes of Conduct, Labour Regulation and Social Policy in a Globalizing World

This article maps the complex and fast-changing terrain of voluntary corporate codes of conduct, self-regulatory measures increasingly adopted by firms as a response to concerns about working conditions in global production chains. It considers their origins, their potentials and weaknesses, and finally their implications for the restructuring of social policy in a globalizing world. Despite there being considerably more rhetoric about codes than good practice, the processes through which codes have been developed has brought positive impacts in terms of highlighting the needs and voices of hitherto excluded groups of workers (women export workers, homeworkers, casual workers) in social policy and labour regulation debates.

Moving the goalposts: gender and globalisation in the twenty-first century

Development institutions saw their work challenged by those working on gender and development in the last third of the twentieth century. Ruth Pearson argues that the new century will witness an assertion of the global relevance of gender in development, and see gender analysis applied in new contexts, and to men as well as women.

transcending the impact of the financial crisis in the United Kingdom: towards plan F—a feminist economic strategy

This paper sets out a framework for understanding the impacts of the financial crisis and its aftermath that is based on the idea of three interacting spheres: finance, production and reproduction. All of these spheres are gendered and globalised. The gendered impact of the current crisis is discussed in terms of the impact on unemployment, employment protection and security, public sector services, social security benefits, pensions, and the real value of wages and living standards. Drawing on the analysis of the UK Women’s Budget Group, the paper demonstrates that the biggest falls in disposable income as the result of austerity policies by the Conservative-led government since 2010 have been borne by the most vulnerable women—lone mothers, single women pensioners and single women without children. Working-age couples without children have been least affected. The paper then goes on to discuss what an alternative economic strategy, based on feminist political economy, might look like. It utilises the notion of the ‘reproductive bargain’, first developed to understand the transition in Cuba in the 1990s. It sets out a possible feminist economic strategy that insists on the incorporation of reproductive and care work into the analysis of alternative economic policies and links employment, wages and social security payments to public provisioning of trans-generational reproductive services. It suggests feasible strategies to finance the proposed Plan F—a feminist economic strategy.

Organising home‐based workers in the global economy: an action‐research approach

This article describes an action‐research project which has the multiple objectives of mapping the range of home‐based work in different countries, investigating the ways in which such work is embodied in local or international production chains, and developing a methodology which will facilitate the establishment of sustainable organisations of home‐based workers. The article focuses mainly on Latin America and Eastern Europe, though the project is also active in India and has begun to explore the possibilities of working in China.

Thailand's hidden workforce : Burmese migrant women factory workers

* 1. Thailands hidden workforce: Burmese women factory workers * 2. Thailands industrialisation and labour migration policies * 3. Burmese women migrant workers in Thailands export industries * 4. Migrant women in Thailands factories: working conditions, struggles and experiences * 5. Burmese migrant women and families in Thailand: reproduction, children and care * 6. After the crisis: new struggles and possibilities * 7. Burmese migrant workers between two worlds * Appendices * Notes * References

Intelligent Design?: A Gender-Sensitive Interrogation of Religion and Development

Development policy, in terms of international development cooperation, as well as the operations of multilateral, bilateral and mainstream non-governmental development agencies, has tended to focus on the material and political outcomes of development with little reference to the religious structures and belief systems which shape the life worlds in which the majority of the inhabitants of poor countries live. This bias should not be interpreted to deny, as noted elsewhere in this book, that many individuals and organizations have engaged in development work in line with specific commitments from different religious traditions (Alkire 2006). Faith-based organizations (FBOs), particularly in the poor countries of the global South, have increasingly been working in partnership with donor agencies and international organizations, in response, for instance, to calls for greater local accountability and participation of community-based organizations in the development process. Nor can there be any dispute about the fact that faith traditions continue to exert a strong influence upon the lives of many people in developing countries; or indeed that the desired outcome of development practice and policies, in terms of opportunities and services for poor people to enhance their living standards and their overall well-being, coincides with the objectives of most religious traditions.

Striking similarities: representing South Asian women's industrial action in Britain

The focus of this article is two significant episodes in British labour politics. The first is the Grunwick strike between 1976 and 1978; the second a dispute at Gate Gourmet that began in 2005. In both disputes, women of South Asian origin were the key actors and their legacy has been constructed through striking imagery as one in which against the odds exotic or passive Others became unexpected heroines of industrial struggle. These representations retained their power, despite significant social, economic and political changes in ‘post-Fordist’ Britain, including in the political rights of strikers, and in the participation and position of both women and minority workers in the labour force. Drawing on interviews with South Asian women involved in each dispute, this article challenges these representations and their significance in accounts of the action, documenting the complex, multiple motives of South Asian women involved in labour politics in the UK.

Striking lives: Multiple narratives of South Asian women's employment, identity and protest in the UK

This article draws on the narratives of the two groups of South Asian women (SAW) in the UK who took part in industrial disputes some 30 years apart, in order to examine the ways in which they have negotiated their way through their classed, racialized and gendered inclusion in the labour market. The comparison of the Grunwick and the Gate Gourmet disputes and the employment histories of the actors involved in these disputes enables us to explore the centrality of waged work to the social construction of a diasporic identity and the complexity of SAW’s identities in the UK. This article utilizes an intersectional framework, based on life history interviews, to reinterpret historical events by examining women’s experiences of industrial action in the context of their class backgrounds and changing class positions, and particular histories of migration and settlement.

Gender and the economic crisis

Introduction (Ruth Pearson, School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds and Caroline Sweetman, Editor, Gender & Development) The global economic crisis, its gender and ethnic implications, and policy responses (Stephanie Seguino, Department of Economics, University of Vermont) Gender and the global economic crisis in developing countries: a framework for analysis (Diane Elson, Department of Sociology, University of Essex) Critical times: gendered implications of the economic crisis for migrant workers from Burma/Myanmar in Thailand (Jackie Pollock and Soe Lin Aung, MAP Foundation) Feminised recession: impact of the global financial crisis on women garment workers in the Philippines (Kristina Gaerlan, Marion Cabrera, Patricia Samia, and Ed L. Santoalla, Oxfam) Securing the fruits of their labours: the effect of the crisis on women farm workers in Perus Ica valley (Reineira Arguello, Womankind Worldwide) Cheap and disposable? The impact of the global economic crisis on the migration of Ethiopian women domestic workers to the Gulf (Bina Fernandez, School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds) The effects of the global economic crisis on women in the informal economy: research findings from WIEGO and the Inclusive Cities partners (Zoe Elena Horn, WIEGO - Women in Informal Employment: Globalising and Organising) How the global economic crisis reaches marginalised workers: the case of street traders in Johannesburg, South Africa (Jennifer Cohen, Department of Economics, University of Massachusetts) Crisis, care and childhood: the impact of economic crisis on care work in poor households in the developing world (Jessica Espey, Save the Children, and Caroline Harper and Nicola Jones, Overseas Development Institute) Resources (Liz Cooke, Oxfam) Index

Cross-border childcare strategies of Burmese migrant workers in Thailand

In discussing the challenges of cross-border childcare faced by migrant workers, most research focuses on ‘distance mothering’, assuming that children remain in the place of origin. In contrast, this article focuses on childcare at the place of destination in the context of migrant Burmese factory workers in Thailand. Since many of these workers are ‘undocumented’, they have few rights in their place of destination. This is especially problematic in the areas of reproductive health and childcare rights. Despite such obstacles, Burmese migrant workers strive to manage their childcare responsibilities by mobilizing whatever resources are available, as well as seeking to maximize the possibilities of citizenship and education rights for their children. According to our research, the specific strategies deployed vary according to the particular location in Thailand in which migrants are working. This study analyzes three locations in Thailand – one in the central Thailand, and the other two at the borderlands between Burma and Thailand. Through a feminist analysis of the ‘care diamond’, the study demonstrates how Burmese women migrant workers utilize the different migrant labor governance systems and porous international border as resources and opportunities to develop complex and changing strategies to juggle their childcare arrangements.