Tim Bartley

Shaming the Corporation The Social Production of Targets and the Anti-Sweatshop Movement

As social movements co-evolve with changes in states and markets, it is crucial to examine how they make particular kinds of actors into focal points for the expression of grievances and the demand for rights. But researchers often bracket the question of why some kinds of organizations are more likely than others to become targets of social movement pressure. We theorize the “social production of targets” by social movements, rejecting a simple “reflection” model to focus on configurations of power and vulnerability that shape repertoires of contention. Empirically, we extend structural accounts of global commodity chains and cultural accounts of markets to analyze the production of targets in the case of the anti-sweatshop movement of the 1990s. Using a longitudinal, firm-level dataset and unique data on anti-sweatshop activism, we identify factors that attracted social movement pressure to particular companies. Firms’ power and positions strongly shaped their likelihood of becoming targets of anti-sweatshop activism. But the likelihood of being a target also depended on the cultural organization of markets, which made some firms more “shamable” than others. Contrary to suggestions of an anti-globalization backlash, globalization on its own, and related predictions about protectionism, cannot explain the pattern of activism.

Certification as a Mode of Social Regulation

Certification of products and companies has long been used as a signal of quality, but its transformation into a mode of social regulation is more recent. Over the past two decades, a range of initiatives has emerged to certify conditions in global supply chains, typically addressing environmental sustainability, labor conditions, human rights, or some combination of these. This includes early and influential programs like organic, Fair Trade, and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification, a second wave of programs like the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) and Social Accountability International (SAI), and a seemingly endless array of newly emerging initiatives, focused on shrimp farming, cocoa production, palm oil, and many others. Such initiatives are typically privately organized and supported by coalitions of NGOs, firms, and foundations, though they are also profoundly shaped by governments. Industry associations have also developed their own certification initiatives, such as the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) and Worldwide Responsible Apparel Production (WRAP) systems, or have added certification to prior initiatives, like Responsible Care in the chemical industry. The proliferation of certification and labeling initiatives has led some observers to worry about confusion among consumers and ―certification fatigue‖ among companies. Yet the growth of certification also raises important questions for scholars of regulation 2 and transnational governance. Why has this form emerged across so many industries? Under what conditions can voluntary, privately operated certification initiatives gain governing authority? Does the rise of certification complement or ―crowd out‖ other forms of regulation? This chapter sheds light on these questions by discussing the character, emergence, evolution, and impacts of certification as a way of addressing the environmental or social conditions of production. It begins with a discussion of certification as a regulatory form, considering its linkages to other modes of ―regulation by information,‖ market-based tools, and private governance. It then turns to questions about certifications emergence and evolution. Finally, the chapter considers certifications impacts ―on the ground,‖ showing that the relevant mechanisms of influence are varied in type but often limited in consequence. In general, this chapter suggests that certification systems are more intertwined with states and less straightforward in their effects than many previous discussions imply. Certification as a regulatory form While companies may make a variety of claims about environmental or social responsibility, the most credible way to do so is through third party systems that set standards, require external monitoring, and certify compliance. Most commonly, this occurs through …

Raising the floor: New directions in public and private enforcement of labor standards in the United States

Low-wage work in the US and many other places continues to be characterized by precarious and dangerous conditions, vulnerable immigrant workforces, and problems of misclassification and wage theft. Several recent initiatives are seeking to demonstrate that conditions can be greatly improved even when governments lack the capacity to broadly enforce the law on the books. In co-enforcement approaches, for instance, municipal governments are enlisting worker and community organizations to improve enforcement of wage and hour laws. Similarly, some private regulatory initiatives are taking ‘worker-driven’ approaches that favor enforcement by locally trusted organizations rather than unreliable ‘checklist auditing’. In this article, we examine one exemplary case of each approach in the US – namely, the Seattle Office of Labor Standards and the Fair Food Program in Florida. Comparing these initiatives reveals a convergence on civil society linkages, locally grounded monitoring capacities, and enforceable penalties. The cases differ in their bases of power and the expected role of the state, though the latter difference is perhaps not as stark as it initially seems. The comparison also suggests some challenges and opportunities for extending these models into new settings.