IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cid/wpfacu/349.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Incentivising Pro-Labour Reforms

Author

Listed:
  • Alice Evans

    (Center for International Development at Harvard University)

Abstract

This paper shows that countries may reduce labour repression if they perceive this as conducive to export growth. This paper traces what happened before, in the presence of, and then following the withdrawal of international economic incentives for pro-labour reforms in Vietnam and Bangladesh. The Government of Vietnam announced it would allow independent trade unions, in order to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and increase market access. Similarly, the Government of Bangladesh rescinded restrictions on unions, following global condemnation of Rana Plaza and fear of buyers leaving en masse. Both governments reduced labour repression to promote export growth. With high-level authorisation, Vietnamese and Bangladeshi activists and reformists became less fearful, and mobilised for substantive change. However, these economic incentives were short-lived: after Trump’s election, the USA withdrew from TPP; buyers continued to source from Bangladesh, and squeezed prices (without requiring labour reforms). Both governments then amped up labour repression - notwithstanding private regulation, economic upgrading, industry growth, and mass strikes.

Suggested Citation

  • Alice Evans, 2019. "Incentivising Pro-Labour Reforms," CID Working Papers 349, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    • Handle: RePEc:cid:wpfacu:349
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://bsc.cid.harvard.edu/files/bsc/files/2019-03-cid-wp-349-incentivising-labor-reforms.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Khan, Mohd Raisul Islam. & Wichterich, Christa,, 2015. "Safety and labour conditions : the accord and the national tripartite plan of action for the garment industry of Bangladesh," ILO Working Papers 994888773402676, International Labour Organization.
    2. Greg Distelhorst & Richard M. Locke, 2018. "Does Compliance Pay? Social Standards and Firm‐Level Trade," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(3), pages 695-711, July.
    3. Raluca Dragusanu & Eduardo Montero & Nathan Nunn, 2022. "The Effects of Fair Trade Certification: Evidence from Coffee Producers in Costa Rica," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(4), pages 1743-1790.
    4. Andrews, Matt & Pritchett, Lant & Woolcock, Michael, 2017. "Building State Capability: Evidence, Analysis, Action," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198747482.
    5. repec:ilo:ilowps:488877 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Oya, Carlos & Schaefer, Florian & Skalidou, Dafni, 2018. "The effectiveness of agricultural certification in developing countries: A systematic review," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 282-312.
    7. Nathan,Dev & Tewari,Meenu & Sarkar,Sandip (ed.), 2016. "Labour in Global Value Chains in Asia," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107103740, September.
    8. Jimmy Donaghey & Juliane Reinecke, 2018. "When Industrial Democracy Meets Corporate Social Responsibility — A Comparison of the Bangladesh Accord and Alliance as Responses to the Rana Plaza Disaster," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 56(1), pages 14-42, March.
    9. Layna Mosley, 2017. "Workers’ rights in global value chains: possibilities for protection and for peril," New Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(2), pages 153-168, March.
    10. Jan Orbie & Lore Van den Putte & Deborah Martens, 2017. "The Impact of Labour Rights Commitments in EU Trade Agreements: The Case of Peru," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(4), pages 6-18.
    11. Leonardo Bursztyn & Alessandra L. González & David Yanagizawa-Drott, 2018. "Misperceived Social Norms: Female Labor Force Participation in Saudi Arabia," NBER Working Papers 24736, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Zhiyuan Wang, 2018. "Economic Competition, Policy Interdependence, and Labour Rights," New Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(6), pages 656-673, November.
    13. Eric Neumayer, 2005. "Do International Human Rights Treaties Improve Respect for Human Rights?," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 49(6), pages 925-953, December.
    14. Berliner, Daniel & Greenleaf, Anne & Lake, Milli & Noveck, Jennifer, 2015. "Building Capacity, Building Rights? State Capacity and Labor Rights in Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 127-139.
    15. Lucas Ronconi, 2012. "Globalization, Domestic Institutions, and Enforcement of Labor Law: Evidence from Latin America," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(1), pages 89-105, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sandra Polaski, 2022. "The strategy and politics of linking trade and labor standards: an overview of issues and approaches," Chapters, in: Handbook on Globalisation and Labour Standards, chapter 11, pages 203-225, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ronconi, Lucas & Zarazaga S.J., Rodrigo, 2015. "Labor Exclusion and the Erosion of Citizenship Responsibilities," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 453-461.
    2. Fangjin Ye, 2020. "The impact of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) on collective labor rights in developing countries," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 899-921, October.
    3. Matthew Amengual & Janice Fine, 2017. "Co‐enforcing Labor standards: the unique contributions of state and worker organizations in Argentina and the United States," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 11(2), pages 129-142, June.
    4. John S. Ahlquist & Layna Mosley, 2021. "Firm participation in voluntary regulatory initiatives: The Accord, Alliance, and US garment importers from Bangladesh," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 16(2), pages 317-343, April.
    5. Karla Rubio‐Jovel, 2023. "The voluntary sustainability standards and their contribution towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals: A systematic review on the coffee sector," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(6), pages 1013-1052, August.
    6. Anna Fabry & Monica Schuster & Miet Maertens, 2024. "Decent and equal work in agri‐food systems: Evidence from Peru," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 46(2), pages 803-830, June.
    7. Laura Boudreau & Julia Cajal-Grossi & Rocco Macchiavello, 2023. "Global Value Chains in Developing Countries: A Relational Perspective from Coffee and Garments," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 37(3), pages 59-86, Summer.
    8. Anja Garbely & Elias Steiner, 2023. "Understanding compliance with voluntary sustainability standards: a machine learning approach," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(10), pages 11209-11239, October.
    9. Mia Mahmudur RAHIM & Sk Samidul ISLAM, 2020. "Freedom of association in the Bangladeshi garment industry: A policy schizophrenia in labour regulation," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 159(3), pages 423-446, September.
    10. Jodi L. Short, 2021. "The politics of regulatory enforcement and compliance: Theorizing and operationalizing political influences," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(3), pages 653-685, July.
    11. Kabeer, Naila & Huq, Lopita & Sulaiman, Munshi, 2020. "Paradigm shift or business as usual? Workers' views on multi-stakeholder initiatives in Bangladesh," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 102938, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    12. Raess, Damian & Wagner, Patrick, 2022. "South to north investment linkages and decent work in Brazil," Papers 1382, World Trade Institute.
    13. Shahidur Rahman & Kazi Mahmudur Rahman, 2020. "Multi‐actor Initiatives after Rana Plaza: Factory Managers’ Views," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 51(5), pages 1331-1359, September.
    14. Dursun Peksen & Robert G. Blanton, 2017. "The impact of ILO conventions on worker rights: Are empty promises worse than no promises?," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 12(1), pages 75-94, March.
    15. Dafe, Florence & Upadhyaya, Radha & Sommer, Christoph, 2021. "Employing capital: Patient capital and labour relations in Kenya's manufacturing sector," IDOS Discussion Papers 18/2021, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).
    16. Mark ANNER, 2022. "Power relations in global supply chains and the unequal distribution of costs during crises: Abandoning garment suppliers and workers during the COVID‐19 pandemic," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 161(1), pages 59-82, March.
    17. Messerschmidt, Luca & Janz, Nicole, 2023. "Unravelling the ‘race to the bottom’ argument: Foreign direct investment and different types of labour rights," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    18. Erin Leitheiser, 2021. "How domestic contexts shape international private governance: The case of the European Accord and American Alliance in Bangladesh," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(4), pages 1286-1303, October.
    19. Luca Messerschmidt & Nicole Janz, 2020. "Unravelling the 'race to the bottom' argument: How does FDI affect different types of labour rights?," Munich Papers in Political Economy 05, Munich School of Politics and Public Policy and the School of Management at the Technical University of Munich.
    20. Anne TREBILCOCK, 2020. "The Rana Plaza disaster seven years on: Transnational experiments and perhaps a new treaty?," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 159(4), pages 545-568, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Labor Markets;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cid:wpfacu:349. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chuck McKenney (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ciharus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.