scholarly journals Wages: An Overlooked Dimension of Business and Human Rights in Global Supply Chains

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Genevieve LEBARON
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
Poverty Line ◽  
Global Supply Chains ◽  
Business And Human Rights ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Living Wages ◽  
Human Rights Abuse ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Wages – the monetary payments that workers receive from employers in exchange for their labour – are widely overlooked in academic and policy debates about human rights and business in global supply chains. They shouldn’t be. Just as living wages can insulate workers from human rights abuse and labour exploitation, wages that hover around or below the poverty line, compounded by illegal practices like wage theft and delayed payment, leave workers vulnerable to severe labour exploitation and human rights abuse. This article draws on data from a study of global tea and cocoa supply chains to explore the impact of wages on one of the most severe human rights abuses experienced in global supply chains, forced labour. Demonstrating that low-wage workers experience high vulnerability to forced labour in global supply chains, it argues that the role of wages in shaping or protecting workers from exploitation needs to be taken far more seriously by scholars and policymakers. When wages are ignored, so too is a crucial tool to protect human rights and heighten business accountability in global supply chains.

scholarly journals Collective Responsibility and the Limits of Disclosure in Regulating Global Supply Chains

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 143-176 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Villiers
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
International Law ◽  
International Business ◽  
Collective Responsibility ◽  
Company Law ◽  
Global Supply Chains ◽  
Human Rights Abuses ◽  
Business And Human Rights ◽  
Labour Exploitation

Global supply chains present major challenges for company law and corporate governance, nationally and internationally. Their increasing relevance in international business has led to a serious regulatory gap, especially in light of corporate involvement in human rights abuses, labour exploitation and environmental degradation. Alongside a number of international norms such as those expressed in the UN’s Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, there has been a proliferation in domestic and international law of disclosure provisions, mandating greater transparency by companies in response to the problems caused by global supply chains. In this paper, however, it is argued that disclosure is not a sufficient answer to such problems. It is suggested that we should approach the problems with a different conceptualisation of supply chain structures. If we regard them as ‘global poverty chains’, such a perspective brings about a moral response — a recognition that we have a collective responsibility to eradicate the poverty and suffering caused by the chains. This response necessitates that transparency requirements be altered and accompanied by a regulatory framework that empowers victims of poverty to be able to escape it.

Modern Slavery in Global Supply Chains: Can National Action Plans on Business and Human Rights Close the Governance Gap?

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (02) ◽  
pp. 239-263 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Bulan HAMPTON
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
The United States ◽  
Global Supply Chains ◽  
Action Plans ◽  
Early Assessment ◽  
Polycentric Governance ◽  
Study Approach ◽  
Business And Human Rights ◽  
Modern Slavery

AbstractFollowing the 2011 endorsement of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs), states have begun to implement National Action Plans (NAPs) to operationalize the UNGPs. Using a case study approach and applying a conceptual framework for polycentric governance, this article aims to provide an early assessment of the effectiveness of NAPs adopted by the United Kingdom and the United States to combat one of the worst human rights abuses in global supply chains: modern slavery. This study demonstrates that both NAPs contain elements addressing the governance gaps surrounding modern slavery, such as enacting new laws, adapting existing regulations, strengthening multi-stakeholder mechanisms for business accountability, and promoting innovation. However, it is argued that the NAPs themselves were not the catalysts for the majority of these measures. This article concludes that states should optimize the five characteristics of polycentric governance outlined in this study to improve the relevance and effectiveness of NAPs as drivers of change.

Business and human rights: The challenge of putting principles into practice and regulating global supply chains

2017 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justine Nolan
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Global Supply Chains ◽  
Due Diligence ◽  
Business And Human Rights

This article examines a company’s responsibility to respect human rights, focusing in particular on corporate global supply chains. While global supply chains have long been associated with a range of human rights violations, a number of recent legislative initiatives both in Australia and elsewhere are applying traditional corporate concepts – such as due diligence and reporting – in a human rights framework, to ensure companies respect human rights wherever they operate.

scholarly journals Forced labour in supply chains: Rolling back the debate on gender, migration and sexual commerce

2021 ◽  
pp. 135050682110207
Author(s):  
Rutvica Andrijasevic
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Supply Chains ◽  
Sex Work ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
The Other ◽  
Law And Policy ◽  
Labour Exploitation ◽  
Separate Treatment ◽  
Forced Labour ◽  
Sexual Commerce

This article makes a conceptual contribution to the broader literature on unfree labour by challenging the separate treatment of sexual and industrial labour exploitation both by researchers and in law and policy. This article argues that the prevailing focus of the supply chain literature on industrial labour has inadvertently posited sexual labour as the ‘other’ of industrial labour thus obfuscating how the legal blurring of boundaries between industrial and service labour is engendering new modalities of the erosion of workers’ rights that are increasingly resembling those typical of sex work. This article advances the debate on unfree labour both conceptually and empirically. Conceptually, it highlights the relevance of social reproduction in understanding forms of labour unfreedom. Empirically, it demonstrates the similarities in forms of control and exploitation between sex work and industrial work by illustrating how debt and housing operate in both settings.

scholarly journals The Ineffectiveness of CSR: Understanding Garment Company Commitments to Living Wages in Global Supply Chains

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Genevieve LeBaron ◽  
Remi Edwards ◽  
Tom Hunt ◽  
Charline Sempéré ◽  
Penelope Kyritsis
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chains ◽  
Global Supply Chains ◽  
Living Wages
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