Bonacich & Appelbaum's "Behind the Label"

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses the wide array of factors presented in the book "Behind the Label" that contributes to worker mistreatment in the manufacture of clothing. The paper reviews the multiple causes of the "new-age" sweatshop: Globalization of the world's economy, governmental backing of this movement with treaties such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), decline of unionization in the United States, the manufacturer's desire to shift the risks of the fashion industry by contracting out their labor and the disproportionate power of the extremely large clothing retailers. The paper author feels that there might be some improvement since the publication of this book.

From the Paper:

"One area of attack extensively discussed in the reading is the enforcement of labor and immigration law by state and federal agencies. The most effective of these strategies, the Concentrated Enforcement Program (CEP) by the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) of the state of California, was notable for the number of staff involved and its concentration upon the garment industry. But as the political winds shifted, funding for this program was lost, staff was cut and the enforcement of the exact same laws became ineffective because of backlog of cases."

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