Documents India 185 results

"As many have warned, the expansionism or ‘exploitation creep' (Chuang, 2014) that characterizes discourses around ‘modern slavery' has only succeeded in clouding the issue, both legally and politically, rather than rendering it more visible (see also Miers, 2003; O'Connell-Davidson, 2015; Quirk, 2018). As Chuang (2014: 611) explains, this ‘exploitation creep' has entailed the consideration of an ever-broadening range of practices as falling under the ‘modern slavery' umbrella term. Chuang centres her attention on two related paradigmatic shifts that have allowed this to happen: the reframing of all forced labour as trafficking and the labelling of trafficking as, by definition, slavery (2014: 611). ‘Modern slavery' has therefore become a catch-all and highly malleable term, which can include practices as disparate as selling sexual services online, generational bonded labour in India, low-level drug distribution in the UK, and forced marriage.
This ‘exploitation creep' has produced two broad policy responses. On the one hand, we have seen the emergence of a hegemonic position referred to in the literature as ‘modern slavery abolitionism' (Chuang, 2014; O'Connell-Davidson, 2015). This locates the source of these ostensibly exploitative labour practices in deviant/criminal entities (organized crime groups and/or rogue multinational corporations). Under the abolitionism paradigm, preventative policies have included the banning or restriction of migration for ‘vulnerable' populations, often women from the Global South (Kempadoo and Doezema, 1998; Doezema, 2002; Kapur, 2005; Andrijasevic, 2007; Agustín, 2007); the ‘rescue, protection and rehabilitation' of individual victims identified in contexts of destination; and the prosecution of perpetrators. Abolitionism invests in moral crusades along an axis of evil, presenting ‘modern slavery' as an exceptional problem to be driven-out (Bunting and Quirk, 2014) and characterized by methodological individualism (LeBaron and Ayers, 2013: 874). Conceptualizing ‘modern slavery' as the result of evil criminals or rogue companies, abolitionist policies thus invisibilize the very conditions in which such exploitative and unfree relations thrive. This unnuanced, ‘one-size-fits-all' approach fails to consider historically determined systems and relations of power that underpin exploitative and unfree labour."

This work is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

"This chapter deals with child labour in value chains, whether global value chains (GVCs) or domestic value chains (DVCs). This chapter goes beyond the usual question of the regulation of child labour in value chains to consider the conditions necessary for the elimination of child labour. This chapter is the product of many years of research on this topic by the two authors, sometimes jointly and at times along with other researchers. The empirical base of the analysis in this chapter comprises the various studies carried out by the authors, jointly or separately, of child labour in the garment GVCs in Delhi (Bhaskaran et al., 2010); in the global and DVCs of handicrafts in Jaipur, matches in Sivakasi, stone quarries in Rajasthan, brick kilns in Malda, West Bengal, knitwear and fireworks in Tirupur, Tamil Nadu (Nathan and George, 2012); cotton production in Punjab and Haryana (IHD and Save the Children, 2014); and of gems, lac bangles, and embroidered garments in Jaipur (The Freedom Fund, 2018). One of the authors (Varsha Joshi) led the Child Helpline, which is the key agency in the identification and rescue of child labour in Jaipur, so we were able to use the insights gathered in the course of her work in rescuing child labourers. While the data leading to the chapter's analysis are mainly from Indian cases, the analysis itself is applicable to other, developing countries in the Global South where child labour still exists in serious dimensions. The chapter's policy prescription of combining higher adult earnings at the base of the labour force pyramid with compulsory and quality education is relevant to all developing countries of the Global South.
After this introduction, the next section deals with types of child labour and the implications for different types of interventions. This is followed by a summary of the different types of interventions of both public and private regulation that have been undertaken to eliminate child labour in value chains, both global and domestic. The elimination of child labour involves."

This work is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

"Workers most exposed to economic risk around the world are commonly not covered by labour law either because laws were designed with people with a standard, continuous employer in mind or because of poor enforcement. According to the International Labour Organization's estimates, informal work, as a percentage of non-agricultural employment, continues to account for over 50% of all employment in half of the countries with comparable data across the globe. In onethird of countries, it involves over 65% of workers.1 There are exciting local and national experiments in new forms of labour regulation occurring in various countries that aim to extend labour regulation to non-standard workers, ensuring that they receive living minimum wages. This article compares four experiments in regulating work, including innovations in the regulation of work for head load (Mathadi) workers in India, immigrant industrial clothing outworkers in Australia, garment workers in Cambodia, and workers in Bulgaria who rely on a range of homebased activities to survive. The schemes have enjoyed varying success, providing lessons about what does and does not work in different contexts. "

"Multinationals from Brazil, Russia, India and China, known as the BRIC countries, are a new and powerful force in global competition and are challenging the incumbency of much older global companies from the developed world. Emerging market multinational enterprises (EMNEs) now account for a quarter of foreign investment in the world, are a prolific source of innovation and make almost one in three cross-border acquisitions globally. Despite this, traditional theories of international business do not provide a satisfactory explanation of their behaviour or performance. The authors of this book shine new light on the rise of the EMNEs and how they have built a competitive advantage through innovation, novel configurations of their international value chains and the acquisition of companies overseas. Any manager, policy maker or researcher who wishes to understand the emergence of this new breed of multinational will find this book an invaluable resource."