Pitt and the Worker Rights Consortium: An Argument for Affiliation Pitt #NoSweat Coalition Against Sweatshop Labor Americans for Informed Democracy, Pitt February 2013 Corresponding author: M. Wooley,
[email protected] Contents Executive Summary 1 1. Introduction 4 2. The Apparel Industry, the Anti-Sweatshop Movement, and Labor Standards: An Overview 5 2.1. Some Structural Features of the Apparel Industry 5 2.2. The Anti-Sweatshop Movement and its Goals 6 2.3. Critiques and Evidence of the Efficacy and Goals of the Anti-Sweatshop Movement 7 2.3.1. Ethical and Macroeconomic Considerations 7 2.3.2. Microeconomic Considerations 8 3. The Fair Labor Association and Worker Rights Consortium: A Comparison 10 3.1. Organizational Features 11 3.2. Codes of Conduct 12 3.3. Monitoring, Remediation, and Reporting Practices 15 4. The FLA and WRC: Evidence and Critiques 19 4.1. Analogies and Models for Labor Rights Monitoring 19 4.2. The Development of FLA Codes and Policies 21 4.3. The FLA: Recent Evidence of Monitoring Effectiveness 23 4.3.1. External Monitors 23 4.3.2. Internal Monitors 24 4.3.3. FLA Investigations 26 4.4. The WRC, Universities, and Labor Standards 30 5. Conclusion: Labor Standards and Pitt 33 References 35 Notes 37 Executive Summary It is widely acknowledged that workers in the apparel industry—one of the largest employers in the world—often labor under conditions that are unsafe, illegal, and abusive. While many people and groups would like to change this state of affairs, only a few institutions have the buying power and influence to do so.