Workers in Sri Lanka's Export Garment Industry a Di
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles DETERMINING THE VALUE OF LABOR POWER: Workers in Sri Lanka’s Export Garment Industry A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology by Devaka Ramesh Gunawardena 2018 © Copyright by Devaka Ramesh Gunawardena 2018 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION DETERMINING THE VALUE OF LABOR POWER: Workers in Sri Lanka’s Export Garment Industry by Devaka Ramesh Gunawardena Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology University of California, Los Angeles, 2018 Professor Akhil Gupta, Chair This dissertation is about the reconfiguration of the export garment industry from the perspective of its nearly 300,000 workers in Sri Lanka. Since 1977, Sri Lanka’s economy has liberalized, which involves the ongoing privatization of State Owned Enterprises (SOEs), cuts to universal welfare, and an emphasis on attracting foreign investment. The state has created thirteen Export Processing Zone (EPZs), mostly along the southwestern coast, to provide opportunities for investors, including tax concessions. Suppliers, especially Sri Lankan-owned Multinational Corporations (MNCs), have consolidated into enterprises worth hundreds of millions of dollars that benefit from tax and trade policy. In addition, Sri Lanka’s continued integration into the global market has led to further cuts to public services, including declining government revenue as a proportion of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Because other small Southern countries attempting to industrialize face similar challenges, I group these changes under the rubric of export capitalism. ii To analyze the impact of export capitalism, I produce an ethnographic account of Sri Lankan export garment workers’ lives. I completed ethnographic research among workers, managers, unionists, residents living near EPZs, government officials, and others, over a 26- month period, from July 2014 to December 2016. I track people’s routines, movements, and critiques across a range of sites, including rural villages, factories inside and outside EPZs, boarding houses near the Katunayake EPZ, located north of the capital Colombo, and union offices. I argue that export garment workers embody the tension between their twin identities as workers—narrowly-defined economic agents receiving a wage—and members of the working class—a broad political constituency. Export garment workers experience wage repression and the intensification of work in vertically-integrated enterprises, including those owned by Sri Lankan MNCs. They also critique the retreat of public services, demanding more from the Sri Lankan welfare state. Interpreting workers’ experiences, I concentrate on the unrealized demands implied by the appropriation of the value that they produce. These demands are not realized either in their wages or the public services that they receive. I argue that workers attempt to manage constraints by relying on each other. Tensions within community, in places such as the boarding houses and villages in which many workers live, in turn reproduce the contradictions of export capitalism. I conclude my dissertation by looking at the ways in which unionists on the ground attempt to recruit workers. The question—as implied by a rapidly expanding literature on the practice of unionism in the global South—is how Sri Lanka’s labor movement is being reshaped by a labor force, often gendered as female, that works in export industries such as garments. Accordingly, my dissertation approaches theoretical debate about the representation of the working class from the ethnographic perspective of the challenges faced by Sri Lanka’s export garment workers. iii The dissertation of Devaka Ramesh Gunawardena is approved. Michael Mann Sherry B. Ortner Akhil Gupta, Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2018 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction…………………………………………………………………..……………………1 Chapter One: The Effects of Dismantling the Welfare State on the Working Class….................50 Chapter Two: The Dynamics of Capital Accumulation in the Export Garment Industry…….…79 Chapter Three: The Ideology of Reciprocity Among Workers…………………………...........111 Chapter Four: Export Garment Workers in the Labor Movement………………………..….....143 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………...167 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………173 v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation is the product of countless conversations I have had with many people over a period of more than eight years. It is difficult in a short space to acknowledge all those who have given me material support, and otherwise inspired the writing that follows. I will try. First and foremost, I would not have had a chance to write about the reconfiguration of the export garment industry in Sri Lanka from the perspective of workers if I had not first met workers themselves. For helping me make my first contacts, I thank a group of local activists who ran a two- month English class in the Katunayake Export Processing Zone (EPZ) in 2014. I thank especially Anushaya Collure and Buddhima Padmasiri for their consistent engagement and helping me think through the incipient challenges of organizing in the EPZs. Anushaya’s careful and deliberate questions made me reflect; Buddhima helped me identify obstacles to the standard approach to activism. We were supported by a core group that formally referred to itself as the Collective for Economic Democratization, which eventually became part of a bigger group, the Alliance for Economic Democracy, which consists of a range of actors across civil society and trade unions. I thank especially Ahilan Kadirgamar, Meera Srinivasan, Upul Wickramasinghe, Amali Wedagedara, Niyanthini Kadirgamar, Swasthika Arulingam, and Balasingham Skanthakumar, among others, who made the Collective a stimulating space to connect my own academic research with questions raised by those critical of the dominant policy making discourse in Sri Lanka. Within the Collective, several especially helped shape its direction and my own thinking. Ahilan became a political mentor long before I realized I needed one. By a fortuitous meeting at vi UCLA, Cenan Pirani introduced me to the Collective and, beyond it, intervened in my life at a crucial stage in both my graduate career and personal development. There are few moments in life I look back on and see as truly pivotal to changing my attitude toward the world, but Cenan was the catalyst for the most crucial shift. In Colombo, Meera made the “Colombo office” into a welcoming space for many different people to socialize. Among those was Vijay Nagaraj, who passed away in 2017 after I returned to the US to complete my project. I will miss his ability to connect people, and his warm, energetic personality. In addition to activism, I enjoyed the company of a diverse group of friends in Colombo, who helped me manage the stresses of research. Krishantha Fedricks reminded me why theory is not just for the US academy, but also for developing conversations with Sri Lankan researchers. Zainab Ibrahim was a humorous accomplice on a brief project I completed with her and Buddhima in early 2016. Aftab Lall, in his laid-back way, reminded me to enjoy the many sights and spots across the country. Lennart and Julia, along with our excellent group of expat friends, shared long conversations at beaches and bars. Among those who participated was Bahirathan Kanesu, who also passed away too early, in 2018. I was saddened to hear about his demise when I returned to Sri Lanka. In Katunayake, I thank the workers who made life fulfilling even as I briefly experienced the challenges many had no option but to endure. Although I use pseudonyms for people described in my dissertation, I thank especially Vijaya, Piumi, Hirunika, Sithumini, among many others in the Katunayake boarding house, who made me feel at home in Sri Lanka. When I lacked confidence in my ability to communicate in Sinhala, one friend, Nimal, gave a thumb’s up and replied, “you have enough.” They reminded me, like Somadasa, John, and Maggie long before, that commitment mattered most. vii Among the unionists I thank many: Chaminda Perera, DW Subasinghe, TMR Rasseedin, Keshara Kottegoda, Nath Amarasinghe, Navaratne, Sugath Rajapaksa, Sylvester Jayakody, Anton Marcus, Chamila Hettiarachchi, Padmini Weerasuriya, Linus Jayathilake, Suranjaya Amerasinghe, Wijepala Weerakoon, Mayura Dharmavardhana, and Leslie Devendra. These people and many more graciously shared their insight and experiences, which combined offered a comprehensive overview of the labor movement in Sri Lanka. Making the journey south to continue my research at Lean Lanka, I thank a crucial contact at the Fulbright Commission in Colombo. At Lean Lanka, I thank those staff who remained critical of the challenges imposed by production. In the lines, I must acknowledge the care and support given to me by countless workers, including friends such as Madhu and Muthumali, who injected humor and grace into an often-overwhelming process. I had the privilege to meet people from the entire factory—floor managers, cutters, mechanics, training instructors, cooking and cleaning staff, and more—who reminded me why I was obligated to return to Sri Lanka. For the intervening period of a year-and-a-half when I lived in LA upon my return to the US, I thank those who helped me readjust to academic conversations while bringing much- needed fun: Neil Gong, Diya Bose, Ted Everhart, Camille Frazier, Sumita Mitra, Joshua Herr, Kathryn Renton, and Guillermo Ruiz Stovel. In addition are those