Under the regime of private company or multi-stakeholder voluntary codes of conduct and industry social auditing, workers have absorbed low wages and unsafe and abusive conditions; labour leaders and union members have become the targets of both government and factory harassment and violence; and trade union power has waned. Nowhere have these private systems of codes and audits so clearly failed to protect workers as in Bangladesh’s apparel industry. However, international labour groups and Bangladeshi unions have succeeded in mounting a challenge to voluntarism in the global economy, persuading more than 180 companies to make a binding and enforceable commitment to workers’ safety in an agreement with 12 unions.
The extent to which this Bangladesh Accord will be able to influence the entrenched global regime of voluntary codes and weak trade unions remains an open question. But if the Accord can make progress in Bangladesh, it can help to inspire similar efforts in other countries and in other industries.
The following information is based on incoming communication with the National Human Trafficking Hotline from January 1, 2016 – December 31, 2016 about human trafficking cases and issues related to human trafficking in Nevada. ...Read More
This article examines Canada’s federal Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) from the perspective of international human-rights and labour norms pertaining to the protection of migrant workers. Showing that the current legal framework of the LCP restric...Read More
In recent years, research and dialogue about best practices for incorporating survivor input into anti-trafficking programming and policies have come to the forefront of work to end human trafficking. Historically, the infrastructure of addressing a...Read More
COVID-19 represents a large and sudden exogenous shock to the world. The pandemic itself and the measures being undertaken to slow its pace and effect have short, medium, and long-term impacts on the problem of modern slavery. We have formulated res...Read More
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