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Workers in global value chains are finding new strategies to address harsh working conditions in global supply chains. These strategies are shaped not only by the exigencies of hyper-competitive global production regimes, but also by state structures and local market conditions. The highly statist system of Viet Nam with its party-controlled official unionism has engendered a powerful wave of wildcat strikes. The harsh, despotic labour market conditions in Bangladesh, with a weak and fragmented labour movement, have pushed activists to pursue international accords. Hegemonic labour control in Honduras, built on factory-level repression, has motivated labour organizing and transnational corporate campaigns.
Thus, an analysis of labour strategies in global supply chains must begin with an analysis of the labour control regimes in which they are embedded. Proponents of a race-to-the-bottom argument would suggest that production goes where wages are lowest, but that argument cannot explain why China continues to dominate apparel production while its wages are four times higher than in Bangladesh. At the same time, those who suggest that production goes where logistics are the most efficient and economies of scale are the greatest (as in China) cannot explain why Viet Nam is one of the fastestgrowing major apparel exporters in the world, or why Honduras is the largest Latin American exporter.
Buyers in apparel global value chains want not only to keep costs low, but also to reduce the likelihood of disruption to supply chains caused by worker organization and mobilization. Indeed, what this article will show is that the ten top apparel exporters in the world today reflect three models of labour control. These include state labour control regimes, market labour control regimes, and employer labour control regimes. In the case of state labour control, labour is controlled by a system of legal and extra-legal mechanisms designed to prevent or curtail independent worker organization and collective action. Extreme examples of such regimes include China and Viet Nam, which I label as authoritarian state labour control regimes.
In market labour control regimes, unfavourable labour market conditions discipline labour; strong worker organizing is curtailed because workers are afraid that active participation in a union may result in job loss and prolonged unemployment or underemployment. Low-income countries with very weak labour markets, such as Bangladesh...