Governing Health and Safety in the Electronics Industry in Malaysia

Raj‐Reichert, Gale

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-39871-6_6

Cited by 1 publication

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“…While the exercise of such associational and structural powers is not disputed, much research on worker power in GVCs is based on a narrow perspective of bargaining power tied to trade unions (Anner et al, 2013;Helfen and Fichter, 201 3;Selwyn, 2008Selwyn, , 2013. Unfortunately, the overarching focus so far on formal bargaining institutions as the basis of worker power does not account for the limits and challenges of weak and non-independent trade unions in many developing countries with repressive governments in GVCs (Ford and Gillian, 2016;Lüthje, 2013;Raj-Reichert, 2017. While more recent approaches to worker power in GVCs (and its cognate global production networks approach) has considered worker agency differently, for example through resilience, reworking, and resistance (see Alford et al, 2017;Carswell and De Neve, 2013;Coe and Jordhus-Lier, 2011), we argue that more is still needed.…”

Section: Gvcs Workers and Powermentioning

confidence: 99%

Exercising associational and networked power through the use of digital technology by workers in global value chains

Helmerich

Raj‐Reichert

Zajak

2020

Competition & Change

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While there are heated debates about how digitalization affects production, management and consumption in the context of global value chains, less attention is paid to how workers use digital technologies to organize and formulate demands and hence exercise power. This paper explores how workers in supplier factories in global value chains use different digital tools to exercise and enhance their power resources to improve working conditions. Combining the global value chain framework and concepts from labour sociology on worker power, the paper uses examples from the garment industry in Honduras and the footwear industry in China to show how workers used old and new digital tools to create and enhance associational and networked powers. Digital tools were used by workers and their allies in the global value chain to lower costs of communication, increase information exchange and participate in transnational campaigns during labour struggles vis-à-vis firms and governments in structurally and politically repressive environments. The paper contributes to our understanding of how workers use of digital technologies to exercise and combine different resources of power in online and offline actions in global value chains, as well as how they are confronted by new dimensions of constrains which include digital surveillance and control by the state.

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