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E-book
Author Kumar, Ashok, 1984- author

Title Monopsony capitalism : power and production in the twilight of the sweatshop age / Ashok Kumar
Published Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, [2020]
©2020

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Description 1 online resource (xvi, 278 pages)
Series Development trajectories in global value chains
Development trajectories in global value chains
Contents Cover -- Advance Praise -- Half Title -- Series Page -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Figures -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- The Enduring Age of the Sweatshop -- First as tragedy -- I hear you speak Kannada -- All work exploits (but some more than most) -- PAST -- 1: The Bottleneck -- Dynamics of the global garment sector -- The evolution of governance typologies -- Workers in a bottleneck -- A crisis in garment workers' rights -- Workers' self-organizationas human rights -- A new era begins -- 2: The Global Sweatshop -- Transnational collective bargaining?
Varieties of workers' association -- Globalizing the European 'inside model' -- Garment sector transnational CBAs? -- Building labour's power -- PRESENT -- 3: China -- A Strike at a Giant Footwear Producer -- Unmade in China -- Workers in large Asian garment firms -- The case of Yue Yuen -- A demand for social insurance -- A strike escalates -- Brand reaction and geographic relocation -- The state and social reproduction -- Enhanced supplier-endvalue capture -- Workers' power at Yue Yuen -- Shifting the terrain -- 4: India -- A Warehouse Workers' Struggle at a 'Full-Package' Denim Firm
From mill to retail -- Evolving workers' strategies -- From a cotton mill to a full-package supplier -- The emergence of a transnational producer-retailer -- Arvind warehouse workers' struggle -- Reorganizing production to undermine the union -- Aggregated spaces of value capture and value creation -- A new space for workers' power? -- A mixed bag -- 5: Honduras -- A Transnational Campaign at a Cotton Commodity Producer -- The cotton commodity producer GVC -- Fruit of the Loom and vertical-integration -- The evolution of anti-sweatshopcampaigns -- A campaign at Fruit of the Loom¹⁷
From victory to victory -- A new day -- Structure and agency -- FUTURE -- 6: Cartels of Capital -- Monopoly and monopsony in the GVC -- Global competition and GVC -- From capitals to capital -- Consolidation and the GVC -- Value chain power asymmetry -- Degree of monopsony power in the GVC -- The MFA and GVC dynamics -- Garment sector consolidation -- Limits to the spatial fix? -- 7: Labour's Power in the Chain -- Labour bargaining power and global governance -- Structural power in the GVC -- Power and network centrality -- Degree of Spatial Inflexibility -- Labour and wage distribution
Workers' bargaining in consolidated garment firms -- Conclusion -- The Twilight of the Sweatshop Age? -- A radical restructure of production -- Global labour's bargaining power -- Bibliography -- Index
Summary "Monopsony Capitalism explores the combination of capital's changing composition and labour's subjective agency to examine whether the waning days of the 'sweatshop' have indeed begun. Focused on the garment and footwear sectors - which epitomize the leading edges in the advance of globalization and the spread of vertically disintegrated value chains - the book introduces a universal logic that governs competition and reshapes the chain. Simply put, deregulation produces high degrees of monopsony power, increasing the value share for the lead firm. This intensifies competition, exerts downward pressure, and winnows the number of suppliers able to compete. The result is supplier-end consolidation. Consolidation increases the surviving suppliers' share of value, which expands access to finance, facilitates self-investment, and raises entry barriers. In 2005, the regulatory regime that had once enforced a degree of spatial inflexibility finally dwindled to nothing with the phase-out of the Multi-Fibre Agreement (MFA). The subsequent emergence of market spatial inflexibility, which gives labour new openings, occurs with free, unrestricted flows between supplier and buyer. This book analyses workers' collective action at various sites of production primarily in China, India, Honduras, and United States, and secondarily in Vietnam, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and Indonesia. It observes how this internal logic plays out for labour who are testing the limits of the social order, stretching it until the seams show, and making it possible for bosses to come to the proverbial table, hat in hand, to hash out agreements with those who assemble their goods. By examining the most valorized parts of underdeveloped sectors, one can see where capital is going and how it is getting there. The findings contribute to ongoing strategies to bolster workers' bargaining power in sectors plagued by poverty, powerlessness, and perilous workplaces. Indeed, with these changes in global capitalism and a capable labour movement, there's hope yet that workers may close the gap"-- Provided by publisher
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher
Subject Sweatshops -- Developing countries
Clothing trade -- Developing countries
Clothing workers -- Labor unions -- Developing countries
Monopsonies.
Capitalism.
Capitalism
Clothing trade
Clothing workers -- Labor unions
Monopsonies
Sweatshops
Developing countries
Genre/Form Electronic books
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2020001953
ISBN 9781108764810
1108764819
9781108775595
1108775594