Five years ago, he multistory Rana Plaza building, which housed garment factories outside Dhaka in Bangladesh, pancaked from structural defects that had been identified the day before. 1,134 garment workers were killed and thousands more injured in Bangladesh.
After decades of campaigns, the global movement against sweatshops had a few modest (but important) victories. However, a recent breakthrough in Bangladesh in encouraging, and may show the way for making more dramatic changes in the garment industry.
A new report goes beyond the sanitized inspection regimes to hear from the workers themselves.
Two-years of campaigning, with over one million people participating, has succeeded in securing $30 million in compensation for the garment worker victims of the Rana Plaza building collapse.
Reader Comments- Sports, NFL, Tax Subsidy; Unions Today; Domestic Worker Organizing; Students Against Sweatshops; Greece, Germany & the EU; TPP; Israel, Iran, Iraq; Keystone XL; Cuba; Ukraine; Selma; American Sniper;
Resource: Where Do We Go from Here? Mass Incarceration and the Struggle for Civil Rights;
After the Greek Elections New York forum- Feb 6 - new location
Hold the Date- Fighting Corruption in America and Abroad - Fordham Law School - New York - Mar 6
For global companies that have shifted production to Southeast Asia's low-cost manufacturing hub, greater cross-boarder labor coordination could mean less room for wage bargaining, a squeeze on profits and maybe even higher price tags on anything from shoes and clothing to cars and electronics appliances. But even as wages rise, labor activists are confident they aren't at risk of pricing themselves out of the market.
The campaign for the Bangladesh Safety Accord, coordinated by United Students Against Sweatshops, that included two Bangladeshi worker tours, six sit-ins and countless direct actions across the country, 23 universities, including Penn State, UW-Madison, and NYU, have required their brands to sign the Accord, and 17 college-logo brands, including Adidas and Fruit of the Loom, have signed the agreement since September.
Millennials and racism; Gap hoax; Koch vs Detroit; Indigenous women missing; Swedes and Pop; M.I.A. won't let you miss her new video
One year after Rana Plaza we’d be foolish to believe that the industry has thoroughly cleaned up its act or that it will continue to try to as Western concern flags.
Spread the word