This chapter addresses global production, which has powerful effects on the incomes, working conditions, and development opportunities of populations around the world. It is not surprising that the organization and regulation of global production have become one of the most contentious subjects of debate within the field of Global Political Economy (GPE). The chapter confronts several difficult questions linked to these debates. Who does the work of global production, and how has its organization changed over time? Who exercises power within evolving systems of global production, and what winners and losers do such arrangements produce? How is global production governed, and with what consequences for labour rights and the environment? In exploring these questions, analytical lenses drawn from a range of political economy perspectives help us to make sense of the complex economic and political forces through which the organization and governance of contemporary global production is shaped and contested.
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7. Production and business
Kate Macdonald
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7. Global Production and Unfree Labour
Gore Ellie
The presence of extremely exploitative labour conditions in the supply chains of key commodities is now widely recognized. Yet there is relatively little agreement over what causes severe labour exploitation, commonly referred to as ‘forced’ or ‘unfree labour’, in global production and how to address it. This work explores these debates by examining the patterns, prevalence, and drivers of severe labour exploitation in global production. The debate is framed through an analysis of key frameworks and concepts, focusing on the divide between proponents of the ‘modern slavery’ paradigm and their critics who prefer the conceptual framing of ‘unfree labour’. The structural drivers of labour exploitation and key factors making individual workers vulnerable to this labour exploitation are examined, followed by an evaluation of the effectiveness of current public and private initiatives to address unfree and forced labour in global production.
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7. The Globalization of Production
Eric Thun
This chapter addresses the globalization of production. Although companies have been investing abroad for centuries, the most recent era of globalization has created an unprecedented range of possibilities for global firms to reorganize and relocate their activities. The chapter analyses how advances in transportation and technology allow a firm to divide up a global value chain — the sequence of activities that lead to the production of a particular good or service — and how these decisions create new opportunities and challenges for both companies and the societies within which they operate. It first reviews the rise of global production and the forces that have led to dramatic increases in foreign direct investment (FDI) and outsourcing. The central questions for any firm involved in global production involves how to govern the value chain and where to locate different activities. The chapter then provides a framework for understanding these issues and the implications of the various choices. It also applies these concepts to the case of East Asia, particularly China.
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12. Labour and work
Matthew Alford
This chapter illustrates the complex and contested relationship between global production and labour. The mode of global production has changed dramatically since the 1970s. Since the 1990s, corporations have outsourced the production of goods to suppliers around the world. At the core of this contemporary form of global production is the ability of lead firms to profit through advanced sourcing strategies, economies of scale, and branding. This gives corporations significant bargaining power over their fragmented and geographically dispersed supplier base. In the contemporary global economy, conditions of poverty and marginalization can be attributed not only to exclusion from employment, but also to the adverse incorporation of precarious workers into global production. The chapter then considers the role of national governments in the governance of labour in global production, before looking at the impact of e-commerce and automation on the future of work.
