Rights
corner
Protecting workers rights
In
the last decade the global expansion of the market economy
has produced a "world without walls". In the
rush to find cheaper and quicker ways to produce shoes,
apparel, and other labor-intensive goods for the global
marketplace, multinational corporations are moving much
of their manufacturing to countries where basic legal
protections for workers are non-existent and union organizing
is prohibited or discouraged. Workers drive the new international
economy, yet millions of them-typically women and children-daily
endure substandard working conditions ranging from inadequate
wages to inhumane hours to life-threatening hazards in
the workplace.
Workers
are largely unprotected from these abuses by either their
own governments or the international system. Though the
International Labor Organization has articulated labor
rights standards for 80 years, these assume that national
governments will enforce them. Unfortunately, many governments
lack the capacity and often the will to do so. Even in
the United States, effective regulation and protection
of workers has been eroded at the low-wage end of the
labor market.
Such
consequences have sparked a growing public demand for
corporations to take responsibility for a range of human
rights and environmental problems in countries where they
operate. Human rights first's own commitment to pursue
labor rights as human rights was a response to these developments.
The challenge is to create accountability-independent,
transparent, and enforceable mechanisms for ensuring that
human rights standards protect ordinary people.
We
are convinced that local, national and international human
rights groups need to work together to leverage consumer
interest in labor practices and company brand sensitivity,
to help protect workers' rights. Enabling consumers to
become well-informed about specific company practices
- piercing the veil between brand names and a web of abusive
contractors and suppliers - creates the kind of market
pressure that strongly encourages corporate compliance
with international human rights standards in a regular
and systematic way. Much work needs to be done to ensure
that corporate social responsibility becomes more than
a passing fad and translates into real protection for
workers.
-Law
Desk.