The anti-sweatshop movement refers to campaigns to improve the conditions of workers in sweatshops. It started in the 19th century in industrialized countries such as the United States, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom to improve the conditions of workers in those countries.Sheila Blackburn (1991) The Historical Journal 34 (1) 43-64 "Ideology and Social Policy: The Origins of the Trade Boards Act" These campaigns are meant to improve the working conditions through advocacy for higher wages, safer conditions, unionization and other protections.
Consumers can use their buying decisions to further the anti-sweatshop movement.
History 19th and early 20th centuries Some of the earliest sweatshop critics were found in the 19th-century abolitionist movement that had originally coalesced in opposition to chattel slavery, and many abolitionists saw similarities between slavery and sweatshop work. As slavery was successively outlawed in industrial countries between 1794 (in France) and 1865 (in the United States), some abolitionists sought to broaden the anti-slavery consensus to include other forms of harsh labor, including sweatshops. As it happened, the first significant law to address sweatshops (the Factory Act 1833) was passed in the United Kingdom at the same time that the slave trade (1807) and ownership of slaves (1833) were made illegal.Miers, Suzanne (2003). Slavery in the Twentieth Century: The Evolution of a Global Problem. Alta Mira Press, Walnut Creek, California
Ultimately, the abolitionist movement split apart. Some advocates focused on working conditions and found common cause with trade unions and Marxists and socialist political groups, or progressive movement and the muckrakers. Others focused on the continued slave trade and involuntary servitude in the colonial world. For those groups that remained focused on slavery, sweatshops became one of the primary objects of controversy. Workplaces across multiple sectors of the economy were categorized as sweatshops. However, there were fundamental philosophical disagreements about what constituted slavery. Unable to agree on the status of sweatshops, the abolitionists working with the League of Nations and the United Nations ultimately backed away from efforts to define slavery, and focused instead on a common precursor of slavery including human trafficking.
Those focused on working conditions included Friedrich Engels, whose book The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 would inspire the Marxist movement named for his collaborator, Karl Marx. In the United Kingdom the Factory Act was revised six further times between 1844 and 1878 to help improve the condition of workers by limiting work hours and the use of child labor. The formation of the International Labour Organization in 1919 under the League of Nations and then the United Nations sought to address the plight of workers the world over. Concern over working conditions as described by muckraker journalists during the Progressive Era in the United States saw the passage of new workers rights laws and ultimately resulted in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, passed during the New Deal.
The anti-sweatshop movement successfully utilized investigative journalism to mobilize the middle class on a range of worker rights. Prominent reformers include Samuel Plimsoll, Lord Shaftesbury Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Henry Mayhew, Upton Sinclair, and Robert M. La Follette.
Some of the earliest sweatshop critics were found in the 19th-century abolitionist movement that had originally coalesced in opposition to chattel slavery, and many abolitionists saw similarities between slavery and sweatshop work. As slavery was successively outlawed in industrial countries between 1794 (in France) and 1865 (in the United States), some abolitionists sought to broaden the anti-slavery consensus to include other forms of harsh labor, including sweatshops. As it happened, the first significant law to address sweatshops (the Factory Act 1833) was passed in the United Kingdom several years after the slave trade (1807) and ownership of slaves (1833) was made illegal.
Ultimately, the abolitionist movement split apart. Some advocates focused on working conditions and found common causes with trade unions Marxists and socialist political groups, or progressive movement and the muckrakers. Others focused on the continued slave trade and involuntary servitude in the colonial world. For those groups that remained focused on slavery, sweatshops became one of the primary objects of controversy. Workplaces across multiple sectors of the economy were categorized as sweatshops. However, there were fundamental philosophical disagreements about what constituted slavery. Unable to agree on the status of sweatshops, the abolitionists working with the League of Nations and the United Nations ultimately backed away from efforts to define slavery and focused instead on a common precursor of slavery – human trafficking.
Those focused on working conditions included Friedrich Engels, whose book The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 (1845) inspired the Marxist movement named for his collaborator, Karl Marx.
In the United Kingdom, the first effective Factory Act was introduced in 1833 to help improve the condition of workers by limiting work hours and the use of child labor; but this applied only to textile factories. Later Acts extended protection to factories in other industries, but not until 1867 was there any similar protection for employees in small workshops, and not until 1891 was it possible to effectively enforce the legislation where the workplace was a dwelling (as was often the case for sweatshops).
The formation of the International Labour Organization in 1919 under the League of Nations and then the United Nations sought to address the plight of workers.
Concern over working conditions as described by muckraker journalists during the Progressive Era in the United States led to the passage of workers' rights laws and ultimately resulted in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, passed during the New Deal.
Late 20th century to present Beginning in 1997, several jurisdictions passed laws requiring government suppliers to be sweatshop-free.
In 2004, the resolution of the lawsuit against Forever 21 and the settlement of the lawsuit against Bebe Stores was a triumphant turning point for the anti-sweatshop movement because local laws could be used to hold a retailer to account.
By 2009, clothing and footwear factories overseas have progressively improved working conditions because of the high demand of anti-sweatshop movement labor rights advocates.
In the 2010s, social media was used to advance the anti-sweatshop movement.
In May 2017, Mama Cash and The Clean Clothes Campaign, both organizations that are working towards abolishing sweatshops as well as creating a world of sustainable and ethical apparel practices, worked together to create The Women Power Fashion Pop-up. The event took place in Amsterdam and allowed consumers to sit in a room designed to look and feel like a sweatshop and were forced to create 100 ties in an hour which is synonymous to that of the expectations of women working in sweatshops today. This pop-up allowed consumers to actually experience the life of a sweatshop worker for a limited time and thus made them more sympathetic to the cause. Outside of the pop-up was a petition that consumers could sign to convince brands to be more transparent with their clothing manufacturing processes. The campaign went viral and created a significant buzz for the anti-sweatshop movement as well as the work of Mama Cash and The Clean Clothes Campaign.
In China, the minimum wage was raised by approximately 7% in 10 provinces in 2019 with the goal of improving living conditions.
Effectiveness of campaigns on sales and stock prices A study published in 2011 found that while in most cases anti-sweatshop movements did not affect sales for companies using sweatshops, they did correspond with a decrease in the sales of well-known, more specialized brands and more intense movements caused more significant reduction in the sales. The same study also found that anti-sweatshop events also seemed to correspond with lower stock prices for the companies that were the target of these events, though some major anti-sweatshop events such as the Kaksy lawsuit against Nike, did not result in any discernible change in stock price of the targeted company. The study found that 64.1% of the companies targeted by anti-sweatshop movements saw drops in stock price in the five days following the anti-sweatshop event, and 56.4% saw drops in the two days following the event. Though the study did find these slight negative economic effects, it did not find that, when taking into account companies of all reputations, anti-sweatshop movements or events damaged the reputation of the companies they targeted to a statistically significant degree; however, there does seem to be a slight undercutting of the reputations of companies with positive reputations when they are faced with anti-sweatshop campaigns, particularly intense ones.
Ability to replace jobs if sweatshops are shut A major issue for the anti-sweatshop movement is the fate of workers displaced if sweatshops are closed. This was an issue when, after the Rana Plaza collapse led to the shutdown of many sweatshops in Bangladesh, the affected employees were not able to get replacement jobs. In many cases, workers turned to sex work after they lost their jobs.
In late 2001, 100,000 sweatshop workers in Bangladesh were laid off. The workers petitioned their government to lobby the U.S. government to repeal its trade barriers so that they can go back to their sweatshop jobs.
Activities The National Labor Committee brought sweatshops into the mainstream media in the 1990s when it exposed the use of sweatshop and child labor to sew clothing for Kathie Lee Gifford's Walmart label.
United Students Against Sweatshops is active on college campuses.
The International Labor Rights Fund filed a lawsuit on behalf of workers in China, Nicaragua, Swaziland, Indonesia, and Bangladesh against Wal-Mart charging the company with knowingly developing purchasing policies particularly relating to price and delivery time that are impossible to meet while following the Wal-Mart code of conduct.
Labor unions, such as the AFL–CIO, have helped support the anti-sweatshop movement out of concern both for the welfare of workers in the developing world and those in the United States.
Arguments Proponents of the anti-sweatshop movement cite examples where sweatshops have reduced living standards and wages.
They believe that better-paying jobs, increased capital investment and domestic ownership of resources will improve economies, rather than sweatshops.
Sometimes local jobs offered higher wages before trade liberalization provided tax incentives to allow sweatshops to replace former local unionized jobs.Kwong, Peter and Joann Lum. "How the Other Half Lives Now." The Nation. June 18, 1988, Vol. 246: 858–60.
Opponents also argue that sweatshop jobs are not necessarily inevitable.
Éric Toussaint claims that quality of life in developing countries was actually higher between 1945 and 1980 before the Latin American debt crisis harmed economies in developing countries causing them to turn to IMF and World Bank-organized "structural adjustments" and that unionized jobs pay more than sweatshop jobs.