Power, Participation, and Private Regulatory Initiatives: Human Rights Under Supply Chain Capitalism by Daniel Brinks

Author:Daniel Brinks
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press, Inc.
Published: 2021-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

A. Labor Rights

A collection of core International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions set forth a range of protections for workers situated at every conceivable link in various global agricultural supply chains. ILO Convention 87 on the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize recognizes the rights of workers “to establish” and “to join organizations of their own choosing without previous authorization.”22 ILO Convention 98 on the Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining provides: “Workers shall enjoy adequate protection against acts of anti-union discrimination in respect of their employment.”23 ILO Convention 29 on Forced Labor obligates parties “to suppress the use of forced or compulsory labor in all its forms within the shortest possible period.”24 ILO Convention 105 on the Abolition of Forced Labor requires parties “to take effective measures to secure the immediate and complete abolition of forced or compulsory labor.”25 ILO Convention 111 on Discrimination in Employment and Occupation calls on parties “to declare and pursue a national policy designed to promote, by methods appropriate to national conditions and practice, equality of opportunity and treatment in respect of employment and occupation, with a view to eliminating any discrimination.”26 ILO Convention 100 on Equal Remuneration mandates that parties “ensure the application to all workers of the principle of equal remuneration for men and women workers for work of equal value.”27 ILO Convention 138 on Minimum Age urges parties “to pursue a national policy designed to ensure the effective abolition of child labor and to raise progressively the minimum age for admission to employment or work to a level consistent with the fullest physical and mental development of young persons.”28 ILO Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labor obligates parties to “take immediate and effective measures to secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labor as a matter of urgency.”29

While ILO conventions are widely ratified, there are varying levels of will and ability to enforce labor laws, particularly in some of the emerging market economies from which TNCs source agricultural products. Such regulatory gaps leave room for rights abuses to occur.

In some ways, private commercial actors are filling labor regulation gaps through the use of private third-party audit systems. The private sector and private actors have become a source of other complementary policy innovations aimed at increasing information about the conditions of production and supply chain sustainability. Indeed, among the more effective policy innovations emanating from private commercial actors and rights activists have been certification systems combined with purchasing contracts conditioned on compliance with respect for human rights in factories and on farms.

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