Liza asked me to forward this. - Doug] Date: Wed, 15 Aug 2001 15:45:13 -0400 From: Liza Featherstone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Though my name has dropped out of these tirades, I co-authored the articles that this person attributes to Doug. These posts reflect a lack of specific knowledge about the student anti-sweatshop movement. USAS and UNITE are not the same organization. USAS doesn't campaign for labor standards in trade agreements. Nor do they tell people to look for the UNITE label -- I agree that approach smacks of Buy American-ism and in fact I say exactly that in a book I'm finishing on the subject. I think we can all agree that some anti-sweatshop campaigns led by people in rich countries are protectionist. The question is, is it possible for people in rich countries to work in useful solidarity with workers in the Third World who wish to be paid more, and to improve their work conditions? Perhaps the author of these posts thinks it isn't, and that kids at Ivy League schools should relax, prepare to take their places in the ruling class and not trouble themselves about the women who worked unpaid overtime making their prestigious sweatshirts. I disagree, and think that USAS's work provides an interesting example of anti-sweatshop work that is principled and not xenophobic. Students try to directly pressure companies to improve wages and conditions, and, realizing that garment factory jobs are often much better than the alternatives, they campaign equally vigorously against companies' attempts to pull out of "bad" factories. Students investigate worker complaints, and campaign for remedies. Most of all, they support workers' own organizing efforts. Thanks to USAS's pressure, workers at a Nike supplier in Mexico have already won significant wage increases and improvements in conditions, and may be close to getting recognition for an independent union. Who besides maybe Thomas Friedman could possibly find that protectionist? Liza Featherstone Featherstone’s name had dropped out because she had not acknowledged receipt of offlist criticism. Only henwood was replying. Featherstone argues that USAS does not engage in buy american campaigns, but one of their advisors Dreier successfully pulled just that off at Occidental. Featherstone then argues that this is not typical. Argues that students are not themselves generally for buy american campaigns or the kinds of state restrictions on trade which the afl cio and unite have already won and are fighting for. Featherstone gives above example of Mexican Nike supplier. argues that the students have been the saviors of the benighted third world worker. But this is one example, and raises the question of how the movement will evolve. So I raise the question of what will happen in the case of failure? let's say that as a result of a student boycott and student pressure labor standards are not brought up in the offending plant in the offending country... At that point, why won't the students take Dreier's buy American path or join the AFL CIO/UNITE campaign for trade sanctions, ridiculously elastic import surge clauses and import quota denials? This could all become a one-two punch. Students try a boycott; boycott fails as it most often will; AFL CIO then calls out the guns. Plus, won't the students rely on the AFL CIO's judgement of whether the boycott was successful? after all, they don't have independent monitoring ability. the afl cio can't be trusted on these matters--it claimed that harkin bill worked, both naila kabeer and oxfam say not. so if afl cio or unite is itching for sanctions or denial of quota increase, it will point to the fact that students have already tried voluntary pressure. It failed, next step is sanctions and the like. by the way, the very fact that the students don't already recognize what the afl cio and unite have already done as protectionist (again see cambodia, africa free trade act with its ridiculously elastic import surge laws and duties on competitive goods) indicates to me that they are not bothered by de facto protectionist policy. Third world trade unionists—and here I speak not only of those aligned with the afl cio—do in general see these campaigns as protectionist. And are incensed by the attempt to link trade and labor rights. But this repudiation does not seem to surface in featherstone's and hewnood's coverage. Don’t the students realize this? Why don’t they put everyone at ease by commiting to paper or putting to vote their rejection of both overt and covert state sanctioned trade restriction and buy american campaigns? If they did that, would the unions pull back their financial support? the afl cio is obviously trying to build good will among part of the so called better class which tends to be more for free trade. it's hard to believe that the afl cio wouldn't be bankrolling this little bit of good feel activism if the afl cio didn't think it would translate into elite support for their policy initiatives in the future. In the absence of a clear statement against buy american campaigns and the covert and overt trade protectionism for which the unions are calling, I see the trajectory of the student boycott movement as one in which ugly nationalism is the terminus ad quem. That would certainly be consistent with the history of the afl cio on such matters, as Dana Frank has demonstrated. And as an example of how easily students can become the moral coating of social imperialism, let’s not forget the nyt article on a student who goes to cambodia after us labor successfully squelches quota increase. student now there to make afl cio look good and moral. whether that duke student is for protectionism, or would recognize the quota denial as protectionist, hardly matters. He is working as a piece in the puzzle of protectionism. Rakesh
