Professor of Politics and Co-Director of SPERI
Governments are increasingly considering anti-slavery legislation to combat forced labour in the supply chains of global companies. But what makes for effective legislation, and how could existing laws be improved?
Ultimately, the only way to root out labour abuses in global supply chains is by disrupting traditional power relations between workers and businesses.
In the first blog in a new series, SPERI Directors Colin Hay and Genevieve LeBaron describe SPERI’s evolution since 2012 and set out a new research agenda.
In the tea industry, on almost every indicator we used to measure labour standards, certified plantations fared about the same, if not worse, as non-certified plantations
What do tea and cocoa have in common? Both products are widely consumed by households around the world; the early world market for both industries was intertwined with the history of colonialism; and in today’s global economy, both products are made with forced labour
This blog series introduces some preliminary research from SPERI’s PREPPE programme, a project that asks: What can political economy tell us about the Weinstein scandal and the #MeToo movement? And what can the Weinstein scandal and #MeToo movement teach us about political economy?
Forced labour is prevalent in the tea and cocoa industries and is happening in the context of widespread labour abuse
‘Confronting Root Causes: Forced Labour in Global Supply Chains’, a new report that call for innovative approaches to tackle forced labour in global supply chains is published today. The first chapter of the report is republished here.
UK-based companies are ramping up efforts to combat slavery in their overseas supply chains. But companies also need to be working harder to address the severe labour exploitation taking place at home
New transparency regulations in some places theoretically require companies to report on forced labour in their supply chains, but a new review finds that’s not what’s happening
Corporate profits are soaring, but so is labour exploitation. Who is the ‘recovery’ really benefiting?
To prevent another economic crisis, we must address the spread and normalization of indecent work
This is the first in a series of ten SPERI Comments on the theme of rethinking recovery. In this introductory post the authors warn that measurements of, and debates about, economic recovery in the UK have tended to overlook deepening inequality along the lines of class, gender, race, ability, age and sexuality.
Fighting slavery, flaming labour exploitation?
Forthcoming seminars at SPERI will endeavour to rethink recovery in a radical way, taking gender and social reproduction fully into account
Since the crisis states have raised the stakes for environmentalists, cracking down on dissent and stifling criticism of the ecological costs of economic growth