Nike Is Leading the Race ... to
the Bottom
by Zack Knorr
AlterNet, March 9, 2007
Despite promises to clean up its act,
Nike is making a U-turn on its commitments to improve the sweatshop
conditions for its workers overseas.
For years, Nike has insisted that it cares
about worker rights and is improving working conditions at its
overseas factories. Now the company is abandoning one of the only
factories in its supply chain that respects the rights of workers
Embarrassed in the 1990s by exposés
of the deplorable conditions in its factories around the world,
Nike made a public promise to clean up its act. Nike pledged that
its supplier factories would respect the rights of workers, including
the right to organize a union.
There has been a huge gap between Nike's
words and the company's actions. Despite the company's pledges,
conditions remain poor throughout Nike's global supply chain and
unions are scarce. For most workers, Nike factories today look
pretty much like Nike factories ten years ago.
But a few factories have made real progress.
Workers at these factories have taken Nike at its word and demanded
that factory management follow the standards in Nike's code of
conduct. And under pressure from labor rights groups, the factories
have responded and ended their sweatshop practices.
One of these factories is BJ&B in
the Dominican Republic. At BJ&B, workers sewing Nike baseball
caps used to suffer the abuses typical of Nike's contract factories:
degrading insults from supervisors, long hours of forced overtime.
Anyone who spoke out and demanded better conditions was fired.
Citing Nike's own code of conduct, workers
and activists demanded that Nike take responsibility for conditions
at BJ&B. Nike, looking for opportunities to rid itself of
its sweatshop reputation, said it agreed: Conditions should be
improved and Nike would force the factory to clean up its act.
The result was dramatic improvement in
standards for workers at BJ&B. Among other gains, workers
were able to form a union to defend their rights -- one of the
only unions in any Nike factory anywhere in the world. And workers
negotiated a groundbreaking union contract that called for an
increase over the poverty-level wages that are the industry standard.
Such victories in the global garment industry
have been few and far between. BJ&B is one of only two factories
in all of Latin America where activists have succeeded in forcing
Nike to make real, lasting improvements in working conditions.
BJ&B is hugely significant in the
debate of working conditions in the global economy. BJ&B demonstrates
that it is possible for U.S. multinational corporations to ensure
ethical behavior on the part of their overseas contract factories
-- when they are willing to take the necessary steps. And BJ&B
has meant dignity in the workplace and a better life for thousands
of people -- workers and their families -- in the Dominican Republic.
Nike was happy to take credit for the
progress at BJ&B. Nike has touted BJ&B as proof of its
commitment to cleaning up working conditions -- proof that Nike
and sweatshops were no longer synonymous.
Last week, Nike demonstrated the sincerity
of its commitment to worker rights -- by announcing the closure
of BJ&B. Nike says the factory isn't "competitive"
and announced that it will move cap production to Bangladesh and
Vietnam, two countries where working conditions are bad, unions
are illegal, and caps are a few pennies cheaper than at BJ&B.
Factory management suspended the entire workforce and set a closure
date of May 22.
It's hard to imagine a clearer demonstration
of the hypocrisy and emptiness of Nike's extensive "corporate
social responsibility" programs. When the spotlight was on
BJ&B, Nike was forced to act responsibly, but as soon as Nike
executives thought no one was looking, they decided to dump one
of their only decent factories -- because the product can be made
more cheaply in a sweatshop.
How highly does Nike value the rights
of workers? The savings the company will derive from abandoning
BJ&B are less than one one-thousandth of the company's annual
advertising budget.
It is not too late for BJ&B. Activists
across the United States, and around the world, are mobilizing
to demand that Nike keep the factory open. We invite you to join
the effort by calling or writing Nike to tell them sweatshops
are bad for business.
Zack Knorr is the International Campaigns
Coordinator for United Students Against Sweatshops.
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