Workers in the Indian export garment industry: surviving neoliberal reforms

Abstract

This chapter examines the concerns of workers about labour rights in the Indian export garment industry in the post-MFA era. First, I outline the historical and contemporary factors that have affected the industry itself and the labour processes therein. These factors are both contingent on domestic matters and more recently on global factors, such as neoliberal trade policies, global commodity chains and MNC practices. The neoliberal policy agenda tends to focus on the economic imperatives of the Indian export garment sector, which both inhibit and benefit India’s export potential. The human aspect of labour rights is either ignored or is targeted as a potential threat to the maximization of profit. Second, using data from intensive fieldwork, and interviews with workers and exporters, the chapter provides the foundation necessary for understanding the predicament faced by Indian export garment workers today. It situates their experiences within the economic, social and political specificities of localities that form part of the Indian export garment sector and, in turn, are part of the wider global commodity structures. I pay particular attention to the ways in which India’s post-independence, dualist development agendas with their historical particularities have shaped the experiences of garment workers. This chapter shows that the existence of small-scale cottage industry together with large-scale industrial production helps to explain the contemporary conditions of workers in the export garment industry. Though the textile and garment industries constitute one of India’s largest sectors of production and export earners, there is a high concentration of cheap and flexible labour. Yet, exporters and industrialists claim that productivity is lower in India because of ‘inflexibility’ and they bemoan the strict labour laws. They argue that compared with their competitors in other Asian countries, they are disadvantaged because not only is labour inefficient, but also the Indian garment industry is subject to undue restrictions on hiring and firing. Although India does have robust labour protection laws, since joining the WTO, these are slowly being eroded (Kolben 2006) because of constant industry pressure to become more ‘flexible’. However, my findings question these assertions, given that most garment workers are in the informal economy and are therefore unprotected by labour laws and legislation.