{"title":"印度服装工业的后殖民结构及其在维持女工不稳定方面的作用","authors":"Saumya Devraj","doi":"10.1080/0023656X.2022.2163382","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Neoliberal policies and decentralization of production activities in developing countries have been blamed for the ever-increasing precarity of labor in India since the late twentieth century. Precarious labor, however, had long been a characteristic feature of the Indian garment industry before it actively participated in neoliberal global garment trade in the 1970s and 1980s. This study examines policies that shaped the Indian garment industry in the post-colonial period from 1947 and their effects on production, employment patterns, and women’s work. It employs the Indian Government’s official industry censuses and employment survey reports. Accordingly, the policy of small-scale garment production was backed by benevolent aims of reviving traditional Indian crafts and maximizing employment. However, it yielded a fragmented industrial structure and a pool of precarious labor from a poverty-stricken population. Gender-based social stereotypes further enabled a socio-economically disempowered female workforce. The neoliberal policies that gained ground with the industry’s increasing export orientation exacerbated the precarious working conditions rooted in indigenous policy-making and social mindset. Locating labor precarity and women’s vulnerability within this complex mesh of local and global factors offers an improved framework for testing how neoliberal policies maneuver them to influence production and employment patterns in today’s garment industry.","PeriodicalId":45777,"journal":{"name":"Labor History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7000,"publicationDate":"2023-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Post-colonial structure of the Indian garment industry and its role in maintaining the precarity of women workers\",\"authors\":\"Saumya Devraj\",\"doi\":\"10.1080/0023656X.2022.2163382\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"ABSTRACT Neoliberal policies and decentralization of production activities in developing countries have been blamed for the ever-increasing precarity of labor in India since the late twentieth century. Precarious labor, however, had long been a characteristic feature of the Indian garment industry before it actively participated in neoliberal global garment trade in the 1970s and 1980s. This study examines policies that shaped the Indian garment industry in the post-colonial period from 1947 and their effects on production, employment patterns, and women’s work. It employs the Indian Government’s official industry censuses and employment survey reports. Accordingly, the policy of small-scale garment production was backed by benevolent aims of reviving traditional Indian crafts and maximizing employment. However, it yielded a fragmented industrial structure and a pool of precarious labor from a poverty-stricken population. Gender-based social stereotypes further enabled a socio-economically disempowered female workforce. The neoliberal policies that gained ground with the industry’s increasing export orientation exacerbated the precarious working conditions rooted in indigenous policy-making and social mindset. Locating labor precarity and women’s vulnerability within this complex mesh of local and global factors offers an improved framework for testing how neoliberal policies maneuver them to influence production and employment patterns in today’s garment industry.\",\"PeriodicalId\":45777,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Labor History\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":0.7000,\"publicationDate\":\"2023-01-02\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"\",\"citationCount\":\"0\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Labor History\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"91\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/10.1080/0023656X.2022.2163382\",\"RegionNum\":4,\"RegionCategory\":\"管理学\",\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"Q1\",\"JCRName\":\"HISTORY\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Labor History","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/0023656X.2022.2163382","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HISTORY","Score":null,"Total":0}
Post-colonial structure of the Indian garment industry and its role in maintaining the precarity of women workers
ABSTRACT Neoliberal policies and decentralization of production activities in developing countries have been blamed for the ever-increasing precarity of labor in India since the late twentieth century. Precarious labor, however, had long been a characteristic feature of the Indian garment industry before it actively participated in neoliberal global garment trade in the 1970s and 1980s. This study examines policies that shaped the Indian garment industry in the post-colonial period from 1947 and their effects on production, employment patterns, and women’s work. It employs the Indian Government’s official industry censuses and employment survey reports. Accordingly, the policy of small-scale garment production was backed by benevolent aims of reviving traditional Indian crafts and maximizing employment. However, it yielded a fragmented industrial structure and a pool of precarious labor from a poverty-stricken population. Gender-based social stereotypes further enabled a socio-economically disempowered female workforce. The neoliberal policies that gained ground with the industry’s increasing export orientation exacerbated the precarious working conditions rooted in indigenous policy-making and social mindset. Locating labor precarity and women’s vulnerability within this complex mesh of local and global factors offers an improved framework for testing how neoliberal policies maneuver them to influence production and employment patterns in today’s garment industry.
期刊介绍:
Labor History is the pre-eminent journal for historical scholarship on labor. It is thoroughly ecumenical in its approach and showcases the work of labor historians, industrial relations scholars, labor economists, political scientists, sociologists, social movement theorists, business scholars and all others who write about labor issues. Labor History is also committed to geographical and chronological breadth. It publishes work on labor in the US and all other areas of the world. It is concerned with questions of labor in every time period, from the eighteenth century to contemporary events. Labor History provides a forum for all labor scholars, thus helping to bind together a large but fragmented area of study. By embracing all disciplines, time frames and locales, Labor History is the flagship journal of the entire field. All research articles published in the journal have undergone rigorous peer review, based on initial editor screening and refereeing by at least two anonymous referees.