Analyse & Kritik

Journal of Philosophy and Social Theory

Suchergebnisse

"Sonja Dänzer"

Titel: Are Multinational Companies Responsible for Working Conditions in Their Supply Chains? From Intuition to Argument
Autor: Sonja Dänzer
Seite: 175-194

Abstract: Although many people seem to share the intuition that multinational companies (MNEs) carry a responsibility for the working conditions in their supply chains, the justification offered for this assumption is usually rather unclear. This article explores a promising strategy for grounding the relevant intuition and for rendering its content more precise. It applies the criteria of David Miller's connection theory of remedial responsibility to different forms of supply chain governance as characterized by the Global Value Chains (GVC) framework. The analysis suggests that the criteria for identifying MNEs as remedially responsible for bad working conditions in their direct suppliers are fulfilled in many cases, even though differentiations are required with regard to the different supply chain governance structures. MNEs thus have a duty to make sure currently bad working conditions in their suppliers are changed for the better. Moreover, since production in supply chains for structural reasons continuously generates remedial responsibility of MNEs for bad working conditions in their suppliers, it puts the prospective responsibility on them to make sure that their suppliers offer acceptable working conditions. Further, it is suggested that the remedial responsibility of MNEs might require them to make financial compensation to victims of bad working conditions and in grave cases initiate or support programs to mitigate disastrous effects suffered by them.

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Titel: Comment on Sonja Dänzer: Structural Injustice in Global Production Networks: Shared Responsibility for Working Conditions
Autor: Mark Starmanns
Seite: 195-212

Abstract: This commentary's claim is that Dänzer's argument does not sufficiently take into account the complexities of the global production of goods, the current corporate responsibility practices and the problems of attributing responsibility to single actors. I argue in favour of a shared responsibility and briefly present a discursive approach for attributing MNE's share of responsibility in global supply chains, which requires obligatory transparency.

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Work and Cooperation
2011 (33) Heft 1

Editorial
Both in social theories with the aim of looking into the creative core of society as well as in everyday politics, two intuitions often supplement each other. The first intuition, empirico-analytical, views common organization of work and production as being the very aim of society, and other parts of society being explicable from this. A second intuition, ethical or moral, holds the sphere of work to be the central site for diagnoses of a society's inherent justice. Both intuitions not only con...

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