Currently viewing the tag: "sweatshops"

Workplace Coercion

By On March 12, 2012 · 40 Comments · In Academic Philosophy, Exploitation, Left-libertarianism, Rights Theory

Coercion is a really difficult concept to define. When theorists say things like “the workplace is a site of coercion” what does that mean, and what should we do about it? One way of understanding coercion is in a non-moralized way. This strategy says that an act [...]

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Sweatshops, Exploitation, and Neglect

By On November 8, 2011 · 18 Comments · In Current Events, Exploitation, Social Justice

Ari Kohen responds to my recent post on sweatshops with a few lingering concerns.  Among other things, he raises important questions about whether the evils of sweatshop labor can be compensated for by increased charitable giving, and about whether we shouldn’t recognize that American companies have [...]

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Helping the Poor: Sacrifice, Intentions, and Outcomes

By On November 3, 2011 · 39 Comments · In Consequentialism, Exploitation, Social Justice

My friend David Sobel argues that even if sweatshops are benefiting the global poor, this doesn’t mean that they are fulfilling whatever obligations they might have to aid the less fortunate:

This activity on the part of corporations, I think it safe to assume, is motivated purely by economic self-interest on the part of the corporation. [...]

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Shouldn’t Sweatshops Do More?

By On November 3, 2011 · 43 Comments · In Current Events, Exploitation, Social Justice

Sophisticated critics of sweatshop labor recognize that sweatshop jobs make workers better off, but argue that sweatshops should do more to improve the lives of workers – that they should make them even better off by paying higher wages, or providing better working conditions.

In a thoughtful post at Running Chicken, Ari Kohen raises precisely this objection to 

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Answering the Left-Libertarian Critique of Sweatshops

By On October 24, 2011 · 108 Comments · In Current Events, Exploitation, Left-libertarianism, Libertarianism, Social Justice

Ben Powell and I have a new paper coming out in the Journal of Business Ethics in which we defend what we take to be the mainstream libertarian position on sweatshops against some critiques that have emerged in the recent academic literature.*  That position (which I have [...]

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Which is Worse: A Sweatshop, or You?

By On June 6, 2011 · 112 Comments · In Academic Philosophy, Exploitation, Social Justice

People say that sweatshops exploit their workers.  People say the same thing about men who hire prostitutes, price gougers, couples who enter commercial surrogacy contracts, payday loan operations, and people who buy kidneys from the poor (or would do so if it were legal).

Exploitation, as we’ve discussed here before, [...]

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