1.3.6 Activity 4

Activity 4

Nike drew up its code of conduct, as I have indicated, to meet its own concerns. Cast your eye down the checklist in Extract 2 and give yourself time to consider what issues might have been added if the code had been
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1.2.10 Summary

  • The shift of the world's manufacturing base from developed to developing economies in the 1970s heralded the beginning of a new global division of labour and the rise of global factories to produce for Western markets. The search for ever-cheaper labour sources undertaken by multinational firms established a new geography of low-cost manufacturing operations which, to this day, remains controversial.

  • The rise of subcontracting as the most flex
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1.2.5 Offshore fragments of industry: a pro-market standpoint

From a pro-market standpoint, global market forces and the competitive pressures that they generate leave businesses with no choice but to take advantage of lower labour costs elsewhere. In the textile business or the toy business, lower wage costs are the key to profitability; if your competitors find a cheaper labour source, you either follow their example or go out of business. It is not, so the argument runs, because managers lack integrity or compassion that there are now more manufactur
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1.2.3 Activity 2

Before you read on, I would like you to dwell for just a moment on the significance of this shift from direct investment by Western firms to the establishment of subcontracting ties with overseas partners. Aside from outside firms being able to pass on to the subcontractor t
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1.2.1 Introduction

Looking back over the 1970s, it is perhaps hard now to appreciate just how dramatic were the changes to the global map of industry taking place at that time. As more and more of the world's industry shifted from the affluent nations to the poorer, less developed countries in search of a cheaper labour force, the global economic map had to be redrawn to take account of the borders crossed and the distances traversed by firms from wealthier countries seeking to generate higher profits by reloca
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Learning outcomes

On completion of this unit you should be able to:

  • explain the main characteristics of ‘sweatshops’, and their presence in today's system of globalised production;

  • set out the arguments for and against overseas sweatshop exploitation;

  • consider how far the consumption of cheap branded goods makes consumers responsible for the conditions under which they are made;

  • show how consumers are distanced from overseas sweatshop exploita
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Introduction

Sweatshops and the exploitation of workers are often linked to the globalised production of ‘big brand’ labels. This unit examines how campaigners have successfully closed the distance between the brands and the sweatshops, while others argue that such production ‘kick starts’ economies into growth benefiting whole communities.

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Acknowledgements

Except for third party materials and otherwise stated (see terms and conditions), this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence

The material acknowledged below is contained in: Ordering the International: History, Change and Transformation (eds William B
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Supporting Collaboration and Harnessing of OER Within the Policy Framework of KNUST

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Supporting Collaboration and Harnessing of OER Within the Policy Framework of KNUST: Report Prepared by OER Africa on Behalf of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). As part of a broader process of stimulating collabo
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SI 645 / SI 745 - Information Use in Communities

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SI 645

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Patients and Populations: Medical Genetics

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Patients Pop-Genetics
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Learning outcomes

By the end of this unit you should be able to:

  • understand the different interpretations of internationally recognised notions of rights and justice;

  • give examples of implementing justice in an international sphere;

  • investigate questions in international studies;

  • analyse the different agencies of change in the international system.

Acknowledgements

Except for third party materials and otherwise stated (see terms and conditions), this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence

Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following sources for permission to reproduce material within this book.

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Learning outcomes

After studying this unit you should be able to:

  • understand how the world is in the process of ‘being made’, right down to the earth beneath our feet;

  • consider how islands are shaped by a dynamic relationship between territories and flows;

  • show how human life is entangled with non-human forces and processes in the making of today's globalised world.

Introduction

The unit uses the example of climate change to highlight the dynamic and volatile character of the planet, and how globalisation links together, in often unequal ways, people and places across the world. The unit focuses on the potentially momentous impact of global environmental change on Pacific Islands like Tuvalu. It introduces students to geographical ways of thinking about the world.

This unit is an adapted extract from the Open University course
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Acknowledgements

Except for third party materials and otherwise stated (see terms and conditions), this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence

The material below appears in: Understanding Environmental Issues (2003) (eds) Steve Hinchliffe, Andrew Blowers and Joanna Freeland
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References

Association of Essex Councils Steering Group (1999) Essex Biodiversity Action Plan, London, HMSO.
Baring-Gould, S. (1983) Mehalah, Woodbridge, The Boydell Press (first published 1880).
Blackmore, R. and Barratt, R. (2003) ‘Dynamic atmosphere: changing climate and air quality’ in Morris, R.M. et al. (eds).

1.2.1 Managing risk in conditions of uncertainty

Earlier we considered what is meant by ‘environmental responses’. There are two aspects to this concept. One is the response made by the environment to processes of change, whether brought about by natural or human causes or a combination of both. The other is the response to environmental changes made by humans or non-humans. In this section we shall consider both of these aspects of response by focusing on an issue of particular significance in the Blackwater: how the
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Science and Religion in Science Journalism
Mr Michael Brooks : Course
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Learning outcomes

After studying this unit you should be able to:

  • recognise the interaction of human and physical processes in the making of environments and the understanding of environmental issues;

  • understand coastal regions as dynamic and contested environments;

  • consider the contested nature of coastal management policies using the case study of managed retreat.