Haiti: blaming the left for disinvestment
On July 8, America's National Public could react to a solidarity campaign by
Radio (NPR) broadcast a story by cor- cutting and fleeing from Haiti. It was the respondent David Welna in which he argued that it was the misguided efforts of human rights advocates in the United
States that were driving multinational investors to pull out of Haiti. For Welna, companies like Disney, Wal-Mart, Kmart, and H.H. Cutler/VF-have no other choice but to flee Haiti and move to
China in the face of pressure to respect worker rights and to pay a wage that comes close to meeting basic subsistence needs.
National Public Radio has refused to give the National Labor Committee
(NLC)-or, more importantly, any Haitian popular organisations-the opportunity to respond. According to the NLC, "The question of jobs in Haiti is a deadly serious one, never to be taken lightly.
There is massive unemployment. [We] spoke with Batay Ouvriye and other
Haitian organisations about the possible threat that Disney and other contractors
Haitian workers who requested that the NLC convey to Disney and its contrac tors their modest wage proposal (58 cents an hour, up from 28 c.) and their need to have their rights respected."
In the past, the NLC has worked successfully with other giant U.S apparel companies, such as Liz Claiborne and The Gap, generating popular pressure so that they kept their production in Central America, rather than cutting and running in the fact of human rights campaigns. * To receive Campaign for Labor Rights e-mail Labor Alerts send a message to cir@igc.apc.org with "labor alerts - all campaigns" in the subject line or specify which labour issues interest: Nike, Disney, Guess, child labour, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, US farm workers, US poultry processing workers. CAMPAIGN FOR LABOR RIGHTS memberships: Send For a sample copy of our newsletter, send your postal address to clr@igc.apc.org inspectors. He hired as the investigator former civil rights activist, mayor of Atlanta and US ambassador to the United Nations Andrew Young, and his recently founded firm, GoodWorks International.
At a June 24 press conference Andrew Young reported the findings of his organisa-
"What we saw overwhelmingly was good." Nike bought full-page adverts in the New York Times and other major newspapers to publicise the report.
As several researchers have pointed out, Young did not speak the languages of the workers. He accepted Nike's proposal to use their translators - thus violating rules that have been established for the inspection of human rights conditions around the world.'
Bob Herbert, a New York Times columnist who has written extensively on Nike labour issues, charged that Young allowed himself to be given a carefully guided tour: "The kindest thing that can be said at this point is that Mr. Young was naive. He spent just three or four hours in each factory." Young also chose not to consider whether Nike pays its workers the minimum wage, claiming that "determining what is a 'fair wage' in a foreign country is a very complicated process."
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Just say "No" to Nike
As a high-priced athletic shoe, Nike sells more than its product— it also sells an image: Nike is about cool, about empowerment, for men and women.
• £6/$8.75/45FF. Cheque payable to P. Rousset, IIRE, Postbus 53290, 1007 Amsterdam, Netherlands
One of Nike's strategies for gaining market share to sign contracts with the athletic departments at various universities.
The Kentucky Gazette recently questioned
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16 International Viewpoint #293 the nature of Nike's contract with the University of Kentucky. The basketball coach there now earns $150,000/year from the university and $1 million from Nike. In exchange, Nike's swipe logo appears on university sports uniforms.
Walt Disney sub-contractor pulls out of Haiti
H.H. Cutler, the Walt Disney Com- workers' organisation in Haiti, has called
As the Gazette pointed out: "Nike wins two ways. For sharing its gold and silver, Nike receives more than endorsements—it also buys silence. What coach or sports hero paid to promote a product would do the opposite and kill the Golden Goose?"
"In fact," the newspaper continues, contract specifically states that Nike has the right to terminate the agreement if the University disparages the Nike brand...or takes any other action inconsistent with the endorsement of Nike products.""
What happened in Kentucky has been duplicated in many other universities. Last year, Nike boss Phil Knight, now the sixth richest man in the United States, gave the University of Oregon $25 million for a new law school, 15 professorships and a $40,000 salary supplement for the university president. A few years earlier, he gave an undisclosed sum of monev to remodel and expand the library, which now bears his name. Nike also has a $7 equipment and advertising contract with the university's athletic pany's largest subcontractor in Haiti, plans to shutdown its operations in the poverty-stricken country this September. About 10% of the country's assembly sector workforce would loose their jobs. This would be a devastating blow to those workers and their families, given Haiti's extreme poverty and 80% unemployment.
H.H. Cutler currently employs 2,300 workers, earning starvation wages as low as 28c an hour. Quotas are high, and conditions miserable. Using the pretext of a "slump in demand," H.H. Cutler is in fact responding to criticism from human rights and labour groups for its policies of worker abuse. By relocating its factories to China and Indonesia, the company will not only pay cheaper wages (6c to 13c an hour), but benefit from greater levels of impunity, weaker trade unions, and even less scrutiny from Human Rights observers
Batay Ouvriye, an independent for immediate protests to urge H.H Cutler not to pull out of Haiti and to meet the Haitian workers demands for a living wage, improved working conditions, and the respect of workers rights to organise. This call is backed by the USbased Disney/Haiti Justice Campaign "It should be made clear to H.H. Cutler and to the Walt Disney Company that a pull out would lead to an immediate call for an international boycott of both Disney and H.H . Cutler products. Companies cannot be allowed to pull out just because they are faced with international criticism and attempts by workers to organise for their rights. . "* Phone, fax, mail or e-mail your protest to: Thomas Austin, President, H.H. Cutler, 120 lona Ave. SW, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 49503 USA. Phone: 616-459 9101. Fax: 616-459-2135 Michael Eisner, CEO., The Walt Disney Company, South Buena Vista Street, Burbank, CA 91521 USA. Phone: 818560-1000. Fax: 818-846-7319 For more information contact: The Disney/Haiti Justice Campaign, P.O. Box 748, Village Station, New York, NY 10013 USA. Phone: 212-592-3612
Yes to human rights! No to sweatshops!
Students and faculty have organised to Leading up to a National Day of Cons- In the midst of the shopping season, the put pressure on Nike, saying that Nike contracts should not be renewed as long as the company allows its contractors to engage in labour abuse. The Associated Students at the University of California's Irvine campus have voted to boycott Nike, becoming the first major US university to "say 'No' to Notes 1. In 1980 the International Law Association established the Belgrade Minimal Rules. Rule number 10 stipulates that analysts should provide all of their own experts.) The Campaign for Labor Rights will send a Nike action packet free via e-mail (clr@igc.apc.org). You can subscribe to the Campaign for Labor Rights newsletter for $35 a year in the US, $50 elsewhere. Also check Global Exc hange's web page for Nike campaign alerts: www.globalexchange.org/watch/campaigns/nikecampaign . html Other sources include Nike in Indonesia (6 issues a year for $20, contact Jeff Ballinger, Press for Change PO. Box 161. Alpine. NJ 07620, fax: +1 201-768-5812 and IndonesiaAlert! ($4 issues a year for $12, 1880 Jackson St. #301, Oakland, CA 94612).1
ISN'T THAT AMAZING? THE
HARDER THEY WORK, THE POORER
THEY GET, AND THE RICHER I GET!! OINK, OINK!
cience on October 4, 1997, and a Holiday Season of Conscience in November and December, the National Labor Committee (NLC) is distributing petitions on which up to a million people are expected to sign their names demanding that the President and the U.S. Congress say "Yes! to Human Rights and No! to Sweatshops."
The petition states that "We the People...believe that in our global economy, human rights protections are every bit as important as corporate rights." It calls for wages to be tied to the basic cost of living and for workers to be free to organise to defend their rights. It will be presented to the White House Sweatshop Task Force which will be reporting to the President at the end of the year with its final agreement which will establish industry-wide human rights standards for the first time.
In order to show public opposition to corporate use of sweatshop manufacturing, on October 4th, there will be simultaneous actions in hundreds of cities and communities stretching across the entire country (and around the world) -vigils, candlelight marches, interdenominational services, leafleting, music, demonstrations, ringing of church bells street theatre and much more. Students from grade schools to universities, will be asked to play a major role.
On October 4, the coalition will announce the Holiday Season of Conscience, providing consumers the opportunity to shop with their conscience.
coalition will release a list of the companies with the worst record of human rights violations
Charles Kernaghan, Director of the National Labor Committee, said in announcing the petition drive, "There is an enormous decency in the American people who would never knowingly purchase products made by children, or any exploited worker, forced to toil under sweatshop conditions for starvation wages. Our job is to help create a vehicle to free this voice of decency on the part of millions and millions of American people. If we do our job right, we will create a social movement which will put a human face back into our global
The actions are sponsored by a broad coalition of religious, human rights, labour, student, women's and grassroots organisations, including (along with the NLC) the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (AFL-CIO CLC), the United Methodist Boards of Church and Society and Global Ministries (Women's Division), the Presbyterian Church (USA), the People of Faith Network, Independent Congressman Bernie Sanders, and the State Senate of Vermont among many others. * Order petitions and brochures from the National Labor Committee, 275 Seventh Avenue, 15th Floor, New York, NY 10001: Tel: (212) 242-3002 or download from the NLC Campaign for Labor Rights memberships: Send $35.00 to CLR, 1247 "E" Street SE, Washington, DC 20003. For a sample copy of their newsletter, send your postal address