Sourcing Ethical Fashion for Collegiate Apparel: ‘School House’ Lessons in Business and Ethics
In my junior and senior year, Caitrin Lynch, Associate Professor of Anthropology, and I wrote a case study exploring the interplay of anthropology and ethical business practices. The case study specifically examined School House, a now closed collegiate apparel company created by Rachel Weeks, a Duke University alum, that paid its Sri Lankan workers a living wage for a time.
I was drawn to this research because:
I was excited to work with Caitrin and to get more exposure to the social sciences and we dove right in. I spent a while acquainting myself with the vernacular of the field and learning how to read dense research papers effectively. We wrote a conference paper and Caitrin presented it at the University of Sussex for the 'Accounting for "Health" and "Safety" in the Global Garment Industry' where we got a lot of wonderful feedback from peers and experts in the field. After incorporating the feedback and re-evaluated our findings, we re-submitted the paper for publishing in the volume After Rana Plaza: Rethinking the Health and Safety of Global Garment Workers. The world of lifestyle-branded ethical garments raises many questions for people concerned with the health and safety of garment workers. Labor activists, factory owners, and garment buyers often do not even have agreement on how to define the problem, never mind identify solutions. Many consumers crave a guarantee of fair labor, but who defines what is “fair” or “ethical”? How does the term “ethical” change within different cultural, industrial, or geographic contexts? In the current trend of fast-fashion and free trade, garment buyers shift manufacturing to locations with the lowest costs, and suppliers in turn are pressured to decrease all costs, labor included. How can this cycle be broken and what are the responsibilities of each stakeholder in the global supply chain? What is the balance between ethical and profitable? How do stakeholders prioritize one ethical issue 3 over another, and how do stakeholders choose what specific strategy to take to achieve the chosen good?
With these questions as the wider context, this paper focused on a small entrepreneurial company's five-year, ultimately suspended, efforts to create a line of ethical clothing. School House first sourced garments in Sri Lanka in 2008 and then moved to the United States in 2011 to source all labor and components in North Carolina. It ultimately went out of business in 2013. The School House story provided the opportunity to examine the obstacles for a small business owner to make a difference in the lives of workers in the global garment industry. Stemming from our assumption that ethical businesses are valuable, we argued that that School House provides lessons on the possibilities of improving the lives of garment workers, and all workers, within the global value chain. In the paper, we described School House’s mission, strategies, and storytelling techniques and the difficult environments it encountered as a small business working in the collegiate garment industry both abroad and at home.
From this paper, I was able to examine the challenges of running a socially conscious business in the tricky fashion industry. Telling a good story is not enough: connections and a good team seemed to be instrumental from this case study. This paper forced me to consider the effects of culture on our attitudes regarding labor. I was fascinated by the fact that companies in the global North will often adopt paternalistic policies that admonish factories but do not provide them resources to make improvements and often do not even address the needs of workers (for example, reproductive health and rights to collective bargaining). So the efforts that sometimes consumers demand translate into a strained relationship sometimes marked by intimidation. Further, in the United States, we may adopt exceptionalist values about labor in America. Consumers sometimes believe that American workers must work for their rights. The capitalistic attitudes that make America so innovative and powerful marginalizes groups of people and this is accepted as a motivating by-product of America's economic model. I entered into this research believing that capitalism though flawed makes America exceptional (and I suppose this was true). As I read more and more from various sources, I've taken on a more nuanced and better educated attitude that understands the benefits and detriments of this economic system and how our culture and other cultures are affected by it. I also learned the part that technology and innovation have to play.
This project was truly interdisciplinary: I learned about the nuanced and complex connections between social justice, culture, business, and technology. This research was one of the most significant activities of my engineering experiences thus far because it explores the larger effects my work on the world and its inhabitants as an engineer. The global supply chain is vast and easily forgotten when focusing on the intricacies of a mechanical design project. Exploring it has allowed me to develop empathy and reflection as I develop my technical skills.
I was drawn to this research because:
- I was enticed by exploring the intricacies of creating positive change (ethical labor practices) in a gargantuan system steeped in inequality and injustices (the garment industry). To battle the beast, you must first understand it. I've always identified as a pragmatic idealist: someone with strong convictions regarding social justice who seeks to educate themselves with the complexities of the world.
- As such, I saw the utility in exploring a business that attempted to make positive change within a pre-existing unjust system. I wondered how much one can make a difference from within versus from without.
- I was excited to support and examine the efforts of a female entrepreneur. Women in the United States are about half as likely as men to start a business, possibly explained by socialized ideas regarding gender roles and sexism in funding practices. I was excited to learn more about this woman's experiences (for a nice overview of this topic, please visit this page by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation).
- I've always loved textiles, garments, and fashion because it has such a strong attachment to our identity and our feelings. Today, the garment industry has a massive global effect on individuals from worker to consumer.
I was excited to work with Caitrin and to get more exposure to the social sciences and we dove right in. I spent a while acquainting myself with the vernacular of the field and learning how to read dense research papers effectively. We wrote a conference paper and Caitrin presented it at the University of Sussex for the 'Accounting for "Health" and "Safety" in the Global Garment Industry' where we got a lot of wonderful feedback from peers and experts in the field. After incorporating the feedback and re-evaluated our findings, we re-submitted the paper for publishing in the volume After Rana Plaza: Rethinking the Health and Safety of Global Garment Workers. The world of lifestyle-branded ethical garments raises many questions for people concerned with the health and safety of garment workers. Labor activists, factory owners, and garment buyers often do not even have agreement on how to define the problem, never mind identify solutions. Many consumers crave a guarantee of fair labor, but who defines what is “fair” or “ethical”? How does the term “ethical” change within different cultural, industrial, or geographic contexts? In the current trend of fast-fashion and free trade, garment buyers shift manufacturing to locations with the lowest costs, and suppliers in turn are pressured to decrease all costs, labor included. How can this cycle be broken and what are the responsibilities of each stakeholder in the global supply chain? What is the balance between ethical and profitable? How do stakeholders prioritize one ethical issue 3 over another, and how do stakeholders choose what specific strategy to take to achieve the chosen good?
With these questions as the wider context, this paper focused on a small entrepreneurial company's five-year, ultimately suspended, efforts to create a line of ethical clothing. School House first sourced garments in Sri Lanka in 2008 and then moved to the United States in 2011 to source all labor and components in North Carolina. It ultimately went out of business in 2013. The School House story provided the opportunity to examine the obstacles for a small business owner to make a difference in the lives of workers in the global garment industry. Stemming from our assumption that ethical businesses are valuable, we argued that that School House provides lessons on the possibilities of improving the lives of garment workers, and all workers, within the global value chain. In the paper, we described School House’s mission, strategies, and storytelling techniques and the difficult environments it encountered as a small business working in the collegiate garment industry both abroad and at home.
From this paper, I was able to examine the challenges of running a socially conscious business in the tricky fashion industry. Telling a good story is not enough: connections and a good team seemed to be instrumental from this case study. This paper forced me to consider the effects of culture on our attitudes regarding labor. I was fascinated by the fact that companies in the global North will often adopt paternalistic policies that admonish factories but do not provide them resources to make improvements and often do not even address the needs of workers (for example, reproductive health and rights to collective bargaining). So the efforts that sometimes consumers demand translate into a strained relationship sometimes marked by intimidation. Further, in the United States, we may adopt exceptionalist values about labor in America. Consumers sometimes believe that American workers must work for their rights. The capitalistic attitudes that make America so innovative and powerful marginalizes groups of people and this is accepted as a motivating by-product of America's economic model. I entered into this research believing that capitalism though flawed makes America exceptional (and I suppose this was true). As I read more and more from various sources, I've taken on a more nuanced and better educated attitude that understands the benefits and detriments of this economic system and how our culture and other cultures are affected by it. I also learned the part that technology and innovation have to play.
This project was truly interdisciplinary: I learned about the nuanced and complex connections between social justice, culture, business, and technology. This research was one of the most significant activities of my engineering experiences thus far because it explores the larger effects my work on the world and its inhabitants as an engineer. The global supply chain is vast and easily forgotten when focusing on the intricacies of a mechanical design project. Exploring it has allowed me to develop empathy and reflection as I develop my technical skills.