Catherwood LibraryILR School

In light of labor unions’ struggle to fight dwindling membership and the resulting decrease in clout in collective bargaining agreements with managements, labor leaders around the world are taking on workers’ rights issues in an effective and new way. With workers on the lower end of supply chains generally suffering the most labor abuses globally, worker advocacy groups have decided to go directly to workers and gather what kind of change they would need in their workplace to feel safe, especially given the massive infrastructure issues many manufacturing plants have in places like southeast Asia. The main components of the groups’ new approach focus on prioritizing the needs of workers, actually enforcing regulatory standards on companies with the help of workers as opposed to letting them “self-regulate”, and imposing tangible market consequences on employers who violate labor and workplace regulations. Massive organized labor groups, such as the AFL-CIO and United Steelworkers, have heartily supported these efforts, noting that innovation and a reinvention of unions’ roles in serving workers are necessary in the modern era.