Cost, risk, and labor markets: the state and sticky institutions in global production networks

Srinivas, Smita (2009): Cost, risk, and labor markets: the state and sticky institutions in global production networks. Published in: Indian Journal of Labor Economics , Vol. 52, No. 4 (2009)

Abstract

This article posits that there is no a priori reason that industrial upgrading and market expansion leads to greater social protections or better regulation. I ask three questions and attempt a conceptual framework for institutions and their broader spatial evolution. A firm’s regional risk ecology ties in insightful ways for primary-secondary workers, insider-outsiders, and to the emergence of social protections. I propose a typology of place, work, and work-place institutions that mitigate risks and mediate costs. Industrial upgrading is a work-place based process; evolution of “informality”, wider social protections, and labour regulations can be assessed accordingly.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Institutions; regulation; social protection; regional risk ecology; co-evolution; construction sector
• Subjects: J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J4 - Particular Labor Markets; L - Industrial Organization > L7 - Industry Studies: Primary Products and Construction > L74 - Construction

References

Ahsan, A. and Pages, C. 2008. Some implications of regional differences in labor-market outcomes in India, in Mazumdar, Dipak and Sarkar, Sandip (Eds.) Globalisation, Labour Markets and Inequality in India, Routledge. All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC). AITUC/ILO Workshop on Social Security for Workers, Social Security Schemes in Kerala, AITUC, New Delhi.

Beasley, T. and Burgess, R. 2004. Can labour regulation hinder economic performance? Evidence from India, Quarterly Journal of Economics 119, 91-134.

Breman, J. 1985. I am the Government Labour Officer....State Protection for Rural Proletariat of South Gujarat, Special Article, Economic and Political Weekly 20 (4), 1043-1055.

Corbridge, S., Williams, G., Srivastava, M. and Veron, R. 2005. Seeing the State: Governance and Governmentality in India, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Deshpande, L. and Deshpande, L. 1998. Impact of Liberalisation on Labour Market in India: What do Facts from NSSO’s 50th Round show?, Economic and Political Weekly 33 (22), L31-L37.

Deshpande, L.K., Alagh, N., Karan, A. and Sarkar, S. 2004. Liberalisation and Labour: Labour Flexibility in Indian Manufacturing, Institute for Human Development, New Delhi.

Doeringer, P. B., & Piore, M. J. 1971. Internal labor markets and manpower analysis. Lexington, MA: Heath.

Esping-Andersen, G. 1990. The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism, Polity Press, Cambridge.

Frontline magazine, India, July 2007, 23 Gibbon, P. and S. Ponte. 2005. Trading Down: Africa, Value Chains and the Global Economy, Temple University Press, Philadelphia.

Government of India. 2002. Report of the Study Group on Skill Development, Training and Workers’ Education, Ministry of Labour, National Commission on Labour.

Government of Tamil Nadu, http://www.alpha.tn.nic.in.stathandbook/title5.htm accessed for Srinivas (2001).

Humphrey, J. and Schmitz, H. 2005. Governance in Global Value Chains, in Schmitz, Hubert (Ed.). 2006. Local Enterprises in the Global Economy: Issues of Governance and Upgrading, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, 95-109.

ILO. Global Employment Trends Model, Geneva. 2001. The Construction Industry in the Twenty-first Century: Its Image, Employment Prospects and Skill Requirements, International Labour Office, Geneva.

Jhabvala, R. 2000. Participatory Approaches: Emerging Trends in Social Security, in Jhabvala, Renana and Subrahmanya, R.K.A. (Eds.), The Unorganised Sector, Work Security and Social Protection, Sage Publications, New Delhi, 30-37.

Kabeer, N. 2004. Globalisation, Labour Standards and Women’s Rights: Dilemmas of Collective. In Action in an Interdependent World, Feminist Economics 10 (1), 3-35.

Kantor, P. and Nair, P. 2003. Risks and Responses Among the Urban Poor in India, Journal of International Development 15, 957-967.

Knorringa P. and Pegler, L. 2006. Globalisation, Firm Upgrading and Impacts on Labour, Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie 97 (5), 470-479.

Kundu, A. 1999. Female Employment and Organised Informalisation, in Papola T.S., Sharma, Alakh.N. Sharma (eds.) Gender and Employment in India, Indian Society of Labour Economics and Institute of Economic Growth, New Delhi.

Levi-Faur, D. 2005. The global diffusion of regulatory capitalism, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 598, 12-32.

Lewin,A.Y. and Volberda, H.W. 1999. Proglomena on coevolution: a framework for research on strategy and new organisational forms, Organisation Science 10 (5), 519–534.

Lindbeck, A. and Snower, D.J. 1986. Wage Setting, Unemployment, and Insider-Outsider Relations, The American Economic Review 76(2), Papers and Proceedings of the Ninety- Eighth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association, May, pp. 235-239.

Lund, F. and S. Srinivas. 2000 (reprinted 2005). Learning from Experience: A Gendered Approach to Social Protection for Workers in the Informal Economy, International Labour Organisation, Geneva, Switzerland ILO/STEP and WIEGO, and Turin (2005).

Mares, I. 2003. The Sources of Business Interest in Social Insurance, Sectoral Versus National Differences, World Politics 55, 229-258.

Mazumdar, D. and Sarkar, S. 2007. Globalisation, Inequality and Labour Markets in India. Routledge Press.

Papola, T.S. 2007. Employment in the Development Agenda: Economic and Social Policies, Discussion Paper DP/170/2007, International Institute for Labour Studies, International Labour Office, Geneva, Switzerland.

Piore, M.J. 1980. Economic Fluctuation, Job Security and Labor-Market Duality in Italy, France and the United States”, Politics & Society 9 (4), 379-407.

Sabel, C.F. 1982. Work and Politics, The Division of Labour in Industry, Cambridge Studies in Modern Political Economies, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England.

Sabel, C.F. 1994. Learning by Monitoring: The Institutions of Economic Development, in Swedberg and Smelser (Eds.) The Handbook of Economic Sociology, Princeton University Press: Russell Sage Foundation, Princeton, NJ.

Sabel, C.F. 1995. Design, Deliberation, and Democracy: On the New Pragmatism of Firms and Public Institutions, Paper presented to the conference on Liberal Institutions, Economic Constitutional Rights, and the Role of Organisations, European University Institute, Florence, December 15-16, 1995.

Schrank, A. and Piore, M.J. 2007. Norms, regulations, and labour standards in Central America, Research Coordination, UN CEPAL, Mexico, February.

Raikes, P., Jensen, M.F., and Ponte, S. 2000. Global commodity chain analysis and the French filière approach: comparison and critique, Economy and Society 29 (3), 390–417.

Rodrik, D. 1997. Trade, Social Insurance, and the Limits to Globalisation, NBER Working Paper No. W5905.

Rodrik, D. 2001. Development Strategies For The Next Century, Harvard University, Kennedy School for Government, February.

Sharma, A. N. 2006. Flexibility, Employment and Labour Market Reforms in India, Economic and Political Weekly, May 27, 2078-85.

Sotarauta, M. and Srinivas, S. 2006. Co-evolutionary Policy Processes: Understanding Innovative Economies and Future Resilience”, Futures 38 (3), 312-336.

Srinivas, S. 2001. Social Security for Construction Workers: State innovation in India, Research Proposal, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT, Cambridge, Mass.

Srinivas, S. 2005. Technical Standards and Economic development: Meeting the most Common Denominator, prepared for the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), Vienna (input into Industrial Development Report 2005).

Srinivas, S. 2008a. Urban Labour Markets in the 21st century: Dualism, Regulation and the Role(s) of the State, Habitat International, Special Issue on Urban Labour 32 (2), 141-159.

Srinivas, S. 2008b. Labour Regulation and Inspection: An Indian or Karnataka model? Technological Change Lab (TCLab) discussion paper, Columbia University.

Srinivas, S. 2010. Industrial Welfare and the State: Nation and City Reconsidered, Theory and Society 39, 451-470.

Tilly, Chris and Hanagan, Michael (Eds.). 2010. Cities, states, trust, and rule: New departures from the work of Charles Tilly 39 (3-4).

Subrahmanya, R.K.A. 1998/1999. Social Protection Schemes in India, Social Security Administration, Winterthur/The Alliance.

Subramaniam, K. K (Eds.) 1982. Construction Labour Market, Allied Publishers, New Delhi.

Van Ginneken, W. (Ed.) 1998. Social Security for the Excluded Majority: Case Studies of Developing Countries, International Labour Office, Geneva, Switzerland.