“New Citizenship”? What can be done at the supply chain in China?

I met with Dotti Hatcher, the Executive Director, P.A.C.E. Global Initiatives (http://www.gapinc.com/content/csr/html/Goals/communityinvestment/our_program_in_action/advancing_in_theworkplace.html) , Gap Inc last week in Hong Kong coz we have some involvements in their program last year. I can say Gap is one of the few brands which have started to work on such innovative programs for workers in China.

I’m rethinking in the past 1-2 years on the question whether the so-called CSR initiatives at the global supply chain are making an positive impact on the living of workers. We always see brands working on capacity building of factories, no matter on productivity, working hour, overtime, etc. But the issue is that whether workers (who are the targeted groups of beneficiary and also cause of brands being monitored) are benefited by those program. My feeling is “NO”.

I’m happy to see leading brands such as Gap to launch program such as P.A.C.E (Personal Advancement & Career Enhancement) program in China. We see Foxconn is doubling the salary of workers. But does it really help? Do we know what the workers want? When we talk to workers regularly, we found that most of those want to stay in the cities, become an urban citizen, have more sense of belongings to the city, have the kid being educated there. But they need to understand more about the culture and expectation of urban citizens before having such achievement. There are some NGOs that I know in China are promoting the concept of “New Citizenship”. I suppose to most of the non-Chinese, it is a bit weird to hear about such concept. Due to the Chinese government policy’s on urban and rural household, lots of problems such as migrant children, stay behind children and social security exist and these problems are all linked to the so called CSR at the supply chain.

Most of the migrant workers are having the rural household, and that means they cannot enjoy the social welfare as an urban citizen. But they are staying in urban area as a resident due to their job. There are always misunderstanding and even discrimination against them in the urban area due to cultural differences. They are being seen as “uncivilized” (not a good term to use…), impolite, lack of education, etc.

Although brands and factories cannot do much in terms of influencing the policy on the household, program such as PACE can provide workers alternative views on their personal life and to understand what they want to achieve in long term if they want to stay in the urban area, and also eliminate those cultural difference by telling workers what urban people are expecting from them. Rather than spending the time on internet café for online games or chit-chat through QQ, workers can have a clear idea on how their future can be. In my opinion it is also a soft approach for workers to understand their own rights (legal rights, labour rights, etc.) and then create changes in long term. And it is more acceptable for factories to implement the program as well.

Of course, there are not so many brands that are similar to Gap, and we cannot expect responsibilities of manufacturers to be taken by the brands. Demonstrating the business case of having such New Citizenship programme to the factory is very curial. Brands and NGOs can work together on such aspect. We need more successful cases on this matter, and I believe there are NGOs starting to work on that now.

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