Private, voluntary compliance programs, promoted by global corporations and nongovernmental organizations alike, have produced only modest and uneven improvements in working conditions and labor rights in most global supply chains. Through a detailed study of a major global apparel company and its suppliers, this article argues that this compliance model rests on misguided theoretical and empirical assumptions concerning the power of multinational corporations in global supply chains, the role information (derived from factory audits) plays in shaping the behavior of key actors (e.g., global brands, transnational activist networks, suppliers, purchasing agents, etc.) in these production networks, and the appropriate incentives required to change behavior and promote improvements in labor standards in these emergent centers of global production. The authors argue that it is precisely these faulty assumptions and the way they have come to shape various labor compliance initiatives throughout the world-even more than a lack of commitment, resources, or transparency by global brands and their suppliers to these programs-that explain why this compliance-focused model of private voluntary regulation has not succeeded. In contrast, this article documents that a more commitment-oriented approach to improving labor standards coexists and, in many of the same factories, complements the traditional compliance model. This commitment-oriented approach, based on joint problem solving, information exchange, and the diffusion of best practices, is often obscured by the debates over traditional compliance programs but exists in myriad factories throughout the world and has led to sustained improvements in working conditions and labor rights at these workplaces.
Himachal Pradesh outperforms other Indian states in implementing universal primary education. Through comparative field research, this article finds that bureaucratic norms—unwritten rules that guide public officials—influence how well state agencies deliver services for the poor. The findings call attention to the informal, everyday practices that generate state capacity.
This article analyzes India's recent enactment of universal primary education. This programmatic policy change is puzzling given the clientelistic features of Indian democracy. Drawing on interviews and official documents, I demonstrate the catalytic role of committed state elites, who introduced incremental reforms over three decades. These officials operated beneath the political radar, layering small‐scale initiatives on top of the mainstream school system. Following India's globalization in the 1990s, support from the World Bank gave committed officials the political opportunity to experiment with new programs in underperforming regions, which they progressively extended across the country. These incremental reforms supplied the institutional blueprint for India's universal primary education program. Along with state initiative from above, civil society mobilized from below, using the judiciary to hold the state legally responsible for policy implementation. Reforms exposed acute gaps in service delivery, propelling new civic demands for state accountability.
Gender-targeted police reforms are frequently proposed to tackle the global problem of rising yet under-reported gender-based violence (GBV)—but with mixed and often disappointing results. We explore this issue in India, a country with alarming rates of GBV and limited police capacity, by studying the impact of Women’s Help Desks (WHDs): dedicated spaces for women in local police stations, staffed by trained officers. Drawing on the largest randomized controlled trial of a police reform to date (180 police stations serving 23.4 million people), we find that officers in stations with WHDs are more likely to register cases of GBV, particularly where female officers run the desks. This suggests that even in resource-constrained and patriarchal environments, police responsiveness can be improved by focusing and mainstreaming attention to women’s cases and by greater gender representation within the police.
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