The Tip of the Iceberg: Media Coverage of “Slave Labor” in Argentina

Abstract

The Argentina media often report “slave labor” conditions in clothing production and seed nurseries. A critical assessment of the types of coercion (economic and noneconomic) that hold workers under these brutal conditions indicates that instances of extraeconomic coercion are merely the extreme manifestation of a general situation in which economic coercion predominates. The determinants of the deterioration of working conditions in these two sectors include relative overpopulation and technological backwardness. Los medios habitualmente refieren en a las condiciones laborales en los talleres textiles y empresas semilleras argentinas como formas de “trabajo esclavo.” Un balance crítico de los tipos de coacción (económica o extraeconómica) que confina a estos trabajadores a brutales condiciones laborales indica que los casos particulares donde existe alguna forma de coacción extraeconómica pueden considerarse la manifestación extrema de una condición más extendida donde la coacción económica predomina. Las determinaciones del deterioro de las condiciones laborales en estas dos ramas económicas incluyen la expansión de la sobrepoblación relativa y el carácter tecnológicamente atrasado de estas actividades.

Multiplying Labour, Multiplying Resistance: Class Composition in Buenos Aires’ Clandestine Textile Workshops

“…For migrants in the talleres this constrains their political compositions (a point explored in detail below), but the workshop economy’s small, kinship‐based nature also leads to the external promotion of culturalist analyses (Gago ). This limited, intra‐collective interaction is a contingency borne of a specific technical composition, yet it is frequently portrayed by the state and media as part of an inherent “Bolivianess”—most famously when a judge ruled that Bolivians like working in such conditions as they reflect “traditional Andean values” (Kabat et al ). As explored below, the flaws in such analyses are manifold, simultaneously essentialising Bolivian migrants and ignoring their internal class relationships.…”

“…In conjunction with the terrible working conditions revealed through campaigns by La Alameda and others, these hyper‐visible moments of excess shape knowledge of the talleres and those that work in them. Given this, mainstream descriptions of the talleres tend towards the hyperbolic, something exacerbated by a powerful, popular, and paternalistic discourse of “slave labour” prevalent in much Argentine media (Kabat et al ). This is not to downplay levels of exploitation, merely to note that the expanded workshop economy’s complexity becomes flattened by this dominance of culturalist narratives and analyses.…”

“…Buenos Aires’ textile industry is big business, employing over 300,000 Bolivian migrants in talleres clandestinos (clandestine workshops; Kabat et al ). But with “informal” employment as high as 80% (Burchielli et al ), and most production existing behind closed doors, the industry—often literally—remains underground: the vast majority of the 25,000 workshops are situated in the owners’ properties in the city’s villas miserias (informal settlements), with others hidden in more formal neighbourhoods (Montero Bressán and Arcos ).…”

“…After a brief methodology, I use this framework to explore how the talleres maximise accumulation and limit resistance. This complex, communitarian economy is, however, often misrepresented through a culturalist lens driven by media‐friendly “slave labour” discourses (Kabat et al ). The next section therefore explores this view’s conceptual and practical limitations, highlighting how such a discourse is counterproductive and weaponised by talleristas (workshop‐owners) to increase exploitation.…”

Gestão De Riscos Sociais Em Cadeias De Suprimentos: Um Estudo De Caso

“…• Reputacional: abraça as consequências geradas a empresa relacionadas ao capital reputacional (Lau, 2011;Christopher et al, 2011;Kabat et al 2017).…”