Karin Astrid Siegmann

Karin Astrid Siegmann
Erasmus University Rotterdam | EUR · International Institute of Social Studies (ISS)

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53
Publications
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Publications

Publications (53)
Article
Full-text available
This article engages with the role of technological upgrading for work in agriculture, a sector commonly disregarded in debates about the future of work. Foregrounding migrant work in Dutch horticulture, it explores how technological innovation is connected to the scope and security of employment. Besides, it proposes a heuristic that connects work...
Article
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Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare and exacerbates the existing insecurities of sex workers. This paper asks: What are sex workers’ everyday experiences of (in)security? And: How has the COVID-19 pandemic influenced these? Methods We engage with these questions through collaborative research based on semi-structured interviews carrie...
Article
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Fairtrade certification of plantations seeks to productively intervene in the continuity of exploitative labor conditions that tea plantation workers in South Asia have experienced since the plantations’ inception under colonial rule. Based on a mixed methods study conducted in 2016 in India and Sri Lanka, this article engages with the puzzling rei...
Article
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Unfree labour has been central to the Indian tea industry’s ‘business model’ since its establishment under British colonial rule. In this paper, we investigate forms of unfree labour in south Indian tea plantations based on a mixed methods study. Conceptualizing unfree labour in a multi-dimensional way our analysis brings to the fore how economic a...
Article
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This article seeks to clarify the effect of growth on gender equality for the case of Pakistan, a country that has seen periods of high growth alongside the persistence of stark gender inequalities. The paper addresses this aim by estimating gendered sectoral employment elasticities of growth for the period 1984–2017 and investigates their drivers....
Article
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The SDGs’ commitment to inclusive growth reflects an increasing international concern with the inclusiveness of macro-economic development. Yet, although research underscores that economic growth is not gender-neutral, gender dimensions remain a footnote to these debates. This article explores the connection between growth performance and gender in...
Technical Report
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Commissioned by Fairtrade International, this study investigates whether Fairtrade certification has made a difference in the lives of workers on tea plantations in two major tea-producing countries, namely India and Sri Lanka. The geographical focus of our study is motivated by the fact that India and Sri Lanka are the two countries with the highe...
Article
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This article looks at the effectiveness of Fairtrade’s labour rights commitments through the lens of convention theory. It zooms in on workers involved in the cultivation, harvest, and processing of tea as Fairtrade’s single most important plantation product. Based on data generated in 2016 through a mixed methods study on the role of Fairtrade cer...
Article
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This article looks at the effectiveness of Fairtrade’s labour rights commitments through the lens of convention theory. It zooms in on workers involved in the cultivation, harvest, and processing of tea as Fairtrade’s single most important plantation product. Based on data generated in 2016 through a mixed methods study on the role of Fairtrade cer...
Article
This paper investigates the role of voluntary initiatives (VIs) as non-governmental systems of labour regulation in global value chains (GVCs). We ask under which conditions VIs with a more active role for labour emerge. In order to answer this question, we apply Wright’s (2000) theory of the factors enabling positive class compromise to a VI imple...
Article
Résumé Les initiatives privées participent à la gouvernance du travail au sein des chaînes de valeur mondiales, mais les travailleurs n'y jouent souvent qu'un rôle accessoire. Face à ce constat, les auteurs reprennent les thèses de Wright (2000) sur les conditions d'un «compromis de classe positif» et les appliquent à l'analyse du protocole sur la...
Article
Resumen Los autores investigan las posibilidades de «mejora social impulsada por los trabajadores» a través de iniciativas de RSE en cadenas mundiales de valor (CMV). Aplican la teoría de Wright sobre el pacto de clase positivo al análisis del Protocolo de Libertad Sindical concluido en el sector de prendas deportivas de Indonesia, ampliándola para...
Article
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SOS Rosarno, an association of farmworkers, farmers and activists in Calabria, Italy, represents an innovative response from below to the extreme exploitation and precarity of migrant farmworkers in the Mediterranean region, as well as to the retailer-driven crisis of small-scale farming.
Conference Paper
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While worker precariousness is widespread, we are also witnessing encouraging examples where workers and labour organizations, jointly with allies, have successfully challenged the economic, political and social structures that marginalize them. These initiatives offer a glimpse of the potential power of workers to (re-)establish rights and improve...
Article
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Given ongoing changes in the world of work that affect both developing and industrialized countries, we argue that it is time to bring the notions of informal and precarious work together. Work-related insecurities offer a conceptual umbrella for the conditions that a large number of workers in the global North and South experience. They emerge in...
Research
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The organization of production in global value chains (GVCs) has been accompanied by a rise of informal and insecure work. Yet, the role of labour agency has received scant attention in the GVC and related literatures. Selwyn (2013) therefore demands to shift attention towards engagement with labour movements to identify what he terms ‘labour-led’...
Article
This article reviews the recent literature on existing mechanisms that allow for the portability of social security entitlements for migrant workers and finds that North-North migrants have the best access to portability. There is limited coordination between origin and destination countries regarding the portability of social entitlements of South...
Chapter
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This chapter contributes to the emerging literature on men who do ‘women’s work’. It focuses on the ‘feminine’ occupation of domestic worker and on how male and female migrant workers balance their gender identities at the intersection of class, race, and immigration status. It addresses the related research gap in the Netherlands by focusing on th...
Article
Pakistan's Vision 2025 connects a policy commitment to greater gender equality with inclusive growth. It prioritises a "good quality of life and high living standard for all citizens across regions, gender" and to "achieve an annual average growth rate of 7 to 8 per cent that is inclusive and endogenous" as its first two objectives (GoP 2014a). The...
Article
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Purpose In this paper the aim is to show how the translation of a logical positivist epistemology into neoclassical economics has had profound methodological consequences which over‐determine an inability to predict cusps and their associated crises. Design/methodology/approach Based on a review of epistemological and methodological literature, it...
Article
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This chapter explores the impact of the global financial crisis on South Asia in terms of qualitative and quantitative aspects of employment. South Asia hosts a quarter of the world’s population and a fifth of the global workforce – as well as 40 percent of the global poor (World Bank 2010). This paper therefore contributes to an assessment of the...
Article
This article investigates the role of international labour migration from Pakistan’s Northwest for the sending communities’ social resilience. It focuses on the implications of male out‐migration for the women who stay behind. This article refers to Bourdieu’s Theory of Practice to shed light on the gendered nature of vulnerability and resilience....
Article
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This paper aims to conceptualise the gendered interface between social capital and vulnerability. It emphasises Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of social capital embedded in his Theory of Practice as a fruitful analytical device for this intersection. Our conceptual thoughts are based on a review of literature on the role of migration-related social netwo...
Article
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Migration is an important social and historical reality in South Asia. In the past decade, migration from one country to another and internal migration (i.e. migration within a particular country) have assumed different dimensions for people in the region. Contemporary research on migration is placed in a spectrum that ranges from exponents of econ...
Article
While Pakistan’s National Information Technology (IT) Policy aims at harnessing the potential of information and communication technologies (ICTs) for development, especially in the underserved rural areas, it ignores the role of existing gender inequalities on the possible benefits of ICTs. We have investigated aspects of the ‘gender digital divid...
Article
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A million tonnes of cotton are hand-picked by women and girls every year in Pakistan’s ‘cotton belt’. Despite their evident contribution to the economy, the pickers’ fates remain invisible in the daily headlines on cotton production as well as in academic research. The present article tries to address this blind spot while focussing on the working...
Article
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Migration within and out of south Asia has been a practice steeped in historical processes. This article identifies commonalities such as the significant macroeconomic role of migration and similar main destinations for south Asia's mobile populations. It critiques popular themes in the discourse on migration, like the focus on economic benefits of...
Article
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This paper looks at how Nike’s soccer ball suppliers (previous and current) in Sialkot (Pakistan) fare in relation to the company’s code of ethics. While minimum required working conditions are implemented, the criteria for social and environmental compliance are not met with. The multinational’s decision to withdraw orders from the previous suppli...
Article
Because the system of "purdah" has translated into extreme occupational segregation, a disproportionately large share of Pakistan's female labour force is employed in stitching/sewing made-ups and garments for export. But since January 2005, when the ATC terminated the decades-old quota regime that regulated international trade in textiles and clot...
Article
[Introduction:] EU-Pakistan Trade in Textiles and Clothing: A Love – Hate Relationship? European nights are intimately linked to Pakistan. A large number of the community’s citizens spend their nights on Pakistani bed-sheets. In 2005, the South Asian economy was the largest supplier of bed-linen to the union (Aziz, 2006). Sufficient basis for an in...
Article
Introduction: News on Pakistan’s trade performance is rarely found side by side, or even associated with, headlines on gender equality. Yet both are burning issues for Pakistani society. This article aims at highlighting their connections. Put differently, it shows how the world market is tied to Pakistani stoves. Trade is important for Pakistan’s...
Article
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This study assesses the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on gendered labour markets in rural Indonesia. It focuses on the gender composition of the workforce, female and male workers' employment conditions and gender wage inequality. The research strategy of »between-methods triangulation« is chosen, denoting the combination of quantitativ...
Article
A large number of the European community use bed-linen supplied by Pakistan. In 2005, the South Asian economy was the largest supplier of bed-linen to the union (Aziz, 2006). The European Union (EU) is Pakistan's largest trading partner, with textiles and clothing (T&C) accounting for almost two thirds of its sales to the union (EC's Delegation to...
Article
Intro: Economic Integration, Stagnating Gender Equality? During the high-level meeting in Hong Kong, WTO member countries discussed issues ranging from abolishing agricultural export subsidies and industrial tariff reduction, and market access for foreign banks and telecom providers. The human face of trade and investment flows, however, is often h...
Article
This paper gives an overview of the human and social dimensions of Pakistan’s water policies to provide the basis for water-related policy interventions that contribute to the country’s human development, with special attention being given to the concerns of women and the poor. While Pakistan may not be a water-scarce country, water stress, poor wa...
Article
The global environment after the expiry of the quota system in textiles and clothing (T&C) trade poses formidable challenges to human development in Pakistan. Increased quality and price competition in the post-ATC scenario provides an opportunity for some segments of the T&C sector – but a threat to the most labour-intensive ones. As quality and q...
Article
Le gouvernement a réalisé que le secteur du textile et de l'habillement est de ceux qui offrent de bonnes perspectives de diversification des exportations, par rapport aux traditionnels produits de base, pour entrer dans l'industrialisation, absorber une main-d'œuvre nombreuse, combler le fossé qui existe entre le secteur rural et le secteur urbain...
Article
The government has realized that textile and clothing sector is one sector that offers good prospects for diversification away from traditional commodity exports, for entry into the area of manufacturers, for absorption of large pools of manpower, for crossing the big divide between the rural and urban sectors, for poverty alleviation, and for gend...
Article
In January 2005, the quota system for imports of textiles and clothing was phased out and gave way to more liberalized global trade in textiles and clothing. The T&C industry is Pakistan’s main export engine. It is also a major industrial employer, and one of the few sectors that provide paid employment to female workers. The policy paper highlight...
Chapter
The good news first: The gender wage differential2 in Indonesia declined during the past fifteen years until the Asian financial crisis. Whereas in 1986 women’s monthly wages represented less than 60% of mens’ monthly wages, in 1997 this percentage had risen to more than 70%. The persisting gap has commonly been attributed to the typically longer e...
Article
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Assumptions applied in Orthodox Economic methods are criticised for being an inadequate depiction of reality. This is particularly the case from the perspective of Feminist Economics. Gender biases are reflected in the quantitative data sources and methods commonly applied for economic research. These include male biases in statistical data, a focu...

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