This volume addresses many of the complex issues raised by North American integration through the lens of one of the largest and most global industries in the region: textiles and apparel. In part, this is a story of winners and losers in the globalization process, especially if one focuses on jobs lost and jobs gained in different countries and communities within North America, defined here as: Canada, the United States, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. However, it would be a mistake to view the industry solely in these zerosum terms. The North American apparel industry is an excellent illustration of larger trends in the global economy, in which regional divisions of labor appear to be one of the most stable and effective responses to globalization. The contributors to this volume are an international and interdisciplinary group of scholars who have all done detailed fieldwork at the firm and factory levels in one or more countries of North America.Taken together the essays offer theoretical and methodological innovations built around the intersection of the global commodity chains and industrial districts literatures, as well as innovative approaches to studying the impact of cross-national, interfirm networks in terms of production and trade issues, and local development outcomes for workers and communities. Author note: Gary Gereffi is Director of the Markets and Management Studies Program at Duke University. He is the co-editor of "Commodity Chains and Global Capitalism" (with Miguel Korzeniewicz) and "Manufacturing Miracles: Paths of Industrialization in Latin America and East Asia" (with Donald L. Wyman). David Spener is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. He is the co-editor (with Kathleen Staudt) of "The U.S.-Mexico Border: Transcending Divisions, Contesting Identities". Jennifer Bair is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Yale University.
Author(s): Gary Gereffi, David Spener, Jennifer Bair
Year: 2002
Language: English
Pages: 360
Contents......Page 6
List of Tables and Figures......Page 8
Acknowledgments......Page 11
Part I: Analytical Overview......Page 13
1. Introduction: The Apparel Industry and North American Economic Integration......Page 14
2. NAFTA and the Apparel Commodity Chain: Corporate Strategies, Interfirm Networks, and Industrial Upgrading......Page 34
Part II: The Changing Face of the Apparel Industry in the United States......Page 62
3. Subcontracting Networks int he New York City Garment Industry: Changing Characteristics in a Global Era......Page 64
4. The Impact of North American Economic Integration on the Los Angeles Apparel Industry......Page 85
5. The New Sweatshops in the United States: How New, How Real, How Many, and Why?......Page 111
6. Labor's Reponse to Global Production......Page 134
Part III: The U.S.-Mexico Border Region......Page 148
7. The Unraveling Seam: NAFTA and the Decline of the Apparel Industry in El Paso, Texas......Page 150
8. TexMex: Linkages in a a Binational Garment District: The Garment Industries in El Paso and Ciudad Juarez......Page 172
9. Commodity Chains and Industrial Organization in the Apparel Industry in Monterrey and Ciudad Juarez......Page 192
Part IV: Interior Mexico......Page 212
10. Torreon: The New Blue Jeans Capital of the World......Page 214
11. Learning and the Limits of Foreign Partners as Teachers......Page 235
12. Knitting the Networks Between Mexican Producers and the U.S. Market......Page 257
13. Fragmented Markets, Elaborate Chains: The Retail Distribution of Imported Clothing in Mexico......Page 277
Part V: Central America and the Caribbean......Page 296
14. When Does Apparel Become a Peril? On the Nature of Industrialization in the Caribbean Basin......Page 298
15. Can the Dominican Republic's Export-Processing Zones Survive NAFTA?......Page 319
Part VI: Conclusion......Page 336
16. NAFTA and Uneven Development in the North American Apparel Industry......Page 338
About the Contributors......Page 352
Index......Page 354
