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The purpose of this paper is to explore how human resource (HR) managers in garment factories in a Sri Lankan export processing zone (EPZ) navigated the tension between their role as stewards of employee welfare and their role to maximise firm productivity in response to time and production pressures imposed by international buyers. Relatively little attention has been paid to the role of HR managers as liaisons between firms and labour. This omission is significant, given the importance of human resource management in the recruitment and retention of labour and the role of HR managers in organisational performance and regulatory compliance.

A qualitative approach was used based on interviews with 18 HR managers, factory managers and other key informants, and 63 factory workers from 12 firms in the Katunayake EPZ. The interviews and focus groups in English were transcribed and coded into themes arising from the literature and further developed from the transcripts. Initial codes were analysed to identify common themes across the data set.

HR managers were acutely aware of the competitive pressures facing the EPZ garment factories. While examples of company welfarism were evident, HR practices such as incentive payment systems and the management of employee absences reinforced a workplace environment of long hours, work intensification and occupational injury.

This paper goes some way towards filling the gap in our understanding of the roles played by HR managers in garment factories in the Global South, raising theoretical debates regarding the potential for HR managers in developing countries to distance themselves from the negative consequences of HR practices such as individual and team reward systems.

This study aims to explore the challenges in implementing and sustaining lean in garment supplier factories and the buyer–supplier role in mitigating lean barriers in a typical situation and pandemic.

Following a qualitative research approach and multiple embedded case study method, data were collected through in-depth interviews with senior managers of one lead buyer and their four key garment supplier factories in Bangladesh. Within and cross-case analysis, techniques were applied to understand the context-oriented lean challenges and buyer–supplier role in mitigating the challenges.

The study findings demonstrate that garment suppliers are less prepared and unsystematic in lean implementation having limited capabilities and less preparation. Moreover, they have limited support from buyers, less commitment from top management and employee resistance to implementing lean. Lean challenges become more intense because of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, buyer–supplier responsible, cooperative and collaborative behaviour can mitigate lean challenges.

Whereas many stakeholders may be responsible for lean challenges, this study explores dyadic role between buyer and supplier only based on a single lead buyer and their four suppliers. Hence future studies could consider more buyers and suppliers for a holistic understanding.

This study could help buyers and suppliers understand the underlying causes of lean implementation challenges in garment supplier factories and their role in sustaining lean reducing the challenges, particularly in a pandemic.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, for the first time, this study depicts how buyer and supplier can play their due roles to mitigate lean challenges in garment supplier factories in a pandemic situation.

The authors compared garments made in Poland, Japan and China to investigate the effect of country of manufacture (COM) on garment marketability by Japanese and Chinese experts. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the differences between the Japanese and Chinese experts.

The authors compared ten jackets and ten skirts manufactured by four factories in Poland, Japan and China and one Japanese sample maker using five different textiles. The authors provided the same specifications and sample pattern to each of the garment makers. The garment’s marketability was evaluated by 16 Japanese and 18 Chinese experts using a questionnaire survey, considering garment shape, silhouette, face fabric, sub-materials, anticipated appeal to consumers, sewing and ironing skills, and estimated selling price.

There were high correlations between the Japanese experts’ estimated selling price and evaluation scores in relation to shape, silhouette and face fabric. There were high correlations between the Chinese experts’ estimated selling price and evaluation scores in relation to all items except for face fabric and buttons. However, there were no significant differences between manufacturing countries. Therefore, the garment quality was not dependent on COM because the manufacturing skills of all selected factories were adequate.

This study experimentally investigated the effect of COM on garment marketability by evaluating garments manufactured in Japan, China and Poland using the same pattern and specification sheet. Moreover, these results show differences between the Japanese and Chinese experts for the COM effect.

This study aims to investigate how buyer-assisted lean intervention in garment supplier factories affects garment suppliers' productivity and production capability development.

Employing a qualitative research approach and a lean intervention design, a multiple case study method was adopted for this study. Quantitative data on productivity performance and qualitative data on production capability development were collected from a Danish buyer and their four corresponding garment suppliers. Collected data were analysed using standard lean measurement tools and qualitative data analysis techniques.

This study demonstrates that buyer-assisted lean intervention is a useful strategy for garment suppliers to enhance their productivity and production capability. However, suppliers need to select the right lean tools, ensure seriousness and commitment to lean initiatives, substantial involvement of top management and workers, arrange formal and informal training, provide performance-based financial/non-financial incentives and nurture a learning culture to facilitate suppliers' production capability development.

This study implemented few lean tools in a single sewing line in four supplier factories for a short intervention duration. Thus, there is a scope for future studies to investigate the impact of the lean intervention on a large scale.

The findings of this study might bring new insights to the management of buyer and supplier firms concerning how buyers could involve in suppliers' lean intervention initiatives and what suppliers need to ensure to develop production capability.

For the first time, this study engaged a buyer in suppliers' lean intervention initiatives to improve productivity and production capability in the garment industry of a developing country.

This study explores the challenges of garment suppliers in delivering defect-free products to their buyers and how buyers play a role in overcoming the challenges.

Following a qualitative research approach and a multiple case study method, quantitative and qualitative data were collected from the four garment suppliers and buyer's representatives. Both quantitative and qualitative data analysis techniques were applied to understand the challenges in delivering defect-free products.

The study findings show that garment suppliers' main challenges in delivering defect-free products are unsystematic quality control, informal root cause analysis, limited education and training facilities, dearth of a learning culture, limited quality control capability, lack of cross-functional team, inadequate modern technologies, workers' resistance to change and poor performance evaluation. Moreover, this study demonstrates how buyers can enhance their support to suppliers to receive defect-free products.

Whereas the garment industry has more than four thousand suppliers, this study considers only four suppliers. Therefore, the generalisability of the study may be questioned. Furthermore, as this study considers only a single sewing line in each factory, future studies could incorporate more lines for a holistic understanding.

The findings of this study could help the managers of supplier firms understand how to tackle the hurdles of defect-free garment production and give buyers a guideline about what role they need to play to receive defect-free garments from suppliers.

For the first time, this study presents how garment suppliers and their lead buyers play significant roles in satisfying end consumers' demand by overcoming the challenges of defect-free garment production.

The primary aim of this paper is to evaluate the challenges before the growth of the ready-made garment (RMG) industry in Bangladesh, the economy's backbone, and suggest appropriate reform.

The paper begins by tracing the growth and evolution of the RMG industry before identifying the challenges. It then proceeds to suggest appropriate reform for the same.

The paper argues for more effective models of collective bargaining and unionism as a solution to the problems that the industry faces.

The paper is the first of its kind in the sense that it is a comprehensive account of the challenges to the RMG industry in Bangladesh.

Garment making by the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has existed for a long enough time to make the sewing culture a mainstream phenomenon today. It is thus essential to evaluate existing producers, the required information and the key requirements for production. This should consequently forge the way forward. Hence, the purpose of this study was to establish guidelines for the basic requirements as a means of operating garment mass production units in consideration of the unique economic, legal and social environment in Tanzania.

The study deployed a qualitative approach: interview sessions, questionnaires and observation together with the document review approach. A qualitative approach captured in-depth views, ideas and concepts from participants.

The study established the requirements for scaling up SMEs into mass production. The requirements include significant investment, well-planned strategies and an implementable industrialisation plan. The country also requires empowered workforces through the existing institutions, international collaborations with foreign investors, implementable policies, among others to excel in this sector.

The identified information together with all factors is leading towards initiating textile-based industries. Thus, information resources concerning garment production in the Tanzanian context are suitable for both individuals and corporations intending to scale up their production.

This is probably among the first studies in Tanzania which explored the basic requirements for setting mass-production units for textile and apparel industries. The uniqueness relies on the involved participants from multi-perspective domains.

The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the effectiveness of labour law in Bangladesh and provide suggestions to improve working conditions in the country.

The article provides an analysis of the factual impact of labour law in Bangladesh.

The study reveals the appalling condition in the ready-made garment industry. The factory owners tend to bend the laws and exploit the workers.

The paper offers some suggestions to improve the working conditions of the workers in the garment industry of Bangladesh.

In the past more than three years, Wal-Mart has been embroiled in incidents of public scandals. In part, they pertain to Wal-Mart’s global strategy of growth and expansion, where the company’s senior managers have been implicated in using illegal bribery and corruption to secure business and to conceal this information from regulatory authorities. Another issue, albeit longer running, has been the incidents of fire and resulting deaths and injuries of hundreds of people, most notably in Bangladesh, but also in other countries where low-skill, low-wage manufacturing predominates, and where foreign multinationals have been accused of condoning and profiting from sweatshop-like exploitation of workers.

The authors use Wal-Mart as a microcosm of corporate conduct which provides a prism through which to examine the exploitation of negative externalities, i.e. engaging in illegal and unethical behavior by using their bargaining power and market control these companies, pressure host countries to condone environmental degradation, violation of country laws in terms of wages, working conditions and operating in sweatshop-like conditions to maximize their profits at the expense of other factors of production, i.e. labor and resources.

The authors contend that Wal-Mart’s unique business model, which focuses on everyday low price, absolute growth and market share expansion by any means possible and everyday low cost, has led to the company’s enormous success since its founding and has made it one of the world’s largest corporations by revenue. At the same time, this model seriously impedes the company’s ability to improve unit-based profit margins and thus forces it to take short cuts in achieving lateral growth and low-cost production.

The authors also examine in some detail the large gap that exists between Wal-Mart’s pronouncements of the company’s commitment to ethical and socially responsible conduct and its actual business practices. They demonstrate that the company’s communications and claims for ethical conduct are mostly aspirational and fail the test of accuracy, specificity, materiality and verifiability through independent, externally provided integrity assurance.

Finally, the authors outline a number of measures that would need to be taken by Wal-Mart, industry groups that depend heavily on outsourcing from low-skill, low-wage countries for their products and host country governments and the governments of Western industrialized nations whose corporations and consumers are the primary beneficiaries of the exploitative sweatshops that fatten their companies’ bottom lines and enrich their denizens with ample amounts of inexpensive goods.

This qualitative paper is about social reporting in response to an incident that involved the loss of human life. It examines Loblaw’s disclosures following the Rana Plaza building collapse that killed over 1,100 Bangladeshi workers.

This article draws on Suchman’s (1995) comprehensive legitimacy typology to interpret Loblaw’s disclosures about the collapse in both mass media coverage of the tragedy and the company’s quarterly, annual and corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports.

Loblaw worked on many fronts to secure stakeholders’ support in the aftermath of the fatal incident. Through their social disclosures, Loblaw simultaneously managed exchange, dispositional, consequential, procedural, structural, personal and cognitive legitimacy, striving to demonstrate that, notwithstanding the incident, the company was still conforming to its social contract.

This research operationalizes all aspects of Suchman’s legitimacy typology in the context of social reporting. In particular, the paper further develops the concept of cognitive legitimacy. This should be of benefit to other CSR researchers.

The loss of human life during business operations is one of the most terrible events an organization can face. Corporate activities leading to loss of human life are obviously far from being socially acceptable. Stakeholders are likely to disapprove such activities and reconsider their support, which can threaten the survival of the organization. It is thus of utmost importance to understand the strategies used by corporate managers in their attempt to secure ongoing stakeholder support.

This paper innovates by focusing specifically on social disclosures about a negative event. In so doing, it also contributes to a small, but important, literature within CSR research that examines incidents resulting in the loss of human life. The paper adapts and applies Suchman’s legitimacy framework to interpret social reporting in response to a specific instance of loss of life, the Rana Plaza building collapse. Finally, this paper mobilizes the notion of cognitive dissonance to further develop Suchman’s notion of cognitive legitimacy.