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March 25, 2026Accounting auditing & accountability journal/Accounting, auditing & accountability journal

Empires of fashion: regulatory fictions of accountability and labour control

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Authors

MAMd Shoaib AhmedUniversity of SussexCAChandana AlawattageAdam Smith InstituteKJKelum Jayasinghe

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Overview

This article examines coercive labour practices in global supply chains, suggesting they stem from systemic despotism.

Key Points

  • The article aims to explore the ongoing issue of slavery-like labour control in global supply chains, framing it as a structural aspect of global capitalism.
  • Extensive fieldwork conducted in the Bangladesh garment industry
  • Grounded empirical analysis combined with theoretical exploration of despotism
  • Identification of four modalities of despotism affecting labour control
  • Four interrelated modalities of despotism identified: market, political, cultural, and managerial
  • Market despotism dictates demands for speed and cost reduction from global buyers
  • Political despotism reflects the influence of a shadow state on industrial practices
  • Cultural despotism underpins gendered subordination in the workplace
  • Managerial despotism enforces control over workers' physical and temporal spaces

Cite This Study

Ahmed et al. (2026) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/69c37afeb34aaaeb1a67d0aahttps://doi.org/10.1108/aaaj-07-2025-8204
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Also Consider

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