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Transnational Labour Governance in Global Supply Chains: Asking Questions and Seeking Answers on Accountability

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Defining and understanding accountability in transnational governance The term accountability is used in many ways. It has been described as “one of those golden concepts that no one can be against”, but also as “elusive,” “evocative” and “contested” (Bovens 2010, 448). It a...

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43

1 Transnational Labour Governance
in Global Supply Chains:
Asking Questions and Seeking
Answers on Accountability
Ingrid Landau and Tess Hardy

X Introduction

Today, a panoply of public, private and hybrid actors and institutions engage
at multiple levels in sustained and focused attempts to improve working
conditions in global supply chains (GSCs). These actors exercise a range of
regulatory functions, from the setting of rules to implementation, monitoring
and the imposition of sanctions or other forms of enforcement. We have seen
the development of a significant body of scholarship tracing the emergence
of transnational labour governance as a polycentric regime and mapping its
complex architecture (e.g. Hendrickx et al. 2016; Hassel 2008). There is also a
rich interdisciplinary literature assessing the effectiveness of various regu-
latory initiatives (e.g. Fransen 2012; Locke 2013) and considering how actors,
institutions and arrangements interact and what the effects of these inter-
actions are (e.g. Meidinger 2008; Fransen, and Burgoon 2017; Bartley 2018).
The “language of accountability” (Koenig-Archibugi 2010, 1142) has featured
prominently in transnational labour governance. For decades now, activists
have called on brands and lead firms in the developed world to take more
responsibility for working conditions in their supply chains. Private regu-
latory initiatives are implicitly premised on transparency and market and
reputational mechanisms that ostensibly enable consumers, investors and
civil society actors to hold companies to account for their labour practices.
Yet, there continues to be much debate and uncertainty in international and
national fora about the meaning and mechanisms of accountability in global
governance (cf. Macdonald and Macdonald 2006; Macdonald 2014). In this
chapter, we seek to explore the way in which conceptions of “accountability”

,44 Decent work in a globalized economy: lessons from public and private initiatives

in transnational labour governance have shifted during the recent past. As
part of this analysis, we consider how accountability has been constructed and
contested across different initiatives and through distinct conceptual frame-
works (Black 2008). In undertaking this analysis, we apply a set of critical
questions, namely: Who is accountable to whom? For what should they be held
accountable for? Through what mechanisms or processes is accountability to
be assured? By what standards is the putatively accountable behaviour to be
judged? What are the potential effects of finding that these standards have
been breached? (Scott 2000; Mashaw 2006, 118). Adopting an explicit focus on
the way in which accountability has been applied – both normatively and in
practice – reveals new insights into the pluralistic and complex relationships
between regulators, intermediaries, targets and beneficiaries.
The chapter is divided into four parts. Following this Introduction, Part 2
discusses what is meant by the term “accountability”, and it identifies some
of the challenges that the concept presents in the transnational context. In
doing so, it draws on interdisciplinary scholarship, including research in the
fields of international relations and regulatory governance. Part 3 explores
why accountability matters in transnational labour governance. In Part 4, we
seek to trace how understandings of accountability in transnational labour
governance have evolved over recent decades. We first look at the way in
which accountability was initially conceived via international governance
organizations before considering the embryonic emergence, and subsequent
explosion, of private regulation in the form of voluntary codes and multi-stake-
holder initiatives. In the latter sections of this part, we consider two critical
developments on the accountability front: the increasing focus on fixing legal
liability in GSCs; and the increasing influence of regulatory intermediaries.
It could be argued that both legal sanctioning and independent monitoring
are embedded features of many recent regulatory initiatives. However, in our
view, their respective and growing importance merits greater attention from
an accountability perspective. In Part 5, we summarize some of our key find-
ings before identifying some outstanding issues that merit further reflection
and future research in order to advance more durable, effective and account-
able forms of transnational labour governance within GSCs (Diller 2020).
Before proceeding, it is important to clarify key terms and mark out the inten-
tion and scope of this chapter. First, we draw on Bartley’s definition of public
regulation to refer to regulatory activities implicitly associated with activities
of the state and private regulation to refer to “a structure of oversight in which
non-state actors – whether for-profit companies, non-profit organizations,
or a mix of the two – adopt and to some degree enforce rules for other or-
ganizations, such as their suppliers or clients” (Bartley 2018, 7). Second, our
focus is squarely on GSCs; we do not consider, in any detail, accountability or
governance of supply chains operating solely in the national or sub-national

, 1. Transnational Labour Governance in GSCs: Questions and Answers on Accountability 45

sphere. At the same time, we recognize that international standards operate
in, and are subject to, domestic rules and institutions and intergovernmental
arrangements, which creates “a type of (imperfect and incomplete) multi-lay-
ered global governance.” (Trebilcock 2018, 57; Zumbansen 2011). In literature
concerned with transnational labour governance, a distinction is often drawn
between “hard” and “soft” law and between “substitutive” and “complemen-
tary” governance regimes (Locke, Rissing, and Pal 2013). One feature of a
pluralistic analysis – which is at the core of this chapter – is a rejection of
many of these binary classifications (Black 2001; Karassin and Perez 2018; Van
der Heijden and Zandvliet 2014). Instead, we conceive transnational labour
governance as consisting of a set of complex interplays that may “co-evolve,
hybridize, compete, and reshape organizational behaviour” (Schneiberg
and Bartley 2008, 51–52; Eberlein et al. 2014). While this broad definition
is designed to capture the full range of regulatory interactions, this chapter
does not purport to comprehensively survey the field or cover every possible
initiative. Rather, we draw out salient examples to illustrate the diverse ways
in which accountability has been defined, documented and determined in
the context of transnational labour governance.

X 1. Defining and understanding
accountability in transnational
governance

The term accountability is used in many ways. It has been described as “one of
those golden concepts that no one can be against”, but also as “elusive,” “evoca-
tive” and “contested” (Bovens 2010, 448). It also suffers from being a term that
has become “a conceptual umbrella” for other distinct concepts, such as legit-
imacy, transparency, equity, democracy, efficiency, responsiveness, responsi-
bility and integrity (Mulgan 2000). Nonetheless, it is commonly acknowledged
that the concept retains a core meaning, whether it is being applied at the
domestic or transnational level (Koenig-Archibugi 2010; Goodhart 2011;
Scholte 2011; Macdonald 2014). Simply put, accountability can be understood
as a moral or institutional relationship between different actors, in which one
actor (or group of actors) (sometimes referred to as “power wielders”) has an
obligation to explain and to justify its conduct, and another actor (sometimes
referred to as “accountability holders”) has the power or authority to pose
questions, pass judgement and impose consequences (Bovens 2007, 450; Black
2008; Macdonald 2014). Accountability mechanisms are ostensibly designed

, 46 Decent work in a globalized economy: lessons from public and private initiatives

for the protection and advancement of the interests of “beneficiaries”, a group
which is often left undefined and may be contested. This simple and broad
definition belies its complexity – particularly when one attempts to identify
who is being held accountable, for what purpose and on whose behalf.
As we will discuss in greater detail, key categories and terms are fluid and
do not neatly map onto the messy and complex relationships that arise in
practice. This is partly because accountability relationships are not linear or
binary and do not flow in one direction from a single accountability holder to
a single power wielder (Black 2008, 150). For example, when considering how
accountability is conceived in GSCs, are the relevant power wielders the direct
employers, major suppliers, certified members, lead firms or all of these? To
what extent are some of these actors simultaneously playing a role as account-
ability holders? Lead firms often have a dual identity in this respect: on the
one hand, lead firms are quintessential power wielders in that they clearly
owe an obligation to explain and justify their conduct in respect of the GSC;
on the other hand, lead firms have the power and authority to pose questions
and pass judgement on suppliers and manufacturers further down the chain
(and, in this context, are more properly classified as accountability holders).
Trying to identify exactly who is benefiting from the various accountability
activities in transnational labour governance is not straightforward. In mar-
ket-based forms of accountability, are the relevant beneficiaries in GSCs the
workers producing the goods, the consumers purchasing those goods or the
investors of the lead firms? In our view, teasing out the constitutive elements
of key accountability concepts is not just a matter of semantics but may lead to
a distinct normative and practical assessment of the relevant accountability
regime. Many of the conceptual distinctions and tensions which are touched
upon in this section underpin our later analysis of how accountability under-
standings and activities have evolved in the context of GSCs.
Accountability can be conceptualized as a normative concept and a social
mechanism (Bovens 2010). The term can be used as a normative standard
against which to evaluate actors’ behaviour. “Being accountable” is seen as
a desirable quality, a virtue. Accountability in this broader sense is instru-
mental to maintaining legitimacy to actors and organizations, in that it can
help legitimize or de-legitimize the exercise of public power (Bovens 2010,
954–955). However, it is also a highly contested concept, as there is rarely
any general consensus as to what constitutes the substantive standards for
accountable behaviour (Bovens 2010, 949).
Accountability as a social mechanism is a narrower and more descriptive
conceptualization. The focus in this second use of accountability is on the
institutional arrangements or mechanisms through which one actor is held
accountable to other actors (Curtin and Senden 2011, 166). For Buchanan
and Keohane (2006, 426), there are three basic components to the concept

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