Arguments on the Social Sustainability and Regulation Practices

Problem Analysis
 Timothy and Thomas is a well-developed country in United States focuses on manufacturing
the clothes
 The case on the “Third World Families at Work: Child Labor or Childcare? Focuses on the
social sustainability and regulation practices towards the prohibited workers less than age 14
 As a senior operations managers, I have the responsibility to aware of the current practices of
social sustainability
 The cultural relativism is the key problem for Jonathan Stein in addressing the child labor
guidelines and laws in Pakistan and United States
 In US, strict laws are implemented against the child work whereas Pakistan is favor to
families to help them.
In this situation, Jonathan Stein is facing dilemma to decide the contractors of Lahore is to be
renewed or not. I have observed that this issue associated with problems like loss of income of
families of Pakistan people, ruin of brand image of Timothy and Thomas, and trust is decreased
among the public on the social responsibility activities of the company on themselves. Jonathan
has to further focus on the reinforcement of the ethics among the contractors and sourcing manager.
Current Situation at Timothy & Thomas North America
 In the first plant at Pakistan, little girls aged under 14 are working with their mothers on the
floor.
 On average, women are gaining wage of $200 with meals which is very low compared to
United States
 Small girls are supporting their mothers in winding the thread on the sewing equipment and
older girls are supporting in sorting, stacking, and removing the waste cloth.
 In my opinion, all these small girls are working willingly to support families instead of having
education based on the case
Based on the Jonathan observations, the working conditions in the Pakistan plant are not a bad
position. Pakistan culture is more favorable to boys compared to girls since boys are seeking
education but girls are spending in plants. The mothers are also feeling glad in keeping children
with them without thinking about future of child. To address these problems, Jonathan has to gather
more information about the current situation, facts related to child labor laws in US and Pakistan,
and relevant data to promote the social responsibility and ethics guidelines to business partners.
Ethical Issues to Jonathan Stein
 In the present case, some key ethical issues are presented for the Jonathan including personal
and professional issue
 The personal issue a Pakistani girl aged 8 years working in the plant and he felt sad and
worrying about the girl and unable to come out from the thoughts since she is the same age to
his daughter
 The professional and ethical issue is that not to ruin the brand value and business of the
company by self-decision to leak the information to the media
Jonathan is in an ethical dilemma and unable to take right decision either removing the unethical
contractors or ruining the brand image of the company. I argue that other unethical component is
the lack of justice. It is hard to make justice by Jonathan to the child labor without considering the
cultural factors. Jonathan worrying about the consequences and punishments of Pakistan
government and International Labor organization if they come to know Timothy is violating the
child labor laws and completing tasks with age under 14 for low wage.
Ways to address the child labor issues
Ï argue that Jonathan has to focus on the few things to make benefit to the girls working in plants
through
 Facilitation of education programs, onsite meals, and doctors to regular checkup of their health.
 Work with the government to establishment of the fair practices in factory and managing the
children of different ages differently.
 Setting the guidelines on the tolerable and intolerable methods of child work to enhance the
moral values among contractors
 Facilitating the safe, secure, and clean environment to women and girls and setting the
standards to minimum wages by contractors to the children or increasing the wages of their
mothers.

I argue that girl child labor in the textile, garment, and sports is not a cultural activity and it is an
economic choice. Low wage work is not a better option for the workers. I opinioned that use of
children with low wage and high working hours is a good practice for businesses to achieve
competitive advantage. The main problem for Timothy is applying the cultural norms of United
States on the Pakistan. It has to understand the cultural differences to build the global guidelines.
(Nichols, 1993)

Evaluation of five sources using CRAP test

Currency

The sources are presented very relevant information about the child labor practices and social
responsibility respect to cloth manufacturing industry.

They covered Facts about

 child labor throughout the world

 incentives to fight the child labor
 social responsibility and sustainable management in apparel
 factors affecting the child labor in demand and supply areas of Pakistan
 economic and social aspects of child labor
Reliability

The articles included the information from both primary and secondary research conducting the literature
review, content analysis, descriptive analysis, theoretical frameworks, and surveys on child working in
factories.

The content is presented balancing the personal and research findings

Currency: The journal articles chosen are updated information gathering through the research and
published past five years. The articles are relevant but not enough to address the child labor practices of
developed countries on developing countries

Reliability: The authors provided references for the data they collected to give credit to original authors
and secondary opinions are balanced effectively from the primary research by applying the different type
of data collection and analysis techniques.

Authority

 The authors are the researchers in education and business management field working for reputed
universities and organizations
 Articles are published in Journals including Manufacturing and service operations management,
sustainability review, economic and labor relation review

Purpose

 The child labor is a real fact and experiencing many countries in the world since even though
businesses are engaged in social responsibility not following the child labor practices
 No biased information is presented and authors are covered all aspects of child labor

(Khakshour, Abbasi, Sayedi, Saeidi, & Khodaee, 2015)

(Fang, 2018)

(Köksal, Strähle, Müller, & Freise, 2017)

(Fatima, 2017)

(Baghal, Shaikh, Baloch, & Pathan, 2015)

Authority

The authors background information is easily found in the articles itself and searching over internet. The
journals are reputed and publishing research articles from past few years and these have high interest in
publishing articles related to child labor and business sustainability practices on them. There are no
advertisements in the articles chosen.

Purpose
The researchers are fully motivated towards gathering more information about the child labor practices.
They are not trying to sell any kind of products and aimed only towards the research fully integrating
their efforts and time.

Baghal, G., Shaikh, E. K., Baloch, N. A., & Pathan, P. A. (2015). Socio-Economic Aspects of Child Labor in
Pakistan; A Case Study of Hyderabad, Sindh. Case Studies Journal, 4(1), 69-74.

Fang, X. (2018). Combating child labor: Incentives and information disclosure in Global Supply Chains.
Manufacturing and Service Operations Management, 1-42.

Fatima, A. (2017). Child labour in Pakistan: Addressing supply and demand side labour market dynamics.
The Economic and Labour Relations Review, 1-18.

Khakshour, A., Abbasi, M. A., Sayedi, S. J., Saeidi, M., & Khodaee, G. H. (2015). Child Labor Facts in the
Worldwide: A Review Article. International Journal of Pediatric, 3, 467-473.

Köksal, D., Strähle, J., Müller, M., & Freise, M. (2017). Social Sustainable Supply Chain Management in
the Textile and Apparel Industry—A Literature Review. Journal of Sustainability , 1-32.

Nichols, M. (1993). Third-World Families at Work: Child Labor or Child Care? Harvard Business Review,
Vol. 71, Issue 1, 12-23. Retrieved from hbr.org.