Stephanie Barriento
Biographic Data
| ID | 1104073 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Stephanie Barriento |
| GIVEN NAMES | Stephanie |
| FAMILY NAME | Barriento |
| SIGNATURE | BARRIENTO S |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Manchester |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4419-3097 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 32 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 418 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 32 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1993 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
Private and public governance of decent work in regional and domestic value chains
Regional value chains in the Global South
Early expansion of global value chains (GVCs) from the 1980s had a clear dynamic involving multinational companies (MNCs) serving high-income consumers in the Global North sourcing a wide range of consumer goods from low-wage countries in the Global South. We are now witnessing a move towards expansion of regional value chains (RVCs) and domestic value chains (DVCs).1 Some are led by North American and European MNCs involved in re-shoring or near…
Fairtrade and beyond
Southern actors and the governance of labour standards in global production networks
Recent studies highlight the emergence of standards, including multi-stakeholder initiatives developed and applied within the global South where supplier firms are usually based. This trend has created a complex ethical terrain whereby transnational standards flow through global production networks and intersect with domestic initiatives at places of production. The paper complements global production network analysis with the concepts of 'space …
Covid-19 and the case for global development
Gender and Work in Global Value Chains
This book focuses on the changing gender patterns of work in a global retail environment associated with the rise of contemporary retail and global sourcing. This has affected the working lives of hundreds of millions of workers in high-, middle- and low-income countries. The growth of contemporary retail has been driven by the commercialised production of many goods previously produced unpaid by women within the home. Sourcing is now largely und…
Multi-scalar Labour Agency in Global Production Networks
Integration into global production networks poses significant challenges, and also opens up opportunities, for labour agency. Governance by lead firms affects working conditions and can drive precarious employment; this interacts with and can constrain national labour legislation covering labour rights. The global production networks (GPN) approach facilitates examination of commercial value chains, their interaction with institutionally and soci…
New dynamics of upgrading in global value chains
The rise of global value chains (GVCs) has been associated with the rapid expansion of outsourcing by lead firms in the global North to interlinked networks of cross-border suppliers in developing countries. Outsourcing was facilitated by trade and financial liberalization initiated in the 1970s and 1980s, and driven by intense competitive pressures for cost reduction. GVC and global production network (GPN) analysis provide crucial insights into…
New end markets, supermarket expansion and shifting social standards
In recent years, Northern supermarket chains have internationalized rapidly and Southern supermarket chains have expanded their footprint in emerging markets. As they have done so, questions have arisen about the impact of such supermarkets and the extent of consumer demand for social standards (labour standards and fair trade). While standards have been more (or less) codified in their Northern counterparts over recent decades, it remains an emp…
Shifting regional dynamics of global value chains
Global value chain and global production network analyses have largely focused on dominance of Northern retailers over suppliers in the global South. The expansion of retailers within the global South sourcing from and supplying consumer end-markets within their own geographic regions is reconfiguring value chain dynamics. This paper draws on GVC and GPN approaches and the concepts of multi-polar governance to analyse changing dynamics of global …
Gendered Commodity Chains
Gendered Global Production Networks
Barrientos S. Gendered global production networks: analysis of cocoa-chocolate sourcing, Regional Studies . Gendered global production network analysis builds on global value chain and feminist political economy. It explores the interaction between commercial value chains and societal norms in which gendered patterns of consumption and production are embedded across diverse societies. The cocoa-chocolate value chain is examined linking Europe and…
Dynamics of Unfree Labour in the Contemporary Global Economy
This short introduction to the symposium sets the context for the collection of articles, locating them in debates about labour conditions in the global economy. It outlines the two central questions which animate the symposium. First, what forms do unfree labour take in the contemporary global economy, and what are the implications for the most vulnerable workers in diverse contexts? Second, which processes, conditions and dynamics generate and …
Corporate purchasing practices in global production networks
Civil society organisations are employing both adversarial and collaborative strategies to challenge purchasing practices of large corporations as a cause of poor employment conditions for a largely female workforce. This paper draws on analysis of global production networks, labour agency and gender to examine linkages and tensions at the intersection between commercial dynamics of dominant firms and their societal embeddedness in diverse locali…
Economic and social upgrading in global production networks
A key challenge in promoting decent work worldwide is how to improve the position of both firms and workers in value chains and global production networks driven by lead firms. This article develops a framework for analysing the linkages between the economic upgrading of firms and the social upgrading of workers. Drawing on studies which indicate that firm upgrading does not necessarily lead to improvements for workers, with a particular focus on…
Contract Labour
Codes of labour practice implemented by corporate buyers in their global production networks are one dimension of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Research indicates the benefits of codes for workers are limited and they fail to reach the most vulnerable workers, particularly those employed by labour contractors who face the worst employment conditions. This contribution argues that the commercial dynamics of global production networks prov…
Do workers benefit from ethical trade? Assessing codes of labour practice in global production systems
Corporate codes of labour practice have proliferated as a result of trade union and ngo campaigns against poor labour conditions in global production. Analysis of global production systems highlights the complexity of commercial networks and the wider social and institutional environment in which codes operate. It posits tensions between a corporate approach focusing on compliance with outcome standards and a civil society approach focusing on pr…
Fair trade and ethical trade
Fair trade and ethical trade have traditionally had quite different aims, scope and modalities, the former principally focused on terms of trade with small scale producers and the latter on working conditions in mainstream production. Global value chain analysis suggests that this coincided with different forms of governance in the chain: fair trade reflecting relational governance based on trust and mutual dependence, while ethical trade was inc…
Gender, Work and Vulnerability in African Horticulture
Reaching the marginalised? Gender value chains and ethical trade in African horticulture
Ethical trade, through codes of practice, forms an important part of the value chains for horticultural products sourced from Africa by major European buyers. This paper explores the relationship between value chains in the horticultural sector, the employment patterns of African producers, and the process of code implementation from a gender perspective. It asks whether, in the context of the gendered economy, codes alone can improve working con…
Squaring the circle
South African fruit growers simultaneously face rising standards imposed within supermarket global value chains, falling market prices internationally, and increasing government legislation. These pressures are leading to falling permanent employment and increasing use of contract labour on fruit farms, tempered by the need to employ skilled workers to meet quality and labour standards. Informal contract employment provides some (male) workers wi…
Enhancing Female Employment in Global Production
Female employment in global production is significant in certain sectors of manufacture and agriculture. There has not only been a ‘feminization’ of the labor force, but also a change in the gender dimension of global employment. Women’s earnings are often a crucial element in household survival, they are not ‘secondary earners’ as depicted in more traditional employment models, and they can accrue many advantages from their employment. But women…
Global Production and Flexible Employment in South African Horticulture
The era of global flexibility has been described as one of generalised precariouness and vulnerability. Global integration is leading to changing patterns of employment, with declining permanent and increasingly insecure forms of work. This trend is typified in the South African export fruit sector. Reintegration into the global economy is leading to both the 'modernisation' and transformation of employment including the rapid rise of offfarm con…
A Gendered Value Chain Approach to Codes of Conduct in African Horticulture
Paternalism and gender in south african fruit employment
A Gendered Value Chain Approach to Codes of Conduct in African Horticulture
Do workers benefit from ethical trade? Assessing codes of labour practice in global production systems
Corporate codes of labour practice have proliferated as a result of trade union and ngo campaigns against poor labour conditions in global production. Analysis of global production systems highlights the complexity of commercial networks and the wider social and institutional environment in which codes operate. It posits tensions between a corporate approach focusing on compliance with outcome standards and a civil society approach focusing on pr…
Covid-19 and the case for global development
Corporate purchasing practices in global production networks
Civil society organisations are employing both adversarial and collaborative strategies to challenge purchasing practices of large corporations as a cause of poor employment conditions for a largely female workforce. This paper draws on analysis of global production networks, labour agency and gender to examine linkages and tensions at the intersection between commercial dynamics of dominant firms and their societal embeddedness in diverse locali…
Contract Labour
Codes of labour practice implemented by corporate buyers in their global production networks are one dimension of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Research indicates the benefits of codes for workers are limited and they fail to reach the most vulnerable workers, particularly those employed by labour contractors who face the worst employment conditions. This contribution argues that the commercial dynamics of global production networks prov…
Global Production and Flexible Employment in South African Horticulture
The era of global flexibility has been described as one of generalised precariouness and vulnerability. Global integration is leading to changing patterns of employment, with declining permanent and increasingly insecure forms of work. This trend is typified in the South African export fruit sector. Reintegration into the global economy is leading to both the 'modernisation' and transformation of employment including the rapid rise of offfarm con…
Shifting regional dynamics of global value chains
Global value chain and global production network analyses have largely focused on dominance of Northern retailers over suppliers in the global South. The expansion of retailers within the global South sourcing from and supplying consumer end-markets within their own geographic regions is reconfiguring value chain dynamics. This paper draws on GVC and GPN approaches and the concepts of multi-polar governance to analyse changing dynamics of global …
Gendered Global Production Networks
Barrientos S. Gendered global production networks: analysis of cocoa-chocolate sourcing, Regional Studies . Gendered global production network analysis builds on global value chain and feminist political economy. It explores the interaction between commercial value chains and societal norms in which gendered patterns of consumption and production are embedded across diverse societies. The cocoa-chocolate value chain is examined linking Europe and…
Reaching the marginalised? Gender value chains and ethical trade in African horticulture
Ethical trade, through codes of practice, forms an important part of the value chains for horticultural products sourced from Africa by major European buyers. This paper explores the relationship between value chains in the horticultural sector, the employment patterns of African producers, and the process of code implementation from a gender perspective. It asks whether, in the context of the gendered economy, codes alone can improve working con…
Gender, Flexibility and Global Value Chains
Summaries Gender is often overlooked in the analysis of global value chains. Analysis of value chains incorporates all aspects from design, through production to final distribution and consumption. These activities are embedded within prevailing gender relations that affect value chains at every node. Conversely the operation of value chains can affect the prevailing gender division of labour in different localities. This article provides an init…
Multi-scalar Labour Agency in Global Production Networks
Integration into global production networks poses significant challenges, and also opens up opportunities, for labour agency. Governance by lead firms affects working conditions and can drive precarious employment; this interacts with and can constrain national labour legislation covering labour rights. The global production networks (GPN) approach facilitates examination of commercial value chains, their interaction with institutionally and soci…
Fairtrade and beyond
New dynamics of upgrading in global value chains
The rise of global value chains (GVCs) has been associated with the rapid expansion of outsourcing by lead firms in the global North to interlinked networks of cross-border suppliers in developing countries. Outsourcing was facilitated by trade and financial liberalization initiated in the 1970s and 1980s, and driven by intense competitive pressures for cost reduction. GVC and global production network (GPN) analysis provide crucial insights into…
Ethical Trade and South African Deciduous Fruit Exports – Addressing Gender Sensitivity
Fair trade and ethical trade
Fair trade and ethical trade have traditionally had quite different aims, scope and modalities, the former principally focused on terms of trade with small scale producers and the latter on working conditions in mainstream production. Global value chain analysis suggests that this coincided with different forms of governance in the chain: fair trade reflecting relational governance based on trust and mutual dependence, while ethical trade was inc…
Paternalism and gender in south african fruit employment
New end markets, supermarket expansion and shifting social standards
In recent years, Northern supermarket chains have internationalized rapidly and Southern supermarket chains have expanded their footprint in emerging markets. As they have done so, questions have arisen about the impact of such supermarkets and the extent of consumer demand for social standards (labour standards and fair trade). While standards have been more (or less) codified in their Northern counterparts over recent decades, it remains an emp…
Gender, Work and Vulnerability in African Horticulture
Southern actors and the governance of labour standards in global production networks
Recent studies highlight the emergence of standards, including multi-stakeholder initiatives developed and applied within the global South where supplier firms are usually based. This trend has created a complex ethical terrain whereby transnational standards flow through global production networks and intersect with domestic initiatives at places of production. The paper complements global production network analysis with the concepts of 'space …
Private and public governance of decent work in regional and domestic value chains
Regional value chains in the Global South
Early expansion of global value chains (GVCs) from the 1980s had a clear dynamic involving multinational companies (MNCs) serving high-income consumers in the Global North sourcing a wide range of consumer goods from low-wage countries in the Global South. We are now witnessing a move towards expansion of regional value chains (RVCs) and domestic value chains (DVCs).1 Some are led by North American and European MNCs involved in re-shoring or near…
Gendered Commodity Chains
Enhancing Female Employment in Global Production
Female employment in global production is significant in certain sectors of manufacture and agriculture. There has not only been a ‘feminization’ of the labor force, but also a change in the gender dimension of global employment. Women’s earnings are often a crucial element in household survival, they are not ‘secondary earners’ as depicted in more traditional employment models, and they can accrue many advantages from their employment. But women…
The other side of economic success
The economic liberalization and overall economic success achieved by the former military dictatorship in Chile paradoxically increased inequities and "feminized" poverty. By 1990, when a democratically elected government came into power, 40% of the population was living in poverty and suffering from large-scale reductions in state welfare. This led to a huge increase in self-help community organizations, many run by women and set-up by the church…
Social clauses and women workers in Latin America
The Hidden Ingredient
The Chilean fruit export sector has expanded rapidly over the past decade. A large army of female temporary workers is recruited annually to work in the fruit export sector, playing a key role in the preparation of high quality off‐season fruit for northern markets. Despite their annual employment in a modern export sector, these temporary workers remain a marginalised force in Chile, reflected in the significant underestimation of the female agr…
The hidden ingredient
Ethical Trade and South African Deciduous Fruit Exports – Addressing Gender Sensitivity
Paternalism and gender in south african fruit employment
Gender, Flexibility and Global Value Chains
Summaries Gender is often overlooked in the analysis of global value chains. Analysis of value chains incorporates all aspects from design, through production to final distribution and consumption. These activities are embedded within prevailing gender relations that affect value chains at every node. Conversely the operation of value chains can affect the prevailing gender division of labour in different localities. This article provides an init…
Stakeholder participation, gender, and codes of conduct in South Africa
Ethical trade is expanding rapidly in the UK. Following the foundation of the Ethical Trading Initiative many companies are adopting codes of conduct to cover employment conditions in their supply chains, based on a process of multi-stakeholder participation. Addressing gender issues in their implementation remains an important challenge for policy makers. This paper considers how gender sensitivity in the monitoring and verification of codes can…
A Gendered Value Chain Approach to Codes of Conduct in African Horticulture
Squaring the circle
South African fruit growers simultaneously face rising standards imposed within supermarket global value chains, falling market prices internationally, and increasing government legislation. These pressures are leading to falling permanent employment and increasing use of contract labour on fruit farms, tempered by the need to employ skilled workers to meet quality and labour standards. Informal contract employment provides some (male) workers wi…
Enhancing Female Employment in Global Production
Female employment in global production is significant in certain sectors of manufacture and agriculture. There has not only been a ‘feminization’ of the labor force, but also a change in the gender dimension of global employment. Women’s earnings are often a crucial element in household survival, they are not ‘secondary earners’ as depicted in more traditional employment models, and they can accrue many advantages from their employment. But women…
Global Production and Flexible Employment in South African Horticulture
The era of global flexibility has been described as one of generalised precariouness and vulnerability. Global integration is leading to changing patterns of employment, with declining permanent and increasingly insecure forms of work. This trend is typified in the South African export fruit sector. Reintegration into the global economy is leading to both the 'modernisation' and transformation of employment including the rapid rise of offfarm con…
Fair trade and ethical trade
Fair trade and ethical trade have traditionally had quite different aims, scope and modalities, the former principally focused on terms of trade with small scale producers and the latter on working conditions in mainstream production. Global value chain analysis suggests that this coincided with different forms of governance in the chain: fair trade reflecting relational governance based on trust and mutual dependence, while ethical trade was inc…
Gender, Work and Vulnerability in African Horticulture
Reaching the marginalised? Gender value chains and ethical trade in African horticulture
Ethical trade, through codes of practice, forms an important part of the value chains for horticultural products sourced from Africa by major European buyers. This paper explores the relationship between value chains in the horticultural sector, the employment patterns of African producers, and the process of code implementation from a gender perspective. It asks whether, in the context of the gendered economy, codes alone can improve working con…
Do workers benefit from ethical trade? Assessing codes of labour practice in global production systems
Corporate codes of labour practice have proliferated as a result of trade union and ngo campaigns against poor labour conditions in global production. Analysis of global production systems highlights the complexity of commercial networks and the wider social and institutional environment in which codes operate. It posits tensions between a corporate approach focusing on compliance with outcome standards and a civil society approach focusing on pr…
Contract Labour
Codes of labour practice implemented by corporate buyers in their global production networks are one dimension of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Research indicates the benefits of codes for workers are limited and they fail to reach the most vulnerable workers, particularly those employed by labour contractors who face the worst employment conditions. This contribution argues that the commercial dynamics of global production networks prov…
Economic and social upgrading in global production networks
A key challenge in promoting decent work worldwide is how to improve the position of both firms and workers in value chains and global production networks driven by lead firms. This article develops a framework for analysing the linkages between the economic upgrading of firms and the social upgrading of workers. Drawing on studies which indicate that firm upgrading does not necessarily lead to improvements for workers, with a particular focus on…
Corporate purchasing practices in global production networks
Civil society organisations are employing both adversarial and collaborative strategies to challenge purchasing practices of large corporations as a cause of poor employment conditions for a largely female workforce. This paper draws on analysis of global production networks, labour agency and gender to examine linkages and tensions at the intersection between commercial dynamics of dominant firms and their societal embeddedness in diverse locali…
Dynamics of Unfree Labour in the Contemporary Global Economy
This short introduction to the symposium sets the context for the collection of articles, locating them in debates about labour conditions in the global economy. It outlines the two central questions which animate the symposium. First, what forms do unfree labour take in the contemporary global economy, and what are the implications for the most vulnerable workers in diverse contexts? Second, which processes, conditions and dynamics generate and …
Gendered Commodity Chains
Gendered Global Production Networks
Barrientos S. Gendered global production networks: analysis of cocoa-chocolate sourcing, Regional Studies . Gendered global production network analysis builds on global value chain and feminist political economy. It explores the interaction between commercial value chains and societal norms in which gendered patterns of consumption and production are embedded across diverse societies. The cocoa-chocolate value chain is examined linking Europe and…
New dynamics of upgrading in global value chains
The rise of global value chains (GVCs) has been associated with the rapid expansion of outsourcing by lead firms in the global North to interlinked networks of cross-border suppliers in developing countries. Outsourcing was facilitated by trade and financial liberalization initiated in the 1970s and 1980s, and driven by intense competitive pressures for cost reduction. GVC and global production network (GPN) analysis provide crucial insights into…
New end markets, supermarket expansion and shifting social standards
In recent years, Northern supermarket chains have internationalized rapidly and Southern supermarket chains have expanded their footprint in emerging markets. As they have done so, questions have arisen about the impact of such supermarkets and the extent of consumer demand for social standards (labour standards and fair trade). While standards have been more (or less) codified in their Northern counterparts over recent decades, it remains an emp…
Shifting regional dynamics of global value chains
Global value chain and global production network analyses have largely focused on dominance of Northern retailers over suppliers in the global South. The expansion of retailers within the global South sourcing from and supplying consumer end-markets within their own geographic regions is reconfiguring value chain dynamics. This paper draws on GVC and GPN approaches and the concepts of multi-polar governance to analyse changing dynamics of global …
Economics (29 works) · Global trade, sustainability, and social impact (29 works) · Political science (22 works) · Business (21 works) · Sociology (16 works) · Innovation and Socioeconomic Development (12 works) · Economic growth (11 works) · Geography (10 works) · Labour economics (10 works) · Law (9 works)