The Wretched of the Earth Humanity, not profits The recent activism of the United Students Against Sweatshops has done much to bring the issue of labor abuse to the attention of the Penn community. But while much of the debate has centered around the moral bankruptcy of corporations that engage in unfair labor practices, the real issue is less about globalization or oppression of the powerless than about Penn's ability to live up to its own educational priorities. Most people in the U.S. agree on the inherent wrong of exploiting men, women and children, whether Mexican women shut up in a stuffy room in Los Angeles for 12 hours a day or boys and girls in Bangladesh who knit expensive sportswear for pennies an hour.
Some workers believe that cheap immigrant labor takes away American jobs.
Others see sweatshop labor as only the latest stage of multinational exploitation in the name of profit and greed. But regardless of the reasons, there is a broad societal consensus that sweatshop labor violates some civilized norm, just as it did a century ago. The issue underlying this week's series of protests, then, is not whether sweatshop labor is right or wrong. As a private university, Penn shares many similarities with any American company. Because it is not supported by the state, the University seeks to increase its revenues, build up its endowment and invest its money wisely.