After reading Joel Johnson’s piece about the Foxconn plant and listening to the perspective of our class on Tuesday, I still felt torn as to whether the happenings at the electronics manufacturing giant were right or wrong. Still without a firm conclusion after a day of thought, I began to think perhaps we were asking the wrong question. Maybe we should not hold Foxconn to the standard of being inherently right or wrong. Instead, maybe we should look to see if they have positively improved upon, avoided, or learned from the problems that we view as massive failures in our own industrial revolution.

From this perspective, I feel the company has in fact been doing all we can ask of them. Not only are they improving upon past injustices by creating a much cleaner, healthier work environment (even offering counseling facilities), but they are attempting to better their worker’s lives even more by offering accessible dining and living facilities. Granted, these facilities may be labeled inadequate by some, but isn’t it the attempt that we should value and applaud Foxconn for? Of course, every new plan or program will have its flaws, but if it is in some way more successful or simply less wrong than the previous version, then aren’t we taking a step in the right direction?

Regardless of people’s feelings, with such a large share of the market, it seems Foxconn is here to stay for at least the near future.