Tag Archives: Foxconn

Foxconn: Relativity and Choice

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-02-02/news/31019111_1_foxconn-iphone-labor-agency

Following our discussion on Tuesday regarding the iPhone and Foxconn’s 17 suicides, I decided to look for articles that took the opposing point of view.  I looked for articles that supported Foxconn for their work and one article I liked in particular was “Apple, Foxconn and your iPhone” by Joshua Greenman.  Greenman takes a global perspective on the issue by basically saying economics are relative.  The standards we have here in the United States are very different than those in China.  Working conditions, from our perspective, may be very poor, but that doesn’t stop Foxconn from being able to easily employ almost a million workers.  Also, Greenman emphasizes the simple yet complicated word of ‘choice’.  I can’t help but agree with him when he concludes his article with the idea that Chinese men and women choose to work at Foxconn because it is what’s best for themselves and their families.  Although Foxconn does not provide the best working conditions, what Foxconn does provide is opportunity.  As tragic as the suicides were at Foxconn, I believe that Foxconn is doing a good job in providing its million workers with food and homes, for as long as the workers choose to work there.

Is Phone Story enough Motivation?

After Tuesday’s discussion in class, I thought about what it really means to look at how poor the conditions are for manufacturing some of today’s most important products.  As was pointed out in class, Apple seems to be the company that gets picked on the most for this problem, but they have done a lot to help reduce the amount of child labor in factories manufacturing their products.  I feel that if consumers want to further reduce the problems in these factories that they need to raise awareness and start pointing fingers at all of the other companies that are in the same boat as Apple.  Then, you end up not just looking at the electronics industry, but all the others that have these types of plants across the world.

I don’t think that most consumers care that much to start demanding changes in their favorite company’s methods of manufacturing.  Nevertheless, those concerned take trips to these factories and make reports as described in the This American Life podcast, and even make games (Phone Story) depicting the events that have taken place to make our beloved electronic devices.  In the podcast, Mr. Daisey admits that he still loves his Apple products even after what he saw at Foxconn, and I’m pretty sure the creators of Phone Story use smartphones of some kind, or else they probably wouldn’t be interested in making apps.  My overall thought on the issue is that I don’t think the conditions are so bad that people will want to change their lifestyle to try to bring about a change to the factory problems.

There Hands Build, Our Hands Play

Our discussions and videogames have led to some interesting thoughts. The relationship between operator and machine is an important theme in videogame analysis. Rarely, however, do we (the “first world”), think about where our machines come from. The articles/podcast this week tend to focus on one company, Foxconn (and through them, Apple), and one factory, the Foxconn factory of Shenzhen, China, in particular.

A natural debate arises from these readings: should “we” feel guilty about our consumption of cheap electronic goods? The articles represent a specific incident (or set of incidences: namely, the use of cheap labour by Apple) to call attention to the wider issue of whether or not our consumption harms others. Johnson writes “did my iPhone kill 17 people”? The podcast talks about the child workforce present in factory jobs. Sample writes about the game “Phone Story”, in which people see the harmful effects of factory life first-hand.

Should consumers take the blame for these atrocities? Best Buy does not seem evil for selling iPads, nor do many people walk around, wallowing in guilt, while playing angry birds on their iPhone. Should the companies exposing cheap labour be held accountable? Surely Apple and other companies must have knowledge of the conditions of their workforce.

I would suggest a different thought though: what involvement should the government have in the lives of workers? In particular, for the case of China, if the government can make “blacklists” (as described in the podcast), then shouldn’t that same government protect its workers from foreign manipulation? Should China exclude (either “exile” or heavily tax) companies that expose and harm its workers, as described in the readings and podcast?

Mike Daisey and the Problem of Global Concern

It is quite easy to conjure up pity and concern while listening to Mike Daisey talk about the labor conditions at Foxconn and other factories in the Chinese “Special Economic Zone” of Shenzhen. You listen to the stories, the hardships. You picture the faces of the men, women, and children who are forced into subpar labor conditions by the cruel corporate officers as they send line after line of technological thingamajigs into production. You think of the seventeen or so people who jumped off of those factory buildings because they just couldn’t take it anymore.

Then you go on your iPhone and check Facebook.

Clearly, the conditions in Foxconn are not good. Clearly, it is not wrong to feel sorry for the workers and to wish for an improved situation. You can blame Foxconn. You can blame Apple. You can even blame the ‘materialism’ of the West in the abstract. But don’t forget the gadget sitting in your own pocket as you read this. It is far too easy to give “the suits” a lot of flak about their mistreatment of the labor force as a means of deflecting any personal blame.

I don’t think Daisey’s desire to see certain reforms in the labor conditions of Shenzhen factories is unreasonable. In an increasingly globalized society, we absolutely need individuals like Daisey to push for small changes that, when done in conjunction with one another, improve the state of humanity. The problem, however, is bigger than a single “Special Economic Zone” halfway across the planet. When we live and actively participate in a society that possesses little more than a superficial conscience, we reap the harvest of our values. One walk through “Phone Story” makes that all too clear.

Is there a solution? As I type away on my Apple MacBook Pro, I know I sure haven’t found one. Not yet, at least. We can keep pointing fingers and chasing labor laws here and there for as long as we would like, and many people will be just fine. But that route will never touch the heart of the matter – or, should I say, the hearts of the matter. The hearts of people dictate the progress of our race and the treatment of our fellows. There will be no end to the exploitation of human beings while we treasure our things more than our neighbors.