Impact Factors Of Labor Standards Compliance Behavior In Overseas Chinese Companies

In international labor relations research,the impact of home and host country effects on the labor relations practices of overseas subsidiaries has been an important research topic in the last 20 years.The conclusions of the existing studies on the home and host country effects of overseas subsidiaries are controversial,and it is evident that the factors influencing the labor relations practices of MNCs’ overseas investments are worth studying.Meanwhile,with the formation of global supply chains,the labor relations practices of overseas enterprises in the supply chains will be affected by other factors besides the home and host country effects.Take the global apparel supply chain as an example,there exists an institutional arrangement in this supply chain aimed at monitoring labor standards of upstream apparel processing enterprises-global labor governance.Several studies on the relationship between global labor governance and suppliers’ labor standards compliance behavior have shown that global labor governance can improve suppliers’ labor standards compliance.These suppliers include both local and foreign-owned firms.Since labor relations practices are the institutions,behaviors and outcomes related to labor relations management,and the compliance of global labor governance guidelines by global supply chain suppliers is part of employers’ labor relations management behaviors,labor relations practices of enterprises include labor standards compliance behaviors.It can be seen that in global apparel supply chains,global labor governance is as important as home and host country effects in influencing the labor relations practices of overseas firms.However,limited research has been conducted to address the question of whether global labor governance interacts with home and host country effects to affect the labor relations practices of overseas subsidiaries.In addition,with the gradual increase of Chinese overseas investments,the labor relations practices of overseas Chinese enterprises have become a hot topic of research,which also focuses on the question of whether the labor relations practices of overseas Chinese enterprises are influenced by home country or host country effects,and the findings of these studies are controversial.It is evident that the factors influencing the labor relations practices of overseas investment are unclear for both MNCs from developed countries and Chinese companies.Based on the above research background,this paper poses four research questions: first,are the labor relations practices of overseas Chinese-invested apparel firms influenced by the home country effect,the host country effect,the interaction of the two,or contingent? if the labor relations practices of overseas Chinese-owned apparel firms is contingent,what are contingencies? Second,how does global labor governance affect the labor compliance behavior of overseas Chinese-owned apparel firms? Third,how does global labor governance interact with home or host country effects to influence the labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese-owned apparel firms? Fourth,is the relationship between global labor governance and public regulation in the host country complementary,alternative,or weaker in promoting labor standards compliance among overseas Chinese apparel firms? Based on an inductive analysis of these research questions,the research objective of this paper is to revise and improve the existing theories to investigate the factors influencing the labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese apparel firms from the perspectives of global labor governance,home country effect,and host country effect.To achieve this research objective,this paper adopts a case study approach because generally qualitative research,including case studies,aims to construct,revise,and refine theories.Since Cambodia and Myanmar are the main destinations for overseas investments by Chinese apparel enterprises,and since most of the apparel enterprises in these two countries are in the upstream processing segment of the global apparel supply chain and are subject to global labor governance,this paper conducts a case study of the labor relations compliance behavior of Chinese apparel enterprises in these two countries to explore the factors influencing their labor standards compliance behavior.This paper collects data mainly through interviews and literature.In terms of interviews,this paper interviewed 94 stakeholder representatives from the apparel industry in both countries,involving a total of 14 Cambodian-Myanmar Chinese apparel enterprises.Using the qualitative data analysis method of Joya,this paper systematically summarizes the influencing factors of labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese apparel enterprises and proposes a research proposition and theoretical framework on the influencing factors of labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese apparel enterprises.Based on the results of data analysis,this paper draws four main research conclusions.First,the labor relations practices of overseas Chinese-owned apparel firms are highly contingent,and their labor relations practices are influenced by a number of contextual factors,including global labor governance,host country institutions,and labor standards support from transnational civil society organizations.Second,whether the labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese-owned apparel firms is influenced by home country effects depends on whether they are subject to global labor governance.For firms subject to global labor governance,their labor standards compliance behavior is affected by global labor governance;for firms not subject to all-labor governance,their labor standards compliance behavior is affected by the home country effect.Third,regardless of whether overseas garment Chinese firms are subject to global labor governance,their labor relations compliance behavior is influenced by host country labor forces,and this influence is reinforced when they are supported by local and transnational civil society organizations.Fourth,public regulation in the host country is an important contextual factor.For Cambodian-Myanmar Chinese garment firms subject to global labor governance,there is a contextual factor of public regulation in the path of global labor governance on labor standards compliance;for Myanmar Chinese firms not subject to global labor governance,there is also a contextual factor of public regulation in the path of home country effect on labor standards compliance.For Chinese firms in Myanmar that are not subject to global labor governance,there is also a situational factor of public regulation in the host country.This paper has four main academic contributions.First,this paper revises the theoretical framework of factors influencing labor relations practices of overseas subsidiaries from the perspective of global supply chains and finds that in addition to home country and host country effects,global labor governance and transnational civil society organizations labor standards support are also important influencing factors,as well as discovering the mechanisms by which global labor governance and transnational civil society organizations labor standards support affect overseas firms’ labor relations practices.Second,this paper distinguishes the influencing factors of labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese apparel firms subject to and not subject to global labor governance.Third,this paper identifies host country public regulation as an important contextual factor that affects the relationship between global labor governance and labor standards compliance behavior of overseas Chinese firms.Fourth,this paper revises the action logic theoretical framework and finds that in addition to tripartite labormanagement-governance actors,multinational apparel brand companies,multi-stakeholder initiatives,and transnational and local civil society organizations are also actors that can influence labor relations patterns.