Race to the bottom? Family labour, household livelihood and consumption in the relocation of global cotton manufacturing, ca. 1750-1990

Project Information

TextileLab

Grant agreement ID: 771288

DOI

10.3030/771288

Project closed

EC signature date 19 February 2018

Start date 1 October 2018

End date 31 March 2024

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 999 250,00

EU contribution

€ 1 999 250,00

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT
Netherlands

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - TextileLab (Race to the bottom? Family labour, household livelihood and consumption in the relocation of global cotton manufacturing, ca. 1750-1990)

Reporting period: 2023-04-01 to 2024-03-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Over the last 250 years, the epicenter of global cotton textile production has shifted from Asia to Europe and the US, and more recently, back to Asia. This project delved into the reasons behind this fascinating shift, adopting a micro-perspective that emphasizes the distribution of textile labour and household consumption. It operates on the fundamental premise that the labour choices and consumption patterns of households significantly affected the resilience or vulnerability of textile industries across different global regions. While existing literature often points to the critical role of markets and institutions, this project uniquely explored the less examined impact of household behavior on the relocation of textile production across the world.

The project had a global outlook, with its different members conducting several comparative cases. We employed a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to understand the significance of household labour relations and evolving consumption habits in determining the conditions for the resilience or migration of textile production. The team has compiled several databases containing thousands of observations of textile wages for men, women, and children, which have been published on our project website for a general audience to be explored.

In today's increasingly globalized world, the findings of this project hold considerable societal relevance. Understanding the origins of current disparities in the international labour division is crucial for shaping policies aimed at fostering more equitable labor conditions globally. Moreover, identifying factors that contribute to the resilience of local economic activities, as well as the role households have played in these processes, is vital for challenging deterministic views of globalization's homogenizing influence. Lastly, adopting a gendered lens to investigate the persistent wage disparities between men and women offers timely insights, given that this issue remains a significant challenge in both developing and developed regions.

Overall objectives of the project were to 1) make comprehensive comparisons of the dynamic influences of household production and consumption in the relocation as well as resilience of textile production worldwide; 2) integrate this perspective in the economic historical literature, thus contributing to the topical academic debates on the history of capitalism by adding a local, household and gender perspective to these debates and 3) disseminate these perspectives among a wider audience, as well as the data we have gathered, by using our project website, social and regular media and inform our teaching activities.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Sub-projects

PD project 1 - Textile wages, prices and tariffs worldwide
The aim of this subproject is to compose and analyse large datasets, to be used by academic and wider audiences. At present, the databases have been published online. They contain tens of thousands of observations of textile wages of men, women and children from India, the UK, and the USA.

PD project 2 - Textiles in Sub-Sahara Africa
Handicraft industries have long thrived in parts of sub-Saharan Africa, especially in the west, while factory-based textile manufacturing has struggled to gain steam. This sub-project examined how household production strategies and consumption preferences have impacted on the simultaneous resilience of handicraft manufacturing and disappointment of large-scale machine-based manufacturing. Several publications, including a monograph and an article in the Journal of Global History, have sprung from this project.

PhD project 1 - Textiles in China & UK
This sub project was intended to diachronically compare developments in Great Britain and China, exploring how the division of labour in household textile production changed over time. The PhD student was struggling all along the project. He has collected most of the source material for Britain, but failed to do so for China, and he decided to quit after 3 years into the project. Luckily, a postdoc could be assigned in China on the basis of "in kind contribution not working on the premises" to finish the Chinese data work. From this project, one submitted article and a working paper have resulted.

PhD project 2 - Textiles in Japan & India
This project compared the differential industrial growth trajectories of the Indian and Japanese textile industries. It analyzes the strategies of business classes in India and Japan involving both internal and external factors. Taking a value chain approach, this research explores the manner in which relative differences in markets for labour, capital, and raw materials as well as State policies shaped the opportunities and constraints for textile enterprises in these two countries, and ultimately shaping the course of development of the textile industry. The PhD project was successfully completed in the fall of 2023, and the candidate has defended her thesis on 17 May 2024 and is now a postdoc at Wageningen University.

Synthesis - “Race to the Bottom? Relocation and resilience of the cotton textile industry”
All of these research projects fall within the period of circa 1750 and 1990. However, some of the sub-projects focus on a shorter period of time, depending on their respective research questions. In the end, however, it is our intention to have a coverage that is as long-term and global as possible. The synthesis is in the making, but could not be finished within the project duration. It will be finished over the next year, and a publisher that publishes OA will be found.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The project employed a dual approach, combining regional and diachronic historical comparisons. For example, the Principal Investigator (PI) and PhD2 have compared gender wage rates and majority gender shares in textile production between India and Japan, two regions that have rarely been compared before. This resulted in an article in the Indian Social and Economic History Review (2022). Additionally, an innovative South-South comparison has been between Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa by the PI and Postdoc 2, with their paper published in the Journal of Global History.

The project's findings are groundbreaking. It has been discovered that in colonized regions, local textile production's competitive advantages, such as meeting specific consumer preferences and using household labour to cut costs, have often been crucial for the survival of textile handicrafts until today. In certain historical situations, these advantages appear to have surpassed the comparative benefit of cheaper production that is usually emphasized in earlier industrialized areas.

Moreover, in-depth comparative analyses of male-female wage disparities in the nascent textile industries of countries like the UK, Japan, and India shed light on significant factors that affect workforce composition (majority gender shares) in specific textile jobs. These factors range from demand-side elements, such as local labor market structures, to supply-driven aspects, like seasonality and household labour allocation strategies.

The project has yielded 26 publications, including 2 monographs, 1 edited volume, 12 journal articles and 10 book chapters. Also, 2 workshops and 1 final conference have been organized. With the project's academic activities as well as public engagement, TextileLab has reached an audience of over 3 million people.

The project team, February 2020

Website of the TextileLab project