front cover of Choke Points
Choke Points
Logistics Workers Disrupting the Global Supply Chain
Edited by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson and Immanuel Ness
Pluto Press, 2017
The global economy seems indomitable. Goods travel all over the globe, supplying just-in-time retail stocks, keeping consumers satisfied and businesses profitable.
            But there are vulnerabilities, and Choke Points reveals them—and the ways that workers are finding ways to make use of the power that those choke points afford them. Exploring a number of case studies around the world, this book uncovers a little-known network of resistance by logistics workers worldwide who are determined to contest their exploitation by the forces of global capital. Through close accounts of wildcat strikes, roadblocks, and boycotts, from South China to Southern California, the contributors build a picture of a movement that flies under the radar, but carries the potential to force dramatic change.
 
[more]

front cover of Fragmenting Globalization
Fragmenting Globalization
The Politics of Preferential Trade Liberalization in China and the United States
Ka Zeng and Xiaojun Li
University of Michigan Press, 2021
Global supply chain integration is not only a rapidly growing feature of international trade, it is responsible for fundamentally changing trade policy at international and domestic levels. Given that final goods are produced with both domestic and foreign suppliers, Ka Zeng and Xiaojun Li argue that global supply chain integration pits firms and industries that are more heavily dependent on foreign supply chains against those that are less dependent on intermediate goods for domestic production. Hence, businesses whose supply chain would be disrupted as a result of increased trade barriers should lobby for preferential trade liberalization to maintain access to those foreign markets. Moreover, businesses whose products are used in the production of goods in foreign countries should also support preferential trade liberalization to compete with suppliers from other parts of the world.

Fragmenting Globalization uses multiple methods, including time series, cross-sectional analysis of the pattern of Preferential Trade Alliance formation by existing World Trade Organization members, a firm-level survey, and case studies of the pattern of corporate support for regional trade liberalization in both China and the United States. Zeng and Li show that the growing fragmentation of global production, trade, and investment is altering trade policy away from the traditional divide between export-oriented and import-competing industries.
[more]

logo for Georgetown University Press
Reinventing the Supply Chain
A 21st-Century Covenant with America
Georgetown University Press, 2023

An original vision for using technology to transform supply chains into value chains in order to revitalize American communities

When the COVID-19 pandemic led to a global economic “shutdown” in March 2020, our supply chains began to fail, and out-of-stocks and delivery delays became the new norm. Contrary to public perception, the pandemic strain did not break the current system of supply chains; it merely exposed weaknesses and fault lines that were decades in the making, and which were already acutely felt in deindustrialized cities and depopulated rural towns throughout the United States.

Reinventing the Supply Chain explores the historical role of supply chains in the global economy, outlines where the system went wrong and what needs to be done to fix it, and demonstrates how a retooled supply chain can lead to the revitalization of American communities. Jack Buffington proposes a transformation of the global supply chain system into a community-based value chain, led by the communities themselves and driven by digital platforms for raising capital and blockchain technology.

Buffington proposes new solutions to problems that have been decades in the making. With clear analysis and profound insight, Buffington provides a clear roadmap to a more durable and efficient system.

[more]

front cover of Small Business and Strategic Sourcing
Small Business and Strategic Sourcing
Lessons from Past Research and Current Data
Nancy Y. Moore
RAND Corporation, 2014
The Department of Defense (DoD) may face challenges as it attempts to maintain its goal of spending about 23 percent of prime-contract dollars for goods and services with small businesses and at the same time apply strategic-sourcing practices to reduce total costs and improve performance and efficiency and in ways that will not conflict with small-business goals.
[more]


Send via email Share on Facebook Share on Twitter