Graduation Year

2026

Date of Submission

4-2026

Document Type

Campus Only Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Government

Reader 1

William Ascher

Rights Information

© 2026 Abigail Dercole

Abstract

This thesis argues that child labor in the global apparel industry persists not primarily because of weak legal frameworks or isolated instances of noncompliance, but because it is incentivized within contemporary global supply chains. International conventions and national labor laws formally prohibit exploitative child labor. Yet the organization of production, pricing pressures from global buyers, and the economic constraints faced by households and suppliers create different incentives. Under these conditions, employing underage workers becomes a rational and predictable outcome. Child labor is not an accidental failure of regulation. It is a systemic feature of the global apparel economy. The analysis develops a multi-level framework that integrates household economics, firm behavior, and global supply chain governance. At the household level, poverty, income volatility, and limited access to education drive demand for children’s labor. For many families, child labor functions as a way to smooth income. At the firm level, suppliers operate under intense price competition and production uncertainty. These conditions create strong incentives to minimize labor costs and maintain workforce flexibility, often through informal employment arrangements. At the global level, these dynamics are amplified by buyer-driven commodity chains, in which brands exert significant control over pricing, delivery timelines, and sourcing strategies while externalizing the costs and risks of labor compliance to suppliers. Together, these forces produce an equilibrium in which child labor persists despite formal prohibition. The thesis also critically evaluates private governance mechanisms, including third-party audits, certification programs, and transparency initiatives. While these tools can reduce the probability of certain violations, they are structurally limited in their ability to address the underlying incentive system. Audit-based regimes are vulnerable to deception, limited in scope, and largely confined to first-tier suppliers. At the same time, the most severe labor violations frequently occur in informal subcontracting networks beyond the reach of monitoring systems. As a result, private governance mechanisms tend to detect and manage noncompliance rather than prevent it. To illustrate how these dynamics operate in practice, the thesis presents four corporate case studies: Nike, Primark, Shein, and Patagonia. Each represents a distinct configuration of sourcing strategy and governance investment. These cases demonstrate that improvements in labor conditions are most durable when governance mechanisms align with sourcing practices that reduce cost pressure, increase supplier stability, and extend accountability beyond first-tier facilities. Building on this analysis, the thesis introduces an original economic decision framework for corporate executives evaluating investments in labor certification and compliance systems. The model quantifies the full cost structure of certification, estimates probability-weighted reputational and regulatory risks, and calculates the net benefit of compliance under multiple scenarios. The results suggest that while certification can meaningfully reduce expected losses, it often fails to produce a positive net financial return under baseline assumptions. This highlights the limits of voluntary compliance in the absence of broader structural change.  The concluding chapter synthesizes these findings into a coordinated reform agenda to realign economic incentives across the supply chain. Proposed interventions include purchasing practice reform, mandatory due diligence legislation, strengthened public enforcement, expanded social protection for vulnerable households, and transitional models that combine work with education. Meaningful and sustained reductions in child labor require systemic change. Addressing any single component in isolation is insufficient as long as the broader incentive structure remains intact.

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This thesis is restricted to the Claremont Colleges current faculty, students, and staff.

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