Herrigel Johanna, MA International Political Economy
PhD Student, Research Associate
Economic Geography Unit
Department of Geography
University of Zurich - Irchel
Winterthurerstr. 190
CH-8057 Zurich, Switzerland
room: | Y25L52 |
email: | |
tel: | +41-44-6355144 |
fax: | +41-44-6356848 |
Johanna Herrigel joined the Geography Department in September 2010 as a PhD student. After having completed her Bachelor in Political Science with focus on International Studies in Lausanne, Johanna graduated in International Politics – International Political Economy Pathway at the University of Manchester with distinction. In her Masters thesis, Johanna looked at the impact of one particular kind of corporate social responsibility strategies, namely voluntary Codes of Conduct designed by Multi Stakeholder Initiatives, on working conditions in export-producing factories of the apparel industry. Throughout her thesis, Johanna has highlighted the analogy between shortcomings in theory / research on global production (Global Commodity Chains, Global Value Chains, Global Production Networks) and impact limits of Codes of Conduct.
Research interests
The focus of my research interest lies on the intersection of Labour Geographies and the Geographies of transnational production (Global Commodity Chains, Global Value Chains, Global Production Networks). A dialogue between these two research fields is in its infancy and hence still largely missing.
To date, little attention has been paid to the agency of labour at the “bottom” of global production (for instance workers doing low-skilled, labour-intensive assembly work for export production) and its role in shaping the global economy. This shortcoming is particularly striking in view of the waves of labour strikes that have hit the export production zones in many Asian countries and led to wage rises and production relocation in 2010.
Meanwhile, the Global Value Chain Framework has become largely applied in donor driven “value chain development” programs of institutions such as the ILO, the world bank, USAID and SADC. With few exceptions (see for instance the “Capturing the Gains” project), the dominant assumption is that economic development or upgrading always leads to social development/upgrading. Consequently, little has been said in research about the risks to which workers are exposed due to their participation in export production and “value chain development” programs usually turn a blind eye on this aspect too.
In my Ph.D. research, I apply a feminist and historical materialism approach in order to address these shortcomings. Through this lens, I look at the terms on which poor people participate in global production. I am particularly interested in the following dimensions: (1) contingent and patterned construction/use/reinforcement of cultural differences, (2) moments of construction/integration into as well as exclusion from global production and (3) working conditions and enabling rights. I intend to look at these aspects through the M4P programme (“Making markets work better for the poor”) applied, amongst others, by the SADC.