Labor Contestation at Walmart Brazil
Limits of Global Diffusion in Latin America
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Beschreibung
This book explores how the labor practices of the world’s largest private employer, Walmart, were contested by unions and regulators in Latin America. With an in-depth case study of Brazil, and a comparative examination of Argentina, Chile, and Mexico, the authors analyze the problematic encounter between diffusion of home-office antilabor practices and evolving national institutional contexts that sometimes enable considerable union and/or regulatory resistance. Walmart’s “repressive familial” and “anti-union” model is found to generate costs and conflicts that contributed to its exit from Brazil after 23 years.
Scott B. Martin is a Lecturer in International Affairs at Columbia University, and The New School, USA.
João Paulo Cândia Veiga is Assistant Professor and Chair of Political Science of the Universidade de São Paulo (USP), Brazil.
Katiuscia Moreno Galhera is VisitingFaculty at Universidade Federal da Grande Dourados, Brazil.
This book explores how and why the labor practices of the world’s largest employer, supermarket giant Walmart, were contested by unions and government regulators as it expanded to Latin America starting in the 1990s. With an in-depth case study of Brazil, and a comparative chapter examining Argentina, Chile, and Mexico, this book analyzes the problematic encounter between diffusion of home-office anti-labor practices and evolving national institutional contexts that are quite varied and in some cases enable considerable resistance by unions and/or regulators. Walmart’s “repressive familial” and “anti-union” model is found to generate costs and conflicts that contributed to its unprofitability and ultimate exit from Brazil in 2018. This experience, contrasted with country situations where Walmart’s overall competitive and labor and human resource practices “fit” better with national markets and institutions, underlines the brittle, problematic nature of diffusionist corporate models lacking adaptive capacity to significant cross-national variations across host countries.
Analyzes over twenty years of retail businesses in Latin America, specifically, Walmart in Brazil Uses comparative methods to explain why Walmart has followed different paths in other Latin American countries: Mexico, Chile, and Argentina Examines labor-management relations and state regulatory actions in Latin America
Autor*in
Scott B. Martin
Themen in »Labor Contestation at Walmart Brazil«
Latin America Labor Brazil Walmart Chile Argentina Mexico Conflictual Cooperation Labor Relations global diffusion Walmart culture globalization of retail structural labor power labor contestation multinational corporations
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“Martin, Veiga and Galhera provide an eloquent and insightful analysis of how one of the world’s most powerful corporations attempted to impose its model of ‘repressive, anti-union familialism’ on the largest economy in Latin America, and how it was met with resistance from workers, unions and the state. Their ‘nested agency within institutions’ perspective provides powerful insights on regional variations. It is a must-read for practitioners and scholars of employment relations and human resource management.”
—Mark Anner, Professor, Labor and Employment Relations, and Director, Center for Global Workers’ Rights, Penn State University, USA, and author of Solidarity Transformed: Labor Responses to Globalization and Crisis in Latin America (2011)
“Why did Walmart fail in Brazil? Thoroughly researched and convincingly argued, this is the compelling story of how one of the world’s most powerful companies struggled to impose its model in Brazil, and of why national institutions and labor unions matter. It’s a cautionary tale of global expansion and corporate parochialism.
—Maria Lorena Cook, Professor Emeritus, ILR School, Cornell University, and author of The Politics of Labor Reform in Latin America: Between Flexibility and Rights (2007)
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