The case of Bangladesh's superficial development - Why has the country's economic growth been the catalyst for working class underdevelopment?

孟加拉国经常被视为发展中国家通过快速和持续的经济增长顺利摆脱贫困的一个例子。由于该国的成衣（RMG）行业在将孟加拉国转变为全球第二大服装出口国的过程中发挥了重要作用，这种经济增长通常会转化为工人阶级生活水平的提高。在现实中，这个国家遭遇了一个悖论：伴随着有希望的增长，中产阶级内部的象征性改善和不稳定劳动力的增加造成了持续的财富不平等。从2000年到2010年，非正规就业增加了10%，而生活水平仍与低发达国家相当。这项研究将调查为什么发展没有扩展到工人阶级，工人阶级继续在国家生活工资下生存，几乎没有向上流动的机会。据推测，资本主义精英和国家之间的界限可能变得模糊，以至于两者之间的共同构成关系积极地延续了工人阶级的压迫，以维持依赖廉价劳动力的经济。在促进以提供服务和资源为重点的客观发展，而不是社会动员的过程中，似乎建立了一种虚假的进步叙述的表象。本研究将研究孟加拉国的形成时期，作为其发展历程的起点，并重新定位国家和资本主义精英的角色，以提供对国家斗争的新颖描述。通过将RMG行业中的劳工福利滥用历史化，并随后检查过去和现在的劳工制度，该研究将挑战剥削是管理不善，治理不善和市场压力的副产品的既定叙述。然后，研究将探索以劳动力为主导的发展作为一种可行的替代方案的潜力。研究问题对孟加拉国的研究在很大程度上是在南亚的区域背景下进行的，作为一个边缘案例，外国学者对其批评的兴趣有限。当地研究人员经常被提供一个国家积极的“盒子”来容纳他们的发现，因为该国的研究受到领土认识论和民族主义防御的影响。这些文献也缺乏对不平等和贫困的区分，它们的共同目标是强调经济政策是如何将人们的收入水平提高到基本上是表面的贫困线以上的。新自由主义和中央集权主义方法的其他分析将孟加拉国的发展历程置于背景下，但无法完全解释为什么贫困增长仍在继续。国家建立的本质一直被忽视，国家的作用经常被忽视/误解，无论是在它未能使用权力还是滥用权力方面。为了通过批判性的劳动制度和全球价值链分析，为对劳动剥削进行新的审视奠定基础，有必要重新审视这个国家的形成时期，在那里，根本原因被掩埋。由于对拉丁美洲、南非和亚洲的当代研究表明自下而上的发展方法是可能的替代办法，因此也应审查劳工主导的发展作为RMG工业内规范的政治干预的潜力。为了进行这项研究，必须提出三个问题：1。从1971年开始，什么样的历史社会属性和阶级关系影响了孟加拉国的发展历程？谁影响了孟加拉国的发展？在RMG行业中，剥削性劳动力是如何持续和（再）生产的？阻止劳动者离开从根本上压抑的劳动力池的真正障碍是什么？RMG行业内基层劳动力主导的发展会是什么样子？它如何影响国家实践和全球价值链，以应对日益严重的价值获取危机和劳动份额差距？

Bangladesh is often seen as an example of a developing country well on its way out of poverty through rapid and consistent economic growth. With the country's ready-made garment (RMG) industry playing a major role in transforming Bangladesh into the second largest global garments exporter, this economic growth would normally translate into improved living standards of the working class. In reality, the country has suffered from a paradox of promising growth accompanied by persistent wealth inequality molded by symbolic improvements within the middle class and a rise in precarious labor. Informal employment rose by 10% from 2000 to 2010 with living standards remaining on par with that of a low-developed country. This study will investigate why development has not been extended to the working class which continues to survive under the national living wage with little-to-no opportunities for upward mobility.It is hypothesized that the line between the capitalist elites and the state may be blurred to the degree that a co-constitutive relationship between the two actively perpetuates working class repression to sustain an economy that relies on cheap labor. A facade of false progressive narratives seems to have been built amidst the promotion of objective development focused on the provision of services and resources, rather than social mobilization. This research will study Bangladesh's formative years as the inception point of its development journey, and re-center the role of the state and capitalist elite to provide a novel account of the nation's struggle. By historicizing labor welfare abuse within the RMG industry, and subsequently examining past and present labor regimes, the study will challenge established narratives of exploitation being a by-product of mismanagement, poor governance and market pressures. The research will then explore the potential for labor-led development as a viable alternative.RESEARCH QUESTIONSResearch on Bangladesh has been largely examined within the regional context of South Asia and as a marginal case which draws limited interest in its critique from foreign scholars. Local researchers are often provided with a state-positive "box" to fit their findings in, with research in the country suffering from territorial epistemology and nationalist defensiveness. The literature also lacks a distinction between inequality and poverty with a common goal being to accentuate how economic policies have raised people's income levels above a largely superficial poverty line.Other analyses from neoliberal and statist approaches have contextualized Bangladesh's development journey but have been unable to fully explain why immiserizing growth continues. The nature in which the country was established is continuously overlooked with the role of the state often ignored/misinterpreted, both in its failure to use power and in its abuse of it. It is necessary to revisit the country's formative years where the root causes lie buried in order to lay the foundation for a novel examination of labor exploitation through critical labor regime and GVC analysis.With more contemporary studies of Latin America, South Africa and Asia suggesting bottom-up approaches to development as possible alternatives, the potential of labor-led development as a normative political intervention within the RMG industry should also be examined.To carry out this research, three questions must be asked:1.What historical social-property and class relations were influential in directing Bangladesh's development journey from 1971, and by whom?2.How is exploitative labor being sustained and (re)produced in the RMG industry, and what are the real barriers that prevent laborers leaving a fundamentally suppressive labor pool?3.What would grass-roots labor-led development within the RMG industry look like, and how could it influence state practices and impact GVCs to counter the growing value-capture crisis and labor-share disparity?