As the multimillion dollar hype of Samsung’s Galaxy S8 release this week saturates our social media feeds, will anyone stop to consider that it is a phone produced by exploitation?
Samsung is seeking to repair a damaged reputation following the disaster of its dangerous exploding batteries, but in the process has made no move to ensure protection for its workforce subjected to the company wide policy of bribes, threats, bullying, dismissal and even kidnapping to keep its employees, and people working for its suppliers under total control, in particular to stop them joining a union to fight for decent wages and conditions.
200 Samsung workers have fallen ill with leukemia, lymphoma and other occupational diseases, yet Samsung refused to give details of the chemicals used in production until a district court ruled against the company’s secrecy policy earlier this year. 76 of the workers, mostly in their 20s and 30s, have died.
And in the Samsung supply chain workplaces the wages paid don't come near the levels necessary for a family to live with dignity. For many workers we have met in Asian nations the fear of not being able to afford basic products like baby formula is a stress Samsung executives have never experienced. Every worker in this supply chain earns the company $10,000 profit and a mere $50 a month increase means they could feed their families.
Just $50 a month out of $10,000 profit would allow families to live with dignity.
The arrest of company head Lee Jae-yong in the huge corruption scandal which led to the ousting of Korean President Park Geun-hye is a just response but charges of abuse of human and labour rights should be added.
Sadly, Samsung’s Galaxy S8 is a global poster boy for corporate greed.
While the world’s media has focused on the dangerously defective Galaxy S7 and the corruption scandal engulfing company headquarters, thousands of Samsung workers have been toiling in dangerous and oppressive conditions to deliver the new model.
A 115-page manual tabled in Korea’s National Assembly in 2013 details how Samsung senior management are trained in techniques to stop workers joining trade unions at all costs. The Galaxy S8 is being produced under the same conditions, despite calls from the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Freedom of Association Committee for the Korean government to investigate and make the company respect basic workers’ rights.
The case at the ILO, brought by the ITUC, Global Union Federation IndustriALL and Korean trade unions, accuses the company of systematic surveillance and intimidation of workers, dismissal of union members, severing contracts with unionised suppliers, non-compliance with agreements, fictional contracting arrangements, and instructions to managers to violate labour laws.
The case also describes Samsung’s “greening” process, which is forced on supplier companies, in which workers are offered inducements to stop them joining unions, as well as persuasive tactics on workers’ families, and sacking workers who take up leadership positions in local unions. The case of a worker at Samsung’s Uslan Service Centre who was kidnapped by manager is detailed in the ILO case. The worker was made to get into a car and driven to an island tens of kilometres away, where his mobile phone was confiscated. Locked in a room, he was told that he would not escape the island unless he withdrew from the union.
In its findings, the ILO Freedom of Association Committee expressed deep concern over the allegations, and regretted that although a government investigation confirmed kidnapping and harassment of several unionists, the Prosecutor’s Office did not deem it sufficient to initiate criminal proceedings.
Hopefully the fall-out from the corruption scandal will end the covert collusion between Samsung and the Korean authorities who have a duty to protect workers, but the people who make the Galaxy S8 and other Samsung products deserve justice, and the public and consumers can help by demanding an end to Samsung’s brutal and repressive treatment of its workforce,
We may be living in a world of disposable electronics but working people are not disposable commodities. We invite you to let Samsung know at www.samsungssecret.org
Technological developments are changing the way we live and there is much talk of digitalisation and the disruptive business models enabled by smart phones, tablets computers and the 'internet of things'.
The question for the brand names like Samsung is whether they are prepared to repair a 'damaged' workforce on whom they depend.
The 4th industrial revolution attracts worldwide commentary yet millions of workers who enable this future are struggling to survive conditions that are akin to the first industrial revolution.
Modern phones, medieval conditions. Samsung, we expect better from a 21st century company.