Introduction

Since the late 20th century, social organizations from the North and South have achieved recognition, prestige, competence, and legitimacy as international actors in Fair Trade.

However, these processes face new structural challenges of change: exploring alternative financing mechanisms, facilitating partnerships in markets, strengthening the capacities of norm entrepreneurs, influencing global trade policies, energizing cooperation in multi-stakeholder spheres and in the spheres of public and private power and authority in trade…

Fair Trade emerges as a fundamental field of learning, empowerment, and positioning for social and institutional actors, the global Indigenous Movement, producer-entrepreneur organizations, and international organizations.

The course provides opportunities to expand the frontiers of knowledge on the subject, deepen understanding of the complex Fair Trade systems, develop analytical and relational skills in the world of policymakers, public and private operators and regulators at national and international levels, and learn about Fair Trade practices and initiatives at local, regional, or global levels.

Course Structure

  • Development of theoretical and conceptual aspects + general introduction
  • Fair Trade case study + course contents
  • Virtual Fair Trade practices + course contents
  • Overall course evaluation

PART I: Theoretical Aspects of Fair Trade

  • Fair Trade: concept
  • Notion of Fair Trade and its impact on academia and International Relations
  • Interdependence relations between the global Fair Trade Movement and the global Indigenous Peoples Movement.
  • Constructions of power and authority: legitimization of the political actor and economic empowerment in Fair Trade.
  • Conceptualization of Fair Trade from the perspective of social organizations, public and private entities, and international organizations.
  • Theoretical reading of Fair Trade: the interdisciplinary approach to the notion of Fair Trade, the 2030 Agenda SDGs, and Indigenous Peoples.
  • Rhetorics of Business for Development, the global partnership for sustainable development, global public goods, and the notion of Fair Trade.

PART 2: Architecture of the Fair Trade System

Global framework of Fair Trade: Contribution of international bodies, national entities, and Social Movements in establishing Fair Trade Regulations, Norms, and Policies (UN, European Union, International Financing Organizations, Bilateral Agencies of International Cooperation, NGOs, UN Agencies, global Indigenous Movement, global Fair Trade Movement).

Emergence of international Fair Trade structures:

  • World Fair Trade Organization WFTO/OCMJ
  • Fair Trade International/FLO: Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International
  • FTAO: Fair Trade Advocacy Office
  • World Fair Trade Organization-Europe
  • Local and global networks
  • National and supranational initiatives: producer and consumer organizations: Fair Trade supply chains.

Production of international Fair Trade norms and standards:

  • Fair Trade Principles
  • Fair Trade Criteria
  • Fair Trade Standards
  • Fair Trade Label/Fairtrade
  • International Certification
  • International Norms

PART 3: Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Development Decades, and Fair Trade

UN mechanisms on Indigenous Peoples: World Conference on Indigenous Peoples, UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

  • United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples 2007: nexus between Rights norms and capacity-building for Fair Trade.
  • Indigenous Peoples Decades and Fair Trade: First Decade 1994–2004 & Second Decade 2004–2014: evolution of the global Fair Trade movement during these two periods.
  • Dynamics of representation of Indigenous Peoples at the UN and advocacy for Rights in different international agendas: influence on international Fair Trade policies.
  • Fair Trade, Indigenous Peoples, and the UN Development Decades: 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990: a long period of seeking opportunities for the positioning of actors in processes of change.
  • New Millennium: UN Declaration in the New Millennium, Indigenous Peoples, and the prospects for articulating Fair Trade in the spheres of global trade.
  • Fair Trade and Indigenous Peoples in the New Millennium: Millennium Development Goals MDGs 2000–2015: 8 goals

PART 4: Sustainable Development Goals SDGs, Agenda 2030, Indigenous Peoples, and Fair Trade

Transforming our world, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, United Nations: the major orientations of the Sustainable Development Agenda: structural implications for the development of Fair Trade

Exploration of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals and the nexus between Indigenous Peoples and the global Fair Trade movement: strategies, partnerships, orientations, programs, policies, financing…

PART 5: Fair Trade Networks and Indigenous Populations

Emergence of the Indigenous Movement as an actor in international Fair Trade

Expansion and growth of new international, local, or regional entities in the North and South in Fair Trade: NGOs, public and private bodies, organizations of the International Indigenous Movement, producer and consumer organizations.

Initiatives in different fields of specialization or intervention: certifiers, norm producers, regulators, accreditation, accountability, transparency, anti-corruption, gender, rights advocacy: new generation of organizations in the spheres of global Fair Trade.

Global Fair Trade networks: typology of networks

Dynamics of interventions by Fair Trade networks at global, regional, or local levels

governanceresearchcenter.org/en/articles/gobernanza-comercio-justo-sostenible/ · Machine translation (AI) of the original in Spanish. It may contain errors: only the original is authoritative. Printed from governanceresearchcenter.org. © José Escobar.