Carla Rangel
December 2
nd
, 2023
INT-220
Global Supply Chain Case Study
This case revolves around apple and come of its supplies including Foxconn, and Pegatron, and the biggest key issue in this case is the ethical violations related to poor employee treatment and poor working conditions at both Foxconn, and Pegatron.
According to the article, “18 Foxconn workers attempted to kill themselves, and 14 died at the manufacturing company’s facilities…” (Lee, Mol, Mellahie, 2016), while for Pegatron, several of their factories, forced employees to work in a dangerous environment for very long hours. (Lee, Mol, Mellahi, 2016) Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is defined by the Harvard Business School as “the
idea that a business has a responsibility to the society that exists around it” (2023). A company has full responsibility on how they treat their workers. Part of Corporate Social Responsibility includes providing a good work environment for employees to work at.
The media and public opinion played a significant role in the apple’s case, as it helped bring the issues to light, leaving the company (Apple) with no option but to come out and address the issues to the public. After the first time that the bad treatment towards employees at Foxconn was exposed, “one of Apple’s responses were to move some of its businesses away from Foxconn to Pegatron.” (Lee, Mol, Mellahi, 2016) which was a good decision to the eyes of the public as it stopped the scandal from appearing on the news and it helped improve Foxconn treatment towards their employees.
