Between Isolation and Empowerment: Pros, Cons, and solutions of Baixing Embroidery and Fair Trade from sociological and anthropological perspectives

Abstract

In this study, I will examine a fair trade project that I’ve initiated in Baixing, a Yao minority village in Guizhou, China, through a combination of sociological and anthropological ideologies. The project was successful in terms of attracting consumers’ interest and gaining popularity in the local market. In fact, 80% of embroidered leather jackets were sold. Despite the success in receiving attention from the buyers, from a more practical perspective, financially, the project ended up in complete failure. In addition to the financial failure, another key aspect of it, the empowerment of Ms.Cao, the artisan that I’ve worked with in this project, also turned out to have the opposite effect: an increase in dependency on fair trade organizations, (in this case, a high school student in Austin, Texas.) By adopting sociological frameworks like dependency theory, gendered political economy, and global commodity chain analysis alongside with anthropological understandings regarding cultural heritage, narrative framing, and the “social life of things,” I, as a high school student in high school student, have found three principle reasons behind the ineffectiveness of my fair trade initiative, which also hinder fair trade approaches in general from being, politically, socially, and economically effective. They are regional constraints, historical legacies, and power asymmetries. In section 5, I’ve listed four comparative case studies that faced similar situations that Baixing is facing to address these problems either collectively or individually, in addition to connecting Baixing’s local dilemmas to a broader international scope for common application and reference. Cases of Kuapa Kokoo and Divine Chocolate in Ghana, Fairtrade wine initiatives in South Africa, and Latin American coffee cooperatives suggest that structural innovations---cooperative ownership, story-telling with dignity, and multi-stakeholder governance---are necessary changes that fair trade organization and companies should implant; otherwise, fair trade attempts are susceptible in diminishing its own values and increasing inequalities to a greater degree. The conclusion section portrays the future of Baixing embroidery with the adjusted version of the fair trade initiative, and it expands on the potential of fair trade as a broader practice.