Boycott is the power to negotiate for what we want and that is positive change. Abroad where people follow democracy, boycott is quite popular as it will help citizen to bargain for what they really want. For example, when a brand is taking advantage of cheap labour, or forced labour, and citizen realizes that, they simply tell one another to help boycott the brand so that they will change. That is why more and more brands tend to create Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) department. If you open a company, what you care is profit, not any CSR, that is the nature of business. However, since companies are afraid of people boycotting their products, they tend to care more about their workers' welfare and working conditions so that it is fair.
In Cambodia, however, boycott is not popular. People do not normally join hand to bargain for what they want, and simply lose the power to the authority or someone who have more money. Yet, in Cambodia, we are more familiar with citizen-justice where when people witness injustice, they do not send the accused to the court, instead they want to take justice by beating in public, which is totally different from boycotting because boycott is resilient and perseverance.
Politically speaking, in 2013 after an election, one political party did use this strategy to bargain with the winning party. It did work!
I would like to raise an awareness that we all should join hand to fight injustice and noncompliance. We are the people have this power to boycott, and boycott will kill our opponent economically. That is why in a company, they need a union, because a union represents collective employees. The more members a union has, the better it is.
From this post, I hope that people understand more about their own power to drive change and to cooperate more as a collective force. It can be shown via stopping from buying certain products or using a service if they have bad impacts for the other people' livelihoods. We have to understand that we alone don't have any power to fight against authority, but we collectively can make authority think twice.
In Cambodia, however, boycott is not popular. People do not normally join hand to bargain for what they want, and simply lose the power to the authority or someone who have more money. Yet, in Cambodia, we are more familiar with citizen-justice where when people witness injustice, they do not send the accused to the court, instead they want to take justice by beating in public, which is totally different from boycotting because boycott is resilient and perseverance.
Politically speaking, in 2013 after an election, one political party did use this strategy to bargain with the winning party. It did work!
I would like to raise an awareness that we all should join hand to fight injustice and noncompliance. We are the people have this power to boycott, and boycott will kill our opponent economically. That is why in a company, they need a union, because a union represents collective employees. The more members a union has, the better it is.
From this post, I hope that people understand more about their own power to drive change and to cooperate more as a collective force. It can be shown via stopping from buying certain products or using a service if they have bad impacts for the other people' livelihoods. We have to understand that we alone don't have any power to fight against authority, but we collectively can make authority think twice.
