Localizing Private Social Standards: Standard Initiatives in Kenyan Cut Flowers

A new DIIS Working Paper explores how private social standards are localized in the Kenyan cut flower sector. The analysis shows that when standards are negotiated and performed, the power relations that exist both between local stakeholders and along the global value chain (GVC) for cut flowers are reflected and reproduced.
 
The analysis reveals a general tension between a focus on private social standards (PSSs) as a technical tool to achieve social compliance based on outcome standards, and a focus on PSSs as a means of enhancing the process through which workers claim their rights. Placing the local standard initiatives in the context of GVC governance, this paper also illustrates how local standard initiatives can be seen as indirectly playing into the governance agenda of retail buyers, because local standards (particularly multistakeholder standards) offer better insurance against conflict and create necessary consensus and "back-up" from critical voices, both locally and in buyer markets.