1. Why did the tragedy occur?
The tragedy happened because of the poor construction materials which were found in the debris used in this building. This building was dangerous because it constructed on a pond. In addition, it needs to hold heavy machines but without any supporting walls. Before the collapsing of Rana Plaza, workers found a crack appeared in the wall of the building, and the engineer recommended that the workers be evacuated. However, supervisors had asked them to return to work due to the official claimed the building had been inspected and declared safe. Consequently, the Rana Plaza collapsed and caused a lot of people dead and wounded.

2. Who was responsible for the tragedy?
I don’t think that only one entity had to be responsible for this tragedy. First, we know the expansion of the garments industry in Bangladesh so that it started to have more and more demand for the high rising buildings. Therefore, the owners of the original buildings started to change those into the factories and added extra floors which were lack of the permission, like the tragedy of Rana Plaza. I think the Bangladesh government failed to inspect the establishment of factories and understaffed to monitor the building codes. Then, the government should protect citizen rights, but the Bangladesh government failed to do this. Instead, the Bangladesh government makes people have unsafe working conditions and restrictions of labor unions. Lastly, MNC’s and factory owners should be responsible for this tragedy. The competition in garment industry is fierce, so MNC’s usually subcontracted production to other countries. From the article, we can see Bangladesh has not only the lowest wage but also large capacity so that it is attractive to the MNC’s. Although the labor cost is the lowest compared to other countries, MNC’s still bargain with factories because they want to make more profits, factories do not consider working environment and labors’ salary to meet their requests.

3. What role, if any, did consumers play in the tragedy? What role, if any, should they play in the response to the tragedy?
What we see is a focused on consumer price system because the consumers seek the cheap merchandise. The brand owners must drive down the cost of production to provide cheap clothes. Therefore, consumers are also responsible for this tragedy; however, in this system also includes high-pricing clothes business, it is not much better than the cheap factories where working conditions. However, I think consumers play a key role in the tragedy because we still have demand for cheap products. I don’t think consumers stop buying the products produced from Bangladesh. They might monitor the brand owners to improve these labors working conditions. In addition, consumers should not only consider the price of goods, they should also be smart consumers to understand the manufacturing process of various brands and choose right products.
4. How should international brand owners respond to the tragedy?
The most important international brand owners must do not only support the survivors to be rehabilitation, but also give them compensation, like provide income and health protection to the victims and their dependents. The article mentioned several options for the international brand owners. I don’t agree that the company shift all of its production away from Bangladesh to other countries. It might lessen the risk of negative press or irresponsible labor practices tainting; however, it make these people in Bangladesh have second hurt. International brand owners must be responsible for irregularities and undesirable phenomenon. I think they should sign the Fire Convention developed by local unions and international organizations. At least, this convention can eliminate an urgent need to address the problem: narrow space, poor security channel.

5. How should governments – foreign and domestic—respond to the tragedy?
For domestic government, like international brand owners, first of all needs to do not only support the survivors to be rehabilitation, but also give them compensation, like provide income and health protection to the victims and their dependents. Then, it should strengthen the labor inspection. We know the inspector in Bangladesh is understaffed so that the government should recruit more inspectors. Although government develops recruitment, both available and new staffs must give them intensive and complete training program. The other is to enhance workers’ and managers’ skills on safety during their working. To improve their safety on their workplaces, the government should have training to educate them have awareness about the safety in the working places.
The foreign governments should find the labor unions and retailers to make an association to develop regulation about how to regulate and prevent to have the same tragedy happen. Besides, the foreign governments should ask retailers to join the association and have a declaration to eliminate sweatshop labor and improve labor rights. When the retailers join this association, the government will inspect their activities of the outsourcing in other countries which have safe working condition or not.