Rain Delay Forces Labor Group to Postpone Planned Fashion Show

Rain forced the Progressive Student Labor Movement (PSLM) to postpone an anti-sweatshop fashion show scheduled for yesterday afternoon on the steps of Widener Library.

Organizers say the show will go up early next week.

According to PSLM member Benjamin L. McKean '02, the fashion show will feature students clad in Gap, Nike and Harvard apparel. As they model for passers-by, announcers will highlight the poor conditions under which the clothes were made and pass out anti-sweatshop literature.

The event is designed to inform Harvard students, rather than to pressure the administration, organizers said.

"This is not a get-out-the-bodies type thing; it's much more spreading the word," McKean said.

Organizers planned the event to coincide with a national day of action to celebrate the creation of the Workers Rights Consortium, an independent labor monitoring group.

Over 100 colleges participated in yesterday's day of action, and Brown University became the first school to join the new organization.

PSLM has been pressuring the University to join such a group to monitor its own overseas apparel factories. Harvard currently relies on the Fair Labor Association (FLA) and PricewaterhouseCoopers, organizations PSLM say are tainted because they are associated with the corporations they are supposed to monitor.

McKean said he hopes the creation of the new monitoring group will prompt Harvard to switch.

"The administration said it would be too much of a hassle to pull out [of the FLA], but now that there's an alternative it will be a lot easier," he said.