April’s factory collapse in Bangladesh, which killed more than 700 people, has renewed public debate over working conditions in the developing world: How can dangerous and debilitating factory work be improved?

For more than a decade, MIT political scientist Richard Locke has studied that question. Locke has made hundreds of visits to factories around the world, heading a team of researchers who have been collecting an unprecedented amount of information from companies. For years, Locke thought that the answer might lie in private policing: multinational firms auditing the factories where their suppliers produce goods, noting safety violations, and threatening to withhold business from those suppliers.

But in recent years, Locke has changed his view. Private oversight, he thinks, is not enough to eliminate workplace dangers, excessive hours, child labor, and poor wages. Governments, he says, must set and uphold better factory standards as well.

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