For nearly two years we have been living in a crisis mode, with our government suspending due process and spending our tax dollars on war and security instead of health care and environmental protection. The ongoing sense of emergency diverts political discussion and problem solving resources from the more banal harms that were on the public radar screen before we switched into crisis mode and that continue to fester-the lack of affordable housing, violence against women, declining water supplies, or the awful labor conditions in which many workers around the world sweat to produce clothes, shoes, toys, and other everyday goods.

Barely three years ago, a student protest movement swept hundreds of campuses in the United States demanding that university administrations do something about sweatshops. The students called on university administrations to take responsibility for the conditions under which clothing sold in their bookstores and worn by their athletic teams are produ...

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