Punishing Early Movers: Baseline Politics and Decarbonization in Bangladesh’s Apparel Supply Chain

Abstract

This paper examines how baseline-setting practices shape the distribution of decarbonization burdens in Bangladesh’s export-oriented apparel supply chain. Using 17 semi-structured interviews with suppliers, brands, industry associations, and policy stakeholders, the paper identifies baseline politics as a plausible mechanism through which transition burdens are unevenly redistributed across firms. Baseline politics is defined here as the governance process through which particular reference years, measurement rules, and reporting logics determine whose earlier environmental efforts count and whose do not. The evidence suggests that some Bangladeshi suppliers invested in cleaner production, energy efficiency, wastewater treatment, green certification, and internal environmental reporting well before carbon reduction became a mainstream sourcing requirement. Yet current target architectures often adopt later baseline years, especially 2019, or operate with fragmented and shifting benchmark logics. Under such conditions, early movers may lose recognition for prior gains and face steeper, more expensive marginal reductions than firms that delayed action. The paper does not argue that baseline politics is the only explanation for uneven transition outcomes. Rather, it shows that this lens adds explanatory value beyond generic buyer power by clarifying how temporal measurement systems can reward delay and penalize initiative. The implications are especially significant for suppliers that invested early without subsequent price recognition or formal credit for those efforts.