ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on participation in private sector and value chain governance. With these renderings of power, place, space and pathways in mind, and it also focus on value chain governance as a process in the particular context of Kenya by analysing pathways and stakeholder narratives. The chapter explores the experiences of the development, governance and ultimate abandonment of the Horticultural Ethical Business Initiative (HEBI) as a way to institute more progressive and ethical labour standards in Kenyan horticulture. Stakeholder narratives on the causes of the failure of HEBI vary and are unpacked in order to understand how different groups articulate the role of this particular ethical space. In doing this we use the lenses of visible, hidden and invisible power to reveal how the excessive power of the retailers dominates value chain governance but interacts with local context and place, to co-produce specific outcomes in Kenya and in the HEBI ethical space.
