Someone asks where you got your new shirt. You tell them you got it at The Gap. Or Dayton's. Or Macy's. Or the Goodwill.

Should you as a consumer have the right to know your shirt actually came from a Jakarta sweatshop, where 15-year-old laborers earned $1 an hour for a 14-hour workday?

Protests at Macalester College in recent weeks and throughout the country on university campuses about issues around the manufacture of clothing suggest you should.

The debate isn't new. And it isn't confined to campus boundaries. Third World worker abuse issues have been debated back and forth in recent years about apparel sold by Nike, Reebok, Wal-Mart, Walt Disney Co. and others. It has spread to the racks of clothing found in every store in the state, to the home closets that store the clothes, to the very backs of the people who wear them.

With increasing frequency, the issue of who makes what under what conditions is placed before college administrators and trustees at schools that benefit greatly from licensing practices with garment industries operated in Third World countries. Students at Harvard, Brown, Princeton, Duke and the University of Wisconsin are raising consciousness at the very least, and sometimes extracting pledges from administrators to review or change their arrangements with clothing dealers and manufacturers. In November at UW-Stevens Point, students sat at sewing machines and slaved over the production of shirts and caps that carried the school's name. Symbolically, their work area was enclosed by barbed wire.

For an example of the widespread impact of university and college licensing fees at work, simply go into many department stores and you'll find Yale or Harvard University sweat shirts. The universities charge clothing manufacturers a fee to use their name on the shirts.

At larger schools, this presents a lucrative deal that brings in hefty amounts each year. In 1999, the University of Minnesota earned $400,000 from licensing agreements. Nationally, collegiate licensing rakes in as much as $2.5 billion annually. In 1998, the University of Michigan earned $5.7 million in total licensing royalties, the leader among the more than 170 schools represented by the Collegiate Licensing Co.

In their quest for inexpensive labor and goods for more than 40 years, U.S. companies have transferred manufacturing jobs to countries and regions where labor is cheap, including Asia, Latin America, Mexico and Indonesia.

In many places, workers labor for 80-hour work weeks behind barbed wire and in the presence of dangerous chemicals. In Indonesia, sweatshop workers make the equivalent of 20 cents an hour. Drinking water often is unsafe, bathrooms are locked, and guards surround the work force with shotguns, according to Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the National Labor Committee.

In 1996, the controversial Fair Labor Association was formed to combat inhumane working conditions at factories producing collegiate apparel. Practically from the beginning, students objected to the FLA as too influenced by business interests. Also, many felt the FLA fell short of its charge to monitor working conditions at sweatshops.

Consequently, at Haverford College in Haverford, Pa., students formed the Worker Rights Consortium, with its tough code of conduct and strict model of enforcement. If spot checks prove companies aren't living up to their agreements, they lose their university contracts.

Here at home, small groups of student activists have been taking up the cause of sweatshop workers. On Monday, 40 to 50 students met with University of Minnesota Provost Robert Bruininks and demanded that the university drop its membership with the FLA in favor of the newly formed WRC.

The universities of Wisconsin (Madison), Michigan and Indiana have joined the WRC, which is run by a Haverford college student.

Last Thursday, Michael McPherson, Macalester College president, announced the school would end its affiliation with the FLA. This came after a group ranging from fewer than 10 to about 40 students moved into the Weyerhauser Administration Building March 6 to protest the college's FLA affiliation.

McPherson's decision wasn't simply a case of knuckling under. An economist by training, McPherson sees a lot of gray in a picture that others regard as black-and-white. If labor standards in foreign countries are raised, fine, but if that's overdone, jobs are lost and lives become worse, McPherson said. Intellectual and moral questions drive the issue, which is far more broadly reaching than a debate over which labor monitoring group the college affiliates with, he added.

The Macalester students behind the protest demanded the president's final decision in eight days. McPherson said he needed more time. Ultimately, the students moved into the administration building, transforming two areas into a large dormitory room complete with a television set, cooking area and sleeping area. Gabe Cohn, a Macalester student activist from St. Louis, said the set-up resembled a constant party when it wasn't a constant meeting.

McPherson decided the advantage of belonging to the FLA was negligible since the college didn't receive much back for its membership. He said membership in the FLA makes more sense for schools that earn more than $1 million in licensing fees, rather than for schools such as Macalester. McPherson has proposed that colleges in Division III athletics form a buyer's cooperative for athletic apparel. In 1999, Macalester College earned $13,000 from licensing fees.

On Thursday afternoon, news of McPherson's decision reached the handful of students still in the administration building. The mood was ebullient. The kids looked tired; several of them had worked as security guards during the night hours to ensure the safety of the group.

Why get involved? Jessica Wallendal, a Macalester sophomore from Pulaski, Wis., said that if she consumes the labor of Third World residents, she ought to be able to know exactly what she's buying and under what circumstances. For example, the students want to know if the U.S. corporations are paying the minimum wages of foreign countries, and what those wages are. They are concerned about the rights of women who work in these factories, and about the effectiveness of monitoring systems.

Not everyone supported the protest, the students said. Some of their peers wrote sidewalk messages around the campus like ``Sweatshops: a good place to learn a foreign language and gain hand/eye coordination.'' An e-mail campaign criticized the activists; many letters to the school newspaper protested the protesters.

Faculty members were divided on the matter, from indifference to enthusiastic support. A few expressed anger at the students' unwillingness to compromise, and for their inconsideration for campus workers who could not do their jobs during the sit-in.

``It sounds terrible, but we are all getting old,'' history professor Paul Solon said. ``Most of us were more amused by the protest than anything else. There was no sense of urgency or crisis with this, it's just something quaint.'' The issue of where the clothes are made is legitimate, Solon said, and he has no doubt of the seriousness of the issue. But the protest came down to a relatively small group who wanted 100 percent victory, and nothing less.

One of the college's next steps is to create a code of conduct for U.S. companies that do business in foreign countries. The students have proposed a draft copy of such a code. McPherson said he hopes to have that project before the board of trustees for its approval by the end of the school year. Getting out the information to implement the code will present a brand new struggle, he said.

The Worker Rights Consortium may provide some of those answers to student concerns about sweat shirts from sweatshops, if it gains the clout and strength it needs.

Five years ago, I toured factories and workplaces in China, as part of a study group of Midwest college students and alumni. The memory that stands out most vividly was of a middle-aged woman at a table doing embroidery. Her hand was swollen perhaps a third larger than it should have been. Her movements were jerk-like, as though made from great pain.

The embroidery design was beautiful, but clearly wrought from stress and years of overuse. As the students at Macalester told their story, I remembered her.

Maybe students like those at Macalester, the University of Michigan and the University of Wisconsin who take over college space are nuisances. Maybe they ask for too much within too short a time.

Beyond the tactics and taffy pulling is this: Much of what we wear came at a human cost no worker in this country would ever have to pay. That's a matter worth thinking about, at the very least.

© 2000 PioneerPlanet / St. Paul (Minnesota) Pioneer Press

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