The little-known but successful model for protecting
human and labor rights
How a worker-driven initiative is filling in the gaps left behind by corporate social responsibility programs.
by Sam Delgado Jul 5, 2024
Over the last century, people have started demanding more from the businesses where they shop. Whether it be a pair of jeans or the food on their plates, consumers want to know that what they’re buying isn’t just good quality but also ethically and sustainably made.
In the early 20th century, groups like the National Consumers League and the now-defunct League of Women Shoppers organized consumers to take advantage of their power in an effort to improve labor protections and the rights of workers in the United States. Today, ethically minded consumers are also motivated by climate change and animal rights, as the consequences of our overconsumption have become clearer…
In practice, corporate social responsibility can look like companies donating to charities every year, committing to net-zero emissions by a certain date, or focusing on labor practices. To prove they’re doing this work, companies will partner with nonprofits or hire third-party consultants to audit their supply chains, and then measure and report their progress in annual reports, press releases, and on their websites.
These practices are now nominally widespread in modern business. According to the EPA, roughly 80 percent of all Fortune 500 and S&P 500 companies publish a report on their corporate social responsibility practices and progress.
But while corporate social responsibility sounds good on paper, the workers deep within these corporations’ supply chains — the ones that sew the clothes you wear and harvest the produce and ingredients for your food — say that they are not feeling the benefits of such programs.
Despite the profits they help companies rake in through their labor, many of these workers are still making pennies while stuck working in unsafe environments. In some cases, the conditions are so bad that they amount to exploitation that is clearly unethical and, in many cases, illegal, as many labor rights advocates and corporate watchdogs have argued. Some of what corporate responsibility programs claim they’re doing and have achieved, workers and advocates say, qualifies as greenwashing or “social washing” — using these strategies and initiatives to mislead the public and appear as if they have robust, effective environmental or labor practices.
To fill the gap between a commitment and reality, collectives of workers and labor advocates worldwide are organizing to create a solution that will not just address labor abuses when they happen but encourage the prevention of exploitation altogether. They come from a variety of industries, and they’re leaving the promises of corporate social responsibility behind and creating something new — and more importantly, effective — in its place: worker-driven social responsibility.
