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he current era of corporate globaliza- and limited forms of cooperation with will-
71
executives as allies and as potential levers for rights. Some view the aggressive effort to
promoting human rights globally. privilege the rights of investors, banks, and
Undoubtedly the most important factor corporations over the wishes of consumers,
is the perception that political and econom- workers, and national or subnational gov-
ic power has shifted away from governments ernments and communities as a threat not
and toward corporations, in particular only to human rights implementation, but
MNCs. In the developed industrial nations also to economic self-determination, devel-
of the North, mainly the United States, opment, transparency, and democracy itself.
Canada, Europe, and Japan, state and Under the terms of the WTO, governments
national governments are often seen as can invoke economic sanctions against
doing the bidding of their major corpora- other states that fail to protect the trade and
tions. Increasingly, they resemble plutocra- intellectual property rights of corporations,
cies in which corpora ti ons control the but corporations are not in turn subject to
political agenda while also dominating the any binding regulations, let alone formal
marketplace. In the South, large Northern- sanctions, for failure to respect the human
based MNCs often have more economic and labor rights of the people who live in
power than governments, and nominally those states.
democratic crony-capitalist oligarchies con- Indeed, there are currently no generally
tinue to control access to most of the valuable accepted international legal standards artic-
natural resources while maintaining power ulating labor, environmental, or human
over impoverished populations by force. rights obligations that are directly binding
Within NGOs,there is a widely held view on the operations or behavior of MNCs.1
that multinational corporations,already the The only standards that do exist are found in
dominant institutions in contemporary the domestic laws of some countries, and
society, are increasing their influence over they vary greatly in terms of what they
the economic, political, and cultural life of require. By and large,these laws are not well
humanity while remaining almost com- enforced. In countries where such laws do
pletely unaccountable to global civil society. exist and are enforced, MNCs can easily
The boards and chief executives who control evade them by moving their capital, invest-
MNCs are not democratically elected, and ments, and production facilities to other
their delibera ti ons are not transparent. If
they feel accountable to anyone,it is to mar- 1
International law standards governing labor and
ket analysts and investors who, for the most human rights, such as the ILO Conven ti ons and the
part, wish simply to make a quick profit. International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cul-
MNCs play an influential role in major tural Rights, have sovereign states as their subjects.
There are only a handful of instances in which corpo-
international financial and trade organiza- rations have been assigned the status of legal personal-
tions. One of the most significant events of ities in international law. See Multinational
the past decade was the formation of the Corporations and Human Rights (Utrecht: Amnesty
International/Dutch Section and Pax Ch ri s ti , 1998),
World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995.
chap. II. For a more recent study of the potential for
The most remarkable feature of the WTO is enforceable international legal standards governing
its dispute-resolution and enforcement MNCs, see “Beyond Voluntarism: Human Rights and
powers, and the extent to which its rules the Developing Intern a ti onal Legal Obligations of
Companies,” International Council on Human Rights
could potentially deprive states of their abil- Policy(January 2002); ordering information is available
ity to enforce, protect, and fulfill human online at www.ichrp.org.
72 Morton Winston
countries that have lower or non-enforced that Northern human rights NGOs have
standards. Since developing countries com- shown little interest in combating abuses of
pete with one another for foreign invest- economic, social, and cultural rights.3
ment and hard currencies,MNC production During the past decade at least some
and capital mobility can lead to a “race to the members of the Northern human ri gh t s
bottom” in which states compete to provide establishment have found reason to agree
MNCs with the least demanding regulatory with this cri ti qu e . In its recent annual
environment for business. 2 The inaction of reports, Amnesty International has stressed
governments has created a regulatory vacu- the indivisibility and interdependence of
um. Social activists have seized this oppor- human rights and has highlighted their rela-
tunity to place human rights, labor rights, tionship to globalization.4 In the past sever-
and global environmental concerns on the al years Human Rights Watch has produced
agenda of global business. groundbreaking reports dealing with topics
The popular demonstrations against such as child bonded labor, mistreatment of
“corporate-led globalization” that took maquiladora workers, and trafficking in
place around the WTO meetings in Seattle women and girls. Both Amnesty Interna-
in November 1999, and subsequent demon- tional and Human Rights Watch have
strations against other multilateral econom- reported on human rights violations linked
ic institutions in New York, Washington, to the activities of major energy companies
Prague, Quebec City, and Genoa, provide in countries such as Nigeria, Burma, India,
evidence of growing popular resistance to Colombia,and Sudan. There is now a grow-
globalization in its current form. This “anti-
corporate activism” has provided some of 2
There has been a lot written about the so-called race
the impetus for a number of human rights to the bottom. See especially Terry Collingsworth, “An
and environmental NGOs to become Enforceable Social Clause,” Foreign Policy in Focus 3,
no. 28 (October 1998); Debora Spar and David Yoffe,
involved in debates over global economic, “Multinational Enterprises and the Prospects for Jus-
trade, and investment policies. tice,” Journal of International Affairs 52 (Spring 1999).
The recent growth of NGO interest in See also the more extended treatment by William H.
Meyer on the question of whether foreign investment
business reflects an interesting twist on helps or hurts human rights in developing countries
globalization:the concerns of Northern and in his Human Rights and International Political Econo-
Southern NGOs are beginning to converge. my in Third World Nations: Multinational Corpora-
tions, Foreign Aid, and Repression (Westport, Conn.:
Large Northern human rights NGOs such as
Praeger, 1998).
Amnesty International and Human Rights 3
This critique was persuasively voiced at a conference
Watch were founded in order to combat vio- organized by Henry J. Steiner of Harvard Law School in
lations of trad i ti onal civil and political 1990 that was attended by representatives of Northern
international NGOs and several Southern NGOs. See
rights, such as abuses of freedom of expres- Henry J. Steiner, “Diverse Partners: Non-Governmental
sion, arbitrary imprisonment, and unfair Organizations in the Human Rights Movement. The
trials. Southern human rights activists are Report of a Retreat of Human Rights Activists,” Har-
vard Law School Human Rights Program and Human
more keenly aware of the legacies of colo- Rights Internet (1991), p. 25.
nialism and imperialism, and they tend to 4
See Amnesty International Report 2001, especially the
see the most pressing human rights issues in foreword by Pierre Sané, pp. 5-10. At its 25th Interna-
tional Council Meeting in Dakar, Senegal, in August
economic and social rather than only in civil
2001, Amnesty revised its organizational statute so as to
and political terms. For many years South- allow it to undertake significantly more research and
ern human rights activists have complained campaigning on economic, social, and cultural rights.
74 Morton Winston
the workplace, worker compensation, and the environmental account, and the social
rights to organize and bargain collectively. account—and urge MNCs to embrace these
Over the past several decades there has new kinds of ethical responsibilities volun-
been a gradual but steady evolution of the tarily. The voluntary CSR approach is seen
idea that corporations have certain ethical by its boosters as a practical response to the
responsibilities toward society. Prior to the current lack of MNC accountability, not as
1970s the dominant view was that the only an alternative to government regulation or
responsibility of businesses is to increase enforceable international legal standards.
profits for owners and investors. This is a At the present time, however, there is no
legal obligation only.8 In the 1970s, in the universal agreement as to exactly what the
wake of the Lockheed, ITT, Ford Pinto, and social and environmental responsibilities of
other scandals, the view that businesses corporations are. In the past decade there
must not engage in bribery, fraud, or collu- has been a proliferation of voluntary codes
sive practices, nor may they interfere in the and guidelines, including the Global Sulli-
political affairs of host states, gained accept- van Principles, the Caux Principles, the
ance. This led to passage of the Foreign Cor- Ceres Principles, and others, as well as
rupt Practices Act in the United States, and numerous company codes delineating
to the first wave of attempts by the UN Eco- socially responsible business practices.9
nomic and Social Council and other inter- Recently, the UN Subcommission on the
national organizations to regulate MNC Protection and Promotion of Human Rights
behavior. In the 1980s the corporate social has published a set of principles that may
responsibility (CSR) agenda was significant- become the benchmark for articulating a
ly broadened when, in the wake of Bhopal, comprehensive and widely acknowledged
Exxon Valdez, and other highly publicized set of ethical and legal obligations for
environmental disasters, the NGO environ- MNCs.10 But none of these guidelines or
mental movement pressed home the idea codes has yet received universal acceptance.
that MNCs must also protect the environ-
ment, thus further expanding the notion
CONFRONTING MNCs:
that corporations have social responsibili-
ties. From the early 1990s on, human rights ENACTING ENFORCEABLE
NGOs and other voices within civil society LEGAL STA N DARDS
have been calling upon corporations to
The voluntary CSR approach is not the only
accept responsibility for promoting labor
NGO strategy. Another influential school of
rights, human rights,environmental quality,
and sustainable development.
The contemporary CSR movement aims 8
See Milton Friedman, “The Social Responsibility of
to persuade MNCs to adopt voluntary codes Business Is to Increase Its Profits,”New York Times Mag-
of conduct and implement business prac- azine, September 13, 1970.
9
For a c omprehensive review of codes of conduct see
tices that incorporate commitments to Oliver F. Williams, ed., Global Codes of Conduct:An Idea
respect and protect labor rights and human Whose Time Has Come(Notre Dame,Ind.: University of
rights as well as the environment. Those Notre Dame Press, 2000).
10
Proposed Draft Human Rights Code of Conduct for
who favor the voluntary CSR approach talk
Companies, U.N. Doc.E/CN.4/Sub.2/2000/XX (2001),
a bo ut companies paying atten ti on to the available online at www1.umn.edu/humanrts/links/
“triple bottom line”—the financial account, principles11-18-2001.htm.
76 Morton Winston
the development of international CSR stan- fall along an en ga gement-confrontation
dards. During the 1990s public criticism of spectrum. There are at least eight different
their labor practices,security arrangements, tactics that various NGOs have employed
and other human rights practices in the with respect to different companies in order
global media embarrassed a number of to encourage them to accept social responsi-
companies. Some MNCs that have experi- bilities. Arranged in order from the least to
enced these kinds of crises have now begun the most confrontational, they are:
to consider seriously the human ri gh t s • dialogue aimed at promoting the adoption
implications of their activities and have of voluntary codes of conduct—the pure
established private voluntary codes of con- CSR approach
duct for overseas offices, subsidiaries, sup- • advocacy of social accounting and inde-
pliers, and contractors. These voluntary pendent verification schemes
codes generally deal with such issues as • the filing of shareholder resolutions
compliance with national and local laws; • documentation of abuses and moral shaming
nondiscrimination; adequate wage levels; • calls for boycotts of company products or
workplace safety and health; working hours divestment of stock
and overtime; freedom of association and • advocacy of selective purchasing laws
the right to organize trade unions; prohibi- • advocacy of government-imposed standards
tions on child and forced labor; environmen- • litigation seeking punitive damages
tal protection; dissemination of company Most NGOs try to tailor the tactics to the
policies; implementation of company poli- target based upon the specific characteristics
cies by supervisors; and protection for of the company’s position on corporate
employees who complain about breaches of social responsibility issues, but there are
company policies. In addition,some associ- clear philosophical differences between
ations of MNCs have developed joint stan- those that favor dialogue and those on the
dards, for instance, the Fair Labor confrontational side of the spectrum.
Association for the apparel industry, and
Rugmark for handmade carpets. Engagement and Support
But critics of the CSR approach see vol-
Although engagers, such as Amnesty Inter-
untary codes mainly as corporate propagan-
national and Human Rights Watch, also
da and as means of avoiding strict
employ negative publicity and stigmatiza-
government regulation. This crucial differ-
tion of particular company practices in some
ence in political analysis leads to further dif-
of their reports, they generally try to avoid
ferences among NGOs in terms of their
confrontational tactics and are more willing
tactics in dealing with global corporations.
to enter into dialogue with MNCs. Engagers
attempt to use high-quality research, ration-
E VA LUATING STRAT E G I E S : al persuasion, and moral argumentation
ENGAGEMENT OR with corporate managers to get companies to
C O N F R O N TAT I O N ? agree voluntarily to institute human rights
principles in their codes of conduct and to
In practice, no NGO acts solely as an implement and monitor their compliance.
en ga ger, nor do any act purely in a con- This CSR strategy is based on the assump-
frontational mode; all utilize strategies that tion that some corporate managers will
78 Morton Winston
The charges have turned out to be Accountability International (SAI), which
unfounded: Nike has not begun stitching UN has developed a comprehensive and rigor-
logos on its tennis shoes; public opinion has ously auditable social responsibility stan-
not concluded that the UN has sold out to big dard for retail manufacturing businesses
business; and joining in the GC initiative has called SA8000.16
not turned out to be a “free ride” for compa- The FLA grew out of an initiative by Pres-
nies. At the same time, some changes have ident Clinton in 1996 called the Apparel
been made in the terms of the GC since it was Industry Partnership (AIP). Created in
launched. The main change is that the com- order to address the problem of sweatshop
panies that join the initiative are no longer labor practices, AIP’s original membership
called “partners” or even “signatories.” Inter- included major U.S.apparel retailers such as
ested companies are asked to have a letter sent Liz Claiborne, Nike, Reebok, Tweeds, Patag-
by their CEOs expressing their acceptance of onia, and L. L. Bean; business associations
the principles and their intent to put them such as Business for Social Responsibility;
into practice. There is still no independent trade union organizations such as the Union
verification or monitoring system; instead, of Needlework and Industrial Textile
participating companies are asked to submit Employees (UNITE); and NGOs including
a case study every year detailing an activity or the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights,
initiative they have undertaken to promote the Interfaith Center on Corporate Respon-
one or more of the nine principles that make sibility, and the Robert F. Kennedy Memori-
up the GC. The International Labor Organi- al Center for Human Rights. This group
zation has set up a database on its Web site— labored for several months and came up
the Business and Social Initiative Database with a code of conduct for workplace prac-
(BASI)—that lists topics, companies, and tices and a set of principles for monitoring
NGOs and allows users to search for reports compliance.17 However, before they could
by participating organizations.15 Many more conclude their work on a standard, a split
companies, including many from the South, opened up between the corporations and
have since joined in the GC, and there are some NGOs and unions over the issue of the
more than 1,000 organizations affiliated with living wage; in November 1998 the apparel
the initiative. Its popularity rests on its being union UNITE and several other labor and
an entry-level standard, one that is not too religious organizations dropped out. They
demanding. complained that the agreement granted cor-
porations too much control over the moni-
Social Auditing and Reporting toring process and lacked strong provisions
on the right to organize, and that the code did
The social auditing approach holds that cor-
not provide for a living wage but only for “the
porations cannot be trusted to self-monitor
minimum wage required by law or the pre-
their compliance with their own voluntarily
vailing industry wage, whichever is higher.”
adopted ethical codes and argues that cor-
porate social performance needs to be inde-
15
pendently audited on a regular basis by BASI can be accessed at oracle02.ilo.org/dyn/basi/
vpisearch.first.
credible outside auditors. Some of the main 16
Available online at www.sa-intl.org.
NGOs taking this approach are the Fair 17
Available online at www.dol.gov/dol/esa/public/
Labor Association (FLA) and Social nosweat/partnership/report.htm.
80 Morton Winston
considerable economic as well as moral pamphlets entitled Visions of Ethical Busi-
influence at annual shareholder meetings. nessthat make the business case for CSR by
These kinds of resolutions do not usually highlighting the practices of the most CSR-
succeed in attracting a majority of votes, but f ri en dly companies. 23 Most NGOs avoid
they do get the attention of the board of praising corpora ti ons for good behavior
directors and top managers, who often enter out of fear it will undermine their own rep-
into negotiations with the sponsors in order utations for independence, but virtually all
to resolve the issues. Shareholder activism NGOs that are active in the field of CSR
makes use of the accountability of corpora- employ moral shaming to some extent.
tions to their investors in order to widen the
sphere of corporate accountability to other Economic Pressure Tactics:
stakeholders, and is regarded by a number of Boycotts and Divestment
NGOs as an effective way in which to influ- A still more confrontational approach holds
ence corporate policy and practice. that corporations will not voluntarily accept
their social responsibilities, but can be per-
Moral Stigmatization and suaded to do so if they fear adverse effects on
Shaming what they view as their primary economic
The most widely employed NGO tactic is mission, to return a profit on investment.
moral shaming and stigmatization of cor- Proponents of economic pressure tactics
porations for bad behavior. There is abun- point to the successful boycotts against Nes-
dant evidence that corpora ti ons are tle, Nike, Starbucks, and others as examples
sensitive to such public criticism, particu- of how consumer boycotts can be powerful
larly when it links their brand name and levers for influencing corporate behavior.24
corporate reputation to unsavory environ- Adoption of boycotts as a tactic is generally
mental and social practices. The acknowl- seen as moving an NGO from the engager
edged leader in the field of corporate into the confronter camp. Company boy-
s ti gm a ti z a ti on is a Washington-based cotts have been used extensively by labor
m on t h ly magazine founded by Ralph unions and some NGOs, but not by groups
Nader called Multinational Monitor, which such as Amnesty International or Human
each year publishes a list of the Ten Worst Rights Watch. Engagers generally eschew
Corporations.20 Corporate Watch ,b a s ed in such tactics on the grounds that they often
San Francisco, produces a Web site that harm workers, they are hard to start and
specializes in reporting corporate mis- stop, and they only work against companies
deeds, as does Global Exchange.21 On the with large retail businesses and lots of con-
opposite side of the fence, there are now
several publications that specialize in high- 20
Available online at www.essential.org.
21
l i gh ting corporate “best practi ce s” in the See www.corpwatch.org and www.globalexchange.org.
22
See www.ethicalperformance.com.
areas of social and environmental respon- 23
See www.business-minds.com.
sibility. One of the leading publications of 24
For a comprehensive study of the Nestlé infant f or-
this kind is the London-based Ethical Per- mula campaign,as well as a persuasive argument for a
fo rm a n ce Best Practi ce .22 The Fi n a n ci a l global regulatory approach,see Judith Richter, Holding
Corporations Accountable: Corporate Conduct,Interna-
Times, in assoc i a ti on with the Warwick tional Codes, and Citizen Action (London: Zed Books,
Business Sch oo l , also offers a series of 2001).
82 Morton Winston
Government-Imposed Standards rate Social Responsibility, whose provisions,
however, are not legally binding.
A seventh tactic assumes that only national
In the United States, the Corporate Code
governments have sufficient power and
of Conduct Act (H.R. 2782) has been intro-
authority to force companies to adopt ethi-
duced into the 107th Congress by Represen-
cal practices that protect human rights and
tative Cynthia McKinney (D-GA). It would
the environment.NGOs accepting this view
require all U.S.-based corpora ti ons that
tend to focus their efforts on enacting legis-
employ more than twenty persons in a for-
lation at the national or, preferably, the
eign country to implement a corporate code
international level, by imposing enforceable
of conduct establishing a number of core
legal obligations on MNCs. NGO activists
human and labor rights standards specified
would like to see multilateral trade and
in the bill, and would also require that the
investment agreements such as NAFTA,and
code apply to all of the companies’ sub-
the failed Multilateral Agreement on Invest-
sidiaries, subcontractors, affiliates, j oi n t
ment, incorporate strict and enforceable
ventures, partners, and licencees. A similar
standards on labor rights, human rights,and
bill, H.R. 4596, failed to make it out of com-
environmental protecti on . But there are
mittee during the 106th Congress, and at
other legislative initiatives in the works.
present the chances of enactment of this or
In January 1999, the European Parliament
other comprehensive legislation along these
passed a Resolution on Standards for Euro-
lines are slim.
pean Enterprises Operating in Developing
A more successful legislative initiative is
Countries. The resolution calls on the Euro-
represented by the passage in late 2001 by the
pean Union to establish legally binding
U.S. House of Representatives of H.R. 2722,
requirements on European companies to
the Clean Diamond Trade Act, by a vote of
ensure that these MNCs comply with inter-
408 to 6. The Senate passed a similar piece of
national law relating to the protection of
legislation, and a presidential signature in
human rights and the environment. The res-
early 2002 seems likely. Although weaker
olution proposes that European MNCs be
than what NGO proponents had wanted,
monitored by a panel composed of inde-
the bill passed by the House permits the
pendent experts and representatives from
president to prohibit the import of rough
European businesses, international trade
diamonds into the United States from coun-
unions, environmental and human rights
tries that are not implementing verifiable
NGOs, and the developing world. It also
controls. The passage of this legislation rep-
calls on the European Commission to
resents a victory for the 1998 Conflict Dia-
ensure that MNCs acting on behalf of, or
mond campaign launched by a small human
financed by, the European Union act in
rights NGO, Global Witness, de s i gn ed to
accordance with basic requirements for
stop the trade in illicit diamonds that gave
human rights and environmental protec-
rise to grave human rights violations in
ti on . However, this resolution was not
Angola and Sierra Leone.26 De Beers and the
approved by the Commission and did not
become a law. In s te ad , in June 2001 the
Commission issued a green paper on Pro- 26
See “Conflict Diamond Report,” available online at
moting a European Framework for Corpo- www.one.world.org/globalwitness/reports/conflict.
84 Morton Winston
tudes NGOs encounter. Some major com- and publish embar rassing revelations, their
panies are engaged in fighting the ideas of work provides imp etus for lagging compa-
social responsibility and environmental sus- nies to move in the direction of greater CSR.
tainability and cling to the classical view that But it is also possible to view the split
the only social responsibility o f business is between engagers and confronters within
to make money for investors. Others are the NGO community as the result of a delib-
basically passive and have no considered erate divide-and-rule strategy by corpora-
position on CSR issues. Still others have tions. To the extent that corporations can
begun internal discussions about CSR and successfully split the NGO community into
human rights issues as they affect their busi- “responsible” and “radical” groups,they can
nesses, and are moving cautiously in the use the difference as the basis for public rela-
direction of embracing greater social tions campaigns designed to deflect criti-
responsibility for their own operations and cism of their behavior. Joshua Karliner
supply chains. In addition, there are a few argues that many corporations now look
leading companies that have turned the cor- favorably on partnerships with environ-
ner by formally and publicly accepting the mental NGOs because “such partnerships
view that they should base their business are seen as part of a strategy to divide and
practices on international human rights and con qu er the environmental movement,”
labor standards,and adopting codes of con- since by co-opting the mainstream, moder-
duct or business principles that embody this ate groups, the corporations delegitimize
commitment. Finally, a few companies have the more radical and progressive elements of
made serious attempts to implement such the movement.30 A similar strategy is being
commitments by educating their own used in the human rights field. At the 1997
employees,identifying and operationalizing Shell Annual General Meeting, several
performance benchmarks, communicating groups, including Friends of the Earth and
their standards to their suppliers and busi- the Nigerian group MOSOP, were planning
ness partners, carrying out internal audits, to stage demonstrations in front of Shell’s
and in some cases seeking external inde- headquarters. But the company countered
pendent auditing to verify their social per- by announcing the day before that it had
formance to external stakeholders. What agreed with Amnesty International and Pax
progress has been made on CSR thus far is Christi to adopt human rights principles in
largely the result of NGO activism. its business code. This public relations ploy
On the positive side one can see the may have allowed Shell tempora ri ly to
engager/confronter split as an example of a deflect criticism of its human rights record
good cop–bad cop interrogational strategy in Nigeria, but did not prevent it from being
in which the confronters push MNCs to put sued by relatives of Ken Saro-Wiwa.
human rights onto their agendas by means In the short term, NGOs involved in the
of stigmatization and economic pressure, corporate social responsibility movement
while the engagers pull them further toward should combine stigmatization and other
corporate social responsibility by means of pressure tactics, such as shareholder resolu-
ethical and prudential reasoning. This com-
bination of “push” and “pull”tactics appears 30
Joshua Karliner, The Corporate Planet: Ecology and
to have worked in several cases. Since the Politics in the Age of Globalization (San Francisco: Sier-
confronters make it their business to dig up ra Club Books, 1997), pp. 189-90.
86 Morton Winston
As long as the majority of consumers the CSR agenda from voluntary compliance
remain either ill informed or indifferent to to “soft law ”a pproaches, and finally to rigor-
the labor and human rights conditions ous national and international enforcement
under which corporations produce the regimes; but it is unlikely to be able to do so
goods they deliver to the marketplace, no unless it can mobilize support for greater
amount of NGO pressure is going to pro- corporate social accountability from
duce sustainable reform. informed consumers, concerned govern-
In the last analysis it is the responsibility of ment officials, and progressive companies.
national governments to enact and enforce The struggle for environmental sustain-
global labor, human rights, and environ- ability and global social justice will continue
mental standards for multinational corpora- to be waged on many fronts. The current
tions, and governments must be persuaded corporate social responsibility movement
that they need to accept and act on these may one day lead to the adoption of global-
responsibilities. Governments could and ly enforceable legal standards that bind
should be doing a great deal more than they MNCs to their social and environmental
currently are, not only in the process of stan- responsibilities. But for this to happen,
dard setting and negative regulation, but also MNCs and NGOs will need to continue to
in providing tax and other regulatory incen- learn from their current encounters and
tives that will reward corporations for good negotiations and cooperate in placing cor-
behavior. The NGO-led corporate social porate social accountability on the political
responsibility movement must now move agenda of nation states.