Making responsible social and environmental choices has not always been a first priority for many corporations, but recent history has changed all that. Small but mighty NGOs, using 21st Century global communications, are nipping at the heels of corporations caught in unethical and irresponsible practices. NGO "market campaigns" are moving these companies toward the higher standard now demanded by their clients, their consumers, and society as a whole. The lever that moves these giants is the risk of destroying their carefully built "brands" if they fail to recognise their "moral liability" and clean up their practices. "Branded!" outlines the ability of NGOs to affect corporate markets. It shows how the development of certification systems for corporate social and environmental practices has created some intriguing questions: Why are retail giants paying premiums for ethically-produced products and not overcharging their customers? How have NGOs gained such power and credibility? What are the challenges of these new modes of corporate accountability for both NGOs and corporations? What are the unexpected opportunities for newly accountable corporations? This is a "must-read" book for corporate executives, NGOs and concerned consumers. It is rich with vignettes of firms, NGOs, campaigns, failures, successes, memorable personalities and hard-fought battles.

Table of Contents

Branded! The Unexpected Consequences of Successful; Redefining Corporate Social and Environmental Accountability for the 21st Century; Leveraging the Brand: The Essence of Ethical Business Campaigns; Birth of It All: Transforming the Global Forest Products Industry; Tapping the Ethic of 'Fairness': Certifying Global Commodity Trade; Even the Banks Can Do It! New Accountability in Global Finance; Can Tourism Be Tamed? Toward a Sustainable Tourism Stewardship Council; Accountability Comes to Mining: Building an Assurance Process; Can Certification Systems Reduce Global Poverty?; Certification Opportunities and Challenges Encountered in Other Arenas: Fisheries, Toxics, and Labour; Industry Push Back, and the Failure of Second-Party Certification Efforts; The Mother of All Campaigns: Taking on Wal-Mart and the Looming Domination of Big-Box Retail Stores; Struggles on the Frontier: Are There Limits to the "Certification Revolution"?; Index.

Author Biography

Michael Conroy is Program Officer for Global Governance for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Previously a Senior Lecturer and Senior Research Scholar at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, he was also Senior Program Officer at the Ford Foundation, and Professor of Economics at the University of Texas at Austin.