I was starting to soften my position on Nike today. With the Lance Armstrong sponsership I really wanted to like Nike again, because Armstrong’s achievements get me all chocked up.
I haven’t bought any of Nike’s stuff since they were busted, twice, a few years ago for horrible labor conditions and salaries. But I figured if they cleaned up their act there should be a statute of limitations on my disdain.
They’re bragging about oversight from PWC and Ernst and Young, but it was the latter that busted them the second time for carcinogens in their factories. There’s nothing at either of their sites about Nike and the labor situation, and Nike doesn’t make the reports available. Furthermore, their description of the PWC process reveals that PWC is merely measuring conditions against Nike’s code book, not the United Nation’s standards.
Nike brags on it’s site that you can apply for a position at PWC to monitor the factories. To apply, you have to send an essay to a priest at St. Johns. One of the criteria is to speak the local language of the country the factory is in. This last one seems ridiculous, you don’t need to speak Vietnamese to measure the carcinogens in the air, time the working day, or measure the wages of workers.
When attacked, Nike responds that they participate in President Clinton’s industry partnership to improve this situation. Here’s a reasurring statement: “Nike is constantly evaluating compensation packages to ensure
workers are being paid fairly. In fact, as a member of President Clinton’s Apparel Industry Partnership (AIP), Nike will be
reviewing a wage survey conducted by the Department of Labor, undertaken at the request of the members of the AIP.” Reviewing a survey, that sounds like a real action item.
I think to counter this situation they’d have to act from the top and encourage a mentality of good will towards workers throughout the company. This article from just last year in The Nation revealed the wrong attitude from Nike’s top management:
On January 11 Joseph Ha, a Nike vice president, sent what he thought was a confidential letter to Cu Thi Hau, Vietnam’s
highest-ranking labor official. In it, Ha blasted a number of human rights and labor groups that have been working to improve
labor conditions in Nike’s overseas factories and expressed admiration for Vietnam’s authoritarian system. “A few U.S. human
rights groups, as well as a Vietnamese refugee who is engaged in human rights activities, are not friends of Vietnam,” wrote Ha
to the Vietnamese official.
It’s encouraging to see Colleges taking action to back up what they teach. After all, would taking a deal from Reebok be all that bad?
I can’t in good conscience buy their stuff, it sounds like they still haven’t figured out what’s really important in life.