Corporations on the Front Line

Over the past few years multinational corporations have been coming increasingly under attack from a number of forces, including non governmental organisations, “political shoppers” and grass root activists. While these civil or market based forms of regulation have had some effect in moderating corporate behaviour, this paper argues that the effect is necessarily limited. What is proving to be more effective is instead the threat of litigation. Yet despite the evidence, the trend amongst government policy makers has been to encourage corporations to voluntarily self regulate. This paper warns that policy makers pursue this end at the peril not only of external stakeholders, but also of multinational corporations, and lays out steps that governments could take both to improve civil and market regulation, and also to strengthen the law. This paper will argue that such a course of action is in our collective interest.