Labor Alerts: a service of Campaign for Labor Rights

LETTER TO ANDREW YOUNG

January 1998

NOTE: Campaign for Labor Rights recently received the following document from five former field secretaries of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, a leading organization during the U.S. civil rights movement. What is strikingly different in this letter from other commentary on Andrew Young's Nike report is that this letter views the Young report from the perspective of that movement. Given that Andrew Young brought his credibility as a member of that movement to his contract work for Nike, such a critique is especially important. Campaign for Labor Rights will soon continue its series of strategy papers in preparation for the April 18 international Nike mobilization. Meanwhile, individuals wishing to express concerns directly to Nike can send an email message: web_comments@nike.com

Another important critique of the Andrew Young report: "The Young and the Feckless," written by Stephen Glass and published in The New Republic, is available from the Campaign for Labor Rights web site at web site: www.clrlabor.org or via email from clr@clrlabor.org

MESSAGE ACCOMPANYING LETTER TO ANDREW YOUNG:

Friends:

Attached and below is the text of a letter to Andrew Young from several former field secretaries of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee regarding his support for NIKE.

As the letter makes clear, the signers are deeply disturbed by Rev. Young's use of his civil rights movement past to legitimize NIKE's practices. The letter also points out the numerous places in which the Andrew Young report is in error, illogical, suspect and otherwise not worthy of his signature.

We have left Rev. Young a respectful period of time to respond to our letter. He has chosen not to do so. Therefore any publicity you can give to our letter would be appreciated.

Phil Hutchings, Mike Miller, Betita Martinez, Wazir Peacock, Jean Wiley

TEXT OF LETTER TO REV. ANDREW YOUNG:

December 4, 1997

Rev. Andrew Young
303 Peachtree St, Suite 4800.
Atlanta, GA 30308

Dear Rev. Young:

We write this letter in sadness. But commitments we once shared demand a response to the recent document you published on NIKE Shoes and their hiring policies and practices in China, Viet-Nam and Indonesia.

First let us introduce ourselves. Some of us you know. All of us served as staff members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee or were otherwise engaged in The Movement during the period you were on Dr. Martin Luther King's staff at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). If we did not know you personally, we certainly knew your work.

As a former SCLC leader at the time of its greatest impact in this country, you bring to your NIKE report the credibility of your leadership in the civil rights movement generally and SCLC particularly, as well as your prominence in American politics. Your NIKE report provides legitimacy that few others could provide. We are writing to urge you to reconsider your report. It appears to us that your Report is a betrayal of the principles for which Dr. King gave his life in Memphis where he made his last public appearance in support of a sanitation workers' strike - the right of workers to organize free trade unions, to be recognized and to gain dignity in the workplace.

Since this is a public letter, we will not burden those who are reading it with the necessity of doing research on the subject. We will limit ourselves to those things which appear to us to be self-evident from reading your report. We therefore proceed by quoting from your report, in the order in which things appear, and commenting on, or raising questions about, what you have said. Points you make are in quotation marks.

1. You say, "After an in-depth meeting with the leadership of NIKE, I became convinced that NIKE was sincere in its desire to have me conduct a totally independent assessment of their Code of Conduct and how it was being applied." There were "No conditions or limits...placed on (your) activities...and...access; (you) would be allowed to visit any factory...and talk with any worker without the presence of NIKE management; (you) would have access to any confidential audits and internal NIKE memoranda...(and) NIKE would agree in advance to make (the) report public, regardless of the findings..." (pg. 5) And, "(T)he views presented here...are expressed with humility...and the hope that it (sic) might help NIKE and others in their industry to improve the conditions for factory workers all over the world." We question the possibility of an "independent" report when one of the parties to the dispute is paying for it and note that it is common for similar efforts to be funded by sources independent of the parties involved in a dispute. Alternatively both parties to a dispute should become sponsors of an "independent" report. While there may not have been NIKE management present in your meetings, there were translators and, perhaps, others. We are not persuaded that even with whatever assurances you were given that a worker in a NIKE plant would or should have felt secure in speaking freely to you.

2. You were "not asked by NIKE to address compensation and 'cost of living' issues which some in the human rights...community had hoped would be a part of this report..." ...."I had no...intention of addressing wages and standards of living in countries where NIKE goods are produced..." (pg. 9) You then go on to contradict yourself, saying that no "one particular U.S. company should be forced to pay U.S. wages abroad while its direct competitors do not." You imply that NIKE workers demand "US wages." They do not. No public account of the NIKE dispute suggests that these workers are asking for US wages. Having created a straw-man, it is rather easy to dispose of him.

3. Continuing, "The bottom line is that a national economy can not be transformed one factory at a time or even one industry at a time. Instead, these economic reforms and improvements will only come when there are international trade agreements and understandings in place which support global standards." (pg. 11). NAFTA is an example of an international trade agreement with such standards. They are routinely violated. NAFTA specifically provides for free workplace elections for unions. Efforts by Mexican workers to organize independent trade unions have been crushed. NAFTA's "guarantees" have meant nothing to employers determined to exploit workers at the lowest possible wages.

   Applied to The Movement in the South, this logic would lead to the claim that, "You can't expect the downtown businesspeople of Birmingham to reach an agreement with Dr. King; there have to be southwide standards before reforms and improvements can take place in one city."

   Finally, as you know, the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the US Constitution were passed shortly after the completion of the Civil War. After a brief period of Reconstruction enforcement by the Federal Government, they became nothing more than words on a piece of paper. It took the modern civil rights movement of which you were a part to bring the necessary pressure to enforce civil rights in the South. Why should we think that "international trade agreements and understandings in place which support global standards" can solve the problems of workers? Who is to enforce these agreements? In countries like Indonesia, China and Vietnam, people are unable to form independent labor unions to pursue their rights and interests. In the absence of powerful, independent, organizations it is unlikely that rights that are "on paper" are likely to be enforced.

4. "...NIKE does not own or operate the factories where its shoes and apparel are produced and has traditionally contracted with others to produce their products...(T)he factories we visited in Vietnam, Indonesia and China are totally owned and operated by Asian companies who have contracts with NIKE (and others)." (pg. 15) Doesn't that sound something like the sharecropping system? More recently, the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) addressed exactly this situation in its dealings with Campbell Soup Company, and finally exacted an agreement from the Company which recognized its responsibility for practices of "contractors" who grew Campbell's tomatos. Similar struggles are being waged in the U.S. in the garment industry where "name brand" companies seek to disavow responsibility for the employment practices of their "independent contractors." The factories you saw are totally dependent on NIKE, Reebok, Adidas and others for their business; NIKE (and the other companies) can and should be held accountable for what goes on in those factories.

5. You respond at some length (pgs 17 - 21) to the allegation of some critics that you were "duped." As evidence to the contrary you describe the physical plants you saw, the working conditions in them and the many workers observed at their work stations. To sum up, with some exceptions that you note, things generally looked o.k. You doubt you could be "systematically misled by carefully selected interpreters in the hundreds of conversations, meetings and dinners that we had in three different countries..." Why not? For the sake of your readers, it would have been helpful if you had told us who your independent translation service was. But even if we knew and were confident of such a translation service, there is little reason to think that a NIKE worker would be in a position to make such an assessment of your interpreters. You later (pg. 25) say you "talked individually with employees...randomly selected by me...and usually without NIKE management around." It seems to us highly unlikely that a worker who feared reprisals would freely speak with you - no matter who was present. Why take the risk? Such a worker might legitimately ask him or herself, "Is Andrew Young going to protect my job?" Even if she or he thought you would like to, it is unlikely that such a worker would think you could. It doesn't take the beating or firing of very many workers to send a message to the vast majority of them. Even the arbitrary assignment of "agitators" (Do you remember when we were called that in the South?) to the worst jobs will silence most workers unless they think there is some likelihood that speaking up will lead to beneficial results.

6. You mention conversations with union leaders and (pg. 22) show yourself in photographs meeting "with union representatives" at different factories. But we have no way of knowing whether or not these were "company unions." Throughout the world, workers struggle for the right to form unions that are independent of government and/or private employers. You refer to your history of relationships with unions in the United States. Then you certainly know how the AFL-CIO has consistently fought against company unions.

7. Independent "spot audits" were conducted without the presence of management to assure compliance with the NIKE Code of Conduct. (pg. 23). The same question applies. Is the worker supposed to trust the auditors? What in his or her experience would lead to such trust? You no doubt remember the early days of the civil rights movement when southern civil rights workers "trusted" the FBI. The result was that the sheriffs and police chiefs in their local communities were briefed by the FBI on what the civil rights movement was doing. You have asked for a new investigation of the killing of Dr. King precisely because you don't trust the major reports issued by the government and its independent auditors who were "auditing" the question, "Who killed Dr. King?"

8. "In each country, I had conversations with NGOs (non-governmental organizations), usually without NIKE personnel present." (pg. 25) From them you heard various criticisms which, you note, were based only on the report of aggrieved parties. There is no citation of these reports, nor an account of the specific points of their criticism. Because of that, we are unable to compare your report with theirs.

9. "I found no evidence of systematic abuse of workers at these factories." (pg. 31) This is hardly surprising. As already noted, it only takes the abuse of a few courageous workers who try to organize for the rest to learn to "stay in their places."

10. "In these Asian countries that do not have a mature trade union movement or a long tradition of 'workers' rights,' the responsibility for protecting the workers must fall increasingly on the large companies - like NIKE - that have production contracts with these factories...(They) must pro-actively take steps that contribute to the creation of systems and processes that protect workers in these 'contract factories'." (pg. 37) Here's an alternative observation: it is almost inevitable that there will be abuses in countries, such as those you visited, that suppress the right of workers to organize in their own behalf. Here's a recommendation that follows: Corporations of industrialized countries should not locate plants in countries which do not clearly allow the right of workers to form free trade unions; and, governments of these industrialized countries should adopt policies which prevent corporations based in their countries from so doing.

11. "Some system of third party monitoring is necessary because of the ownershp structure of these Asian factories...There still needs to be...a better way for an individual worker to file a complaint or grievance within the factory..." (pg. 37) Despite references to your understanding of unions, you seem to rely on paternalistic solutions to problems that workers could solve by themselves if they had the unfettered right to form independent unions and negotiate contracts without fear of employer or government reprisals.

12. "There should be a better system or process in place...that would allow an individual worker to file a complaint...and know that it will be seriously considered and/or investigated and that will not leave the worker vulnerable to retribution by factory management." (pg. 43.) What would such a system be? Where is there one on this earth except in those places where there is an independent organization paid for and controlled by the workers themselves? And even where there are such organizations, as in the US, you well know that grievances often take many years before they are resolved because the power of the American labor movement has been weakened and provisions intended to benefit workers are now turned against them by hostile courts and administrative bodies. "(S)pecial human relations and cultural sensitivity programs..." (pg. 45) will not be an effective substitute for worker power because they are controlled by management.

    In the absence of a union, individual American workers may avail themselves of legal remedies to workplace grievances. But in order to do so they must have resources to obtain an attorney, be willing to wait for justice during often lengthy legal proceedings and be prepared for subsequent sanctions at their place of work. Workers who "win" in court often leave their jobs because of the relentless hostility and harassment they experience from their employer. "Protective legislation" is a remedy which often leaves those workers who make use of it little option but to seek another job. Even in a country with a history of due process of law, the fact that a process is in place often means little for the worker who has a complaint.

13. "Many have called for NIKE to submit to 'independent monitoring'...To some, this means turning over monitoring factory compliance...to NIKE's critics, and giving these organizations free access to the plants which produce NIKE goods...This is - in my opinion - neither a practical nor fair solution. I am not aware of a single Western institution...which permits its critics to be the final arbiter in evaluating its performance." (pg. 55) The "final arbiter" idea is another straw man. Western institutions may not "permit" critics to be final arbiters. However, critics may demand and win the right to evaluate such institutions. Parent organizations have won such a right in relation to public schools; residents of neighborhoods have won the right to evaluate urban renewal schemes and to have financial institutions disclose their lending practices, and worker-controlled unions have won the right to have employers "open the books" when there are disputes over the profitability of a firm. The independent union is not the "final arbiter" because these matters are resolved through the process of collective bargaining.

14. You list a number of non-governmental organizations and individuals with whom GoodWorks (your company) either met or spoke. Among them is Medea Benjamin, Director of the San Francisco-based Global Exchange, one of NIKE's critics and a supporter of the international NIKE boycott. Since Ms. Benjamin is in the San Francisco Bay Area, we called her. She unequivocally said, "The only dealing we've had with Andrew Young is efforts on our part to meet with him - anytime, anyplace at his convenience - and we never got any response." If Ms. Benjamin is any indication of your research, your whole report is further open to question.

    To conclude this letter, on Saturday, July 26, the San Francisco Chronicle carried a column by Cynthia Tucker, editorial page editor of the Atlanta Constitution, titled "Searching for Truth in (Martin Luther) King's Murder." In that column, you give credibility to a conspiracy theory that claims people around the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover were involved in Dr. King's assassination, and are quoted as proposing a "truth commission" to reinvestigate King's murder. "You'd have to give everybody immunity against prosecution," you said. "If you do that, I think you'd get people willing to tell what they know about the conspiracy. We're not after retribution. We just want the truth."

    We want the truth too, Andy. We urge you to re-consider and re-open the Nike question just as you demand a reopening of the King assassination question.

    Sincerely,

    Phil Hutchings, Betita (Elizabeth Sutherland) Martinez, Mike Miller, Wazir Peacock, Jean Wiley Former field secretaries, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

    P.S. Since writing this letter, a story appeared in the Saturday, November 8, 1997 New York Times, titled "Nike Shoe Plant in Vietnam Is Called Unsafe for Workers." In the story, newswriter Steven Greenhouse quotes extensively from an Ernst and Young inspection report prepared in January, 1997, a number of months before you prepared your report. In your report you say you had access to all the NIKE independent inspection reports. How do you fit the Ernst & Young report with your own? If, as the Times quotes your associate Doug Gatlin as saying, you didn't "see or read all of the reports they (Ernst & Young) did..." what else didn't you see or read? Here's what the NY Times says: "The Ernst & Young report painted a dismal picture of thousands of young women, most under age 25, laboring 10 1/2 hours a day, six days a week, in excessive heat and noise and in foul air, for slightly more than $10 a week. The report also found that workers with skin or breathing problems had not been transferred to departments free of chemicals and that more than half the workers who dealt with dangerous chemicals did not wear protective masks or gloves."
    
    

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