DIY Guide: How to Research Companies

5. 'Digging the Dirt'

Activist websites
For information on a company's wrongdoings, there are various campaign organisations' websites. A good start is to search web super-sites such as www.essential.org (a website hosting about 30 US anti-corporate NGOs - especially the Multinational Monitor at www.essential.org/monitor) and www.oneworld.net (which includes over 500 organisations from around the world, both North and South, focused on development, environment and human rights). OneWorld also functions as a magazine, and provides profiles on particular issues, plus campaigning guides.

The Corporate Watch site at www.corporatewatch.org.uk is also well worth a look. We are currently building up a database of in-depth profiles of major corporations, focussing on information useful to campaigners. The site also carries news updates and you can use the search engine on the site to search other good activist sites such as Multinational Monitor.

We have also found the following sites particularly useful:

Websites on individual companies:
www.mcspotlight.org - everything you could ever want to know about McDonalds, plus basic information on a few other companies
www.essentialaction.org/shell/ - on Shell
www.saigon.com/~nike - on Nike
www.sprawl-busters.com and www.walmartsucks.com - on WalMart
www.bayerhazard.com/ - on Bayer

Websites on particular industries:
www.moles.org (Project Underground) - on oil and mining
www.prwatch.org - on public relations
www.ran.org (Rainforest Action Network) - on logging and other rainforest industries
www.irn.org (International Rivers Network) - on dam building and other river industries
www.foe.co.uk/camps/ foodbio/index.htm and www.genewatch.org/ - on genetic engineering
www.gm-info.org.uk - Corporate Watch's list of current GM test sites in the UK (being updated as of July 2002).
www.infact.org/helpstop.html - on tobacco
www.adbusters.org - Canadian subvertisers
www.pan-uk.org/ - on pesticides
www.caat.org.uk/ (Campaign Against the Arms Trade)
www.nosweat.org.uk/ - on sweatshops
www.nologo.org - Naomi Klein's website on Clothing, sweatshops, casualisation etc

Websites on corporations and corporate power generally:
www.corpwatch.org - CorpWatch US (unrelated to Corporate Watch UK)
www.corporatewatch.org.uk - the authors.
www.irrc.org/ - Investor Research & Responsibility Centre (US)
www.citizen.org - Public Citizen (US)
www.xs4all.nl/~ceo - Corporate Europe Observatory
www.endgame.org/ - Endgame Research Services

In addition, the following sites have useful information on pollution:
The FoE Factory-watch online database at www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/industry_and_ pollution/factorywatch is searchable by company and details the emissions from the companies UK factories.
The Scorecard website (www.scorecard.org) contains useful information and action tools on US toxic pollution.

Finally, worth a mention is the Free Range Activism site, at www.gn.apc.org/pmhp which has guides to various campaigning resources, including lots of campaign-relevant government legislation.

Alternative Media
If you want the 'dirt' on a company, the alternative media may be of use. In particular The Ecologist (tel. 0207 351 3578, ecologist@gn.apc.org) and the ENDS Report (tel. 0207 814 5300, post@ends.co.uk) both contain useful criticism of companies and produce an annual index. Ethical Consumer (tel. 0161 226 2929, www.ethicalconsumer.org) is also useful. Look at the company index at www.ethicalconsumer.org/magazine/companies _index.htm, then get the most recent issue that features the company you're after in the research supplement. In here you'll find every way of slagging off the company that the guys at EC can think of.
The Corporate Watch newsletter covers various topics of corporate power and its social and environmental impacts - plus campaigns against corporations. All the back issues of the newsletter (and our now discontinued magazine) are on our website: www.corporatewatch.org.uk .

From the US, there's Multinational Monitor and Corporate Crime Reporter.

If you have the money, the best way to search the alternative media is through Ethical Consumer's online database, Corporate Critic - see www.ethicalconsumer.org/corp_critic.htm. EC monitors a huge range of alternative media, and records references and abstracts of articles critical of companies on this database. It costs £70.50 to get set up, then 75p for each abstract you download. You still need to get the article itself after that. If you're penniless, EC offer a free trial that lets you download up to 10 abstracts.
It might also be worth doing a search of the Indymedia website (www.indymedia.org) to see if this throws up anything interesting. Beware of paranoid conspiracy theories however!

Government sources
Certain government sources are also good for 'digging the dirt' on a company. For example, companies registered in the US are required to list all the court cases that they are involved in on form 10-K on the SEC database (see Using company registrars). Regulatory agencies can also provide a good source of pretty indisputable evidence (see Regulators). The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) website (www.epa.gov) contains some useful information. This tends to be very detailed however, and it is often hard to find a general overview.

Mainstream Media Sources
A search of the mainstream media can provide a good source of company scandal and can throw up interesting leads (see Media section). If necessary, media sources can be backed up later on by more reliable sources, such as government records.

Other sources
Interviewing staff from your target company may turn up some unexpected information (see Interviews). You might also find some transcripts of court proceeding useful.

Further reading
This booklet is intended as an introduction to researching companies. Some of the information in this guide has been gratuitously plagiarised from chapter 5 and 6 of Nicholas Hildyard and Mark Mansley's excellent publication The Campaigners Guide to Financial Markets. This goes into far more detail than we have here and is an invaluable tool for serious researchers. It is available from Cornerhouse: tel. (01258) 473795, email: cornerhouse@gn.apc.org

Reliability of information
Beware of libel! Note that for example you can be sued for using something from a newspaper which was libellous if you did not take reasonable steps to ensure its reliability. Certainly any campaign literature should be checked before use.
Unless your source is either a document signed or published by the subject, or a public record (i.e. from the government), or something you've directly seen or heard and documented carefully, try to back it up with another source. The less reliable your sources, the more corroborating further sources you need.

Use of devices such as 'according to ...' and 'allegedly' help with libel-dodging, but you may still be found liable if an incorrect inference can be drawn from what you write. Another useful tactic is to surround any potentially libellous comments with very critical comments which you can definitely back up. That way, when the company states which bits of your publication it considers libellous, it is implicitly admitting the truth of those bits which it doesn't challenge.

To protect a source who might lose their job or get in other kinds of trouble for revealing information to the public, bring a witness (who can testify) to the interview, who doesn't know the source's name.

And finally...
If you know of any research techniques or sources that you think should be included in this guide, please tell us about them. Don't forget to use your imagination. And good luck with your research.

Corporate Watch
16b Cherwell Street
Oxford OX4 1BG
01865 791 391
www.corporatewatch.org.uk
mail@corporatewatch.org

Edited by Louise Sales and Rebecca Spencer.
Design by Stig. Printed version available for £3.50, printed on 100% recycled paper by Oxford Greenprint using solvent-free inks and renewable energy (www.oxfordgreenprint.org.uk).

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