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So Nike released its first “corporate responsibility report” earlier this month. It’s a slick piece of marketing, printed on 100-per-cent recycled paper with vegetable-based inks, of course. Nike says it’s committing to everything from phasing out toxins in the materials it uses to manufacture shoes and reducing greenhouse gases to finally eliminating child labour in its supplier factories. (We especially like Nike’s contention that “consumption is not the problem, the nature of consumption is.”) Window dressing to counter all the negative press in recent years? Perhaps. Or has Nike truly come to the realization that it can’t afford to operate without a social conscience?
