Your Holiday Gift Guide with Human Rights in Mind

Justice Matters

On this episode of Justice Matters, co-host Maggie Gates, Executive Director of the Carr Center, talks with Sarah Zoen, Associate Director at Pillar Two — an organization that advises businesses on human rights due diligence — about how to navigate shopping for the holidays while keeping human rights and ethical business practices in mind. Together, they offer online resources, best practices, and other tips to help with your holiday shopping.

Here's a list of the resources mentioned in this episode:

2022 Corporate Human Rights Benchmark by the World Benchmarking Alliance provides a comparative snapshot of 127 of the world’s largest and most influential companies in high-risk sectors. Their methodology considers companies’ policies, processes, and practices to obtain an overview of whether companies are implementing key expectations of the UNGPs. It also considers how companies would respond to serious human-rights-related allegations.

2021 Gender Benchmark by the World Benchmarking Alliance provides a comparative snapshot of 35 influential apparel companies on gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Fashion Transparency Index ranks 250 of the world’s largest fashion brands and retailers according to their level of public disclosure on human rights and environmental policies, practices, and impacts.

Between 2022-2023, Know the Chain benchmarked 185 companies from the information and communications technology, food and beverage, and apparel and footwear sectors looking specifically at forced labor risks in companies’ global supply chains.

Be Slavery Free’s Chocolate Scorecard ranks companies’ level of transparency, how they fare on paying workers a living income, whether they use child or forced labor, and their deforestation and climate impact, producing an overall ranking.

The UK Government runs a Modern Slavery Statement Registry.

The Australian Government runs a Register for Modern Slavery Statements.