Kristina Tamm Hallström

NGO Power in Global Social and Environmental Standard-Setting

We have seen a worldwide increase in new nonstate, multi-stakeholder organizations setting standards for socially and environmentally responsible behavior. These standard-setting arenas offer new channels for political participation for NGOs. Scholars have drawn attention to the rise and the role of NGOs in global politics, but there is less research on the power and long-term implications of NGO participation in transnational multi-stakeholder standard-setting. This article analyzes NGOs within three such global organizations: the Forest Stewardship Council, the Marine Stewardship Council, and the International Organization for Standardization on Social Responsibility. Using a power-based perspective, we demonstrate the impact that NGOs can have on multi-stakeholder work. In doing so, we analyze four types of NGO power: symbolic, cognitive, social, and monitoring power. The article further emphasizes institutional, structural, and discursive factors within multi-stakeholder organizations that create certain challenges to NGO power and participation in the longer term.

'Power' is that which remains to be explained: dispelling the ominous dark matter of critical planning studies

The purpose of this article is to contribute to the development of new theoretical and methodological resources for analysing power dynamics in planning studies. Our overarching aim is to demystify the concept of ‘power’ and what it purports to be describing, making those practices grouped under this label more tangible and, hence, also more readily contestable. Investigating how the effects we label as power are produced, instead of using ‘power’ as an all-covering explanation of societal events, demands a conceptualization of power as the outcome of social processes rather than as a causal variable behind them. An empirical study of a referendum regarding a major urban development in a Swedish suburban municipality illustrates how strong assumptions regarding the dominance of, for example, pre-existing powerful actor-constellations or purely economic relations are not always very helpful, highlighting the need for more acute attentiveness to the micro-physics of power.

The Certification Paradox : monitoring as a solution and a problem

In Egels-Zanden’s chapter we could see how multinational shoe companies work in order to create trust in their brands by using a process logic framework in their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) efforts. In other words, the companies and their suppliers undertake a dialogue and negotiate with the actors within civil society as to a reasonable interpretation of the freedom of association. This example indicates that confidence has become all the more important in today’s market exchange. It is no longer sufficient to offer products and services of high quality at a reasonable price but, instead, it has also become important to, as a producer, be transparent and open for dialogue. One must be able to demonstrate that the production process has been conducted in an acceptable manner, in terms of specific values, such as sustainability, the work environment, and human rights. If consumers, civil society actors, and journalists discover that a company has used child labor, harmful chemicals, or has denied its employees acceptable working conditions, there is a high risk that the company will be criticized in the media, which, in turn, can seriously damage its reputation and the possibility of market survival.

Value-neutralizing in verification markets: organizing for independence through accreditation

Value-neutralizing in verification markets : organizing for independence through accreditation