The Open Corporation project involves trade unions ranking MNCs (i.e Multi-National Corporations) with regard to transparency and accountability. Using a set of indicators related to a company’s degree of responsibility vis-à-vis its workforce, trade unions have now started benchmarking companies, with the aim of making workers and their representatives aware of corporate activities and decisions and putting pressure on corporate images and reputations.
The indicators used relate to social dialogue, working conditions, CSR, diversity, policies for persons with disabilities, environmental policies and financial transparency. Each topic has a similar weight in the final calculation of a company’s ranking, except for social dialogue which counts almost double. The result is the Transparency Index.
Data was gathered in two ways. Desk research conducted by the project’s trade union research partners gathered quantitative data from information publicized by the companies and available on their websites. Qualitative data was gathered from employee representatives working in the MNCs.
An initiative of Filcams-CGIL, the Italian Commerce, Tourism, Services Workers’ Federation, the Open Corporation project is partnered by European trade union federations such as UNI Europa and EFFAT, and by national federations from France, Bulgaria and Italy. It is supported by the ETUC.
For further information, please consult the Open Corporation website
Complementing the project, the ETUC has also issued a CSR toolkit aimed at promoting the better use of norms
