More than 50,000 air pollution violations at the massive Martin Lake coal-fired power plant led the Sierra Club, represented by Earthjustice and Environmental Integrity Project, to file a lawsuit today in federal court against plant owner Luminant (formerly TXU).

As we applaud the significant strides accomplished by transparency advocates this year, it’s useful to recall why opening the books is so important...One of the primary ways that extractive industries contribute to human rights abuses in some countries is by providing a source of income to oppressive governments.

The campaign promoting Proposition 23, a referendum on California’s November ballot that would essentially annul the state’s landmark clean energy law, is being funded primarily by two Texas-based oil companies.

We've just posted online our introduction to CSR from our 2008 text co-written with Laura Spence, Corporate Social Responsibility: Readings and Cases in a Global Context. It's available for free download here at the Social Science Research Network, albeit only in the pre-typeset version.

When we worry about the influence of big business on our existence these days, we generally think about a variety of companies: our employer, the financial institutions that handle our money, the drug companies that treat our ailments, the agribusiness firms that feed us, the telecoms that allow us to communicate, etc.

The donation to the Proposition 23 campaign comes from a subsidiary of Kansas-based Koch Industries, which owns refineries and controls 4,000 miles of oil pipelines.

It's Labor Day. Over 100 years ago, workers risked life and limb to get things like a five day work week, an eight hour day, and the right to organize. Walmart, the country's #1 retailer, and one of the biggest corporations in the world, is doing its best to dismantle those gains one by one.

European Union countries must drop their biofuels targets or else risk plunging more Africans into hunger and raising carbon emissions, according to Friends of the Earth (FoE).

(c) Jerry D. Greer.Days before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) kicks off a series of regional hearings across the United States on whether and how to regulate toxic coal ash waste from coal-fired power plants, a major new study identifies 39 additional coal-ash dump sites in 21 states that are contaminating drinking water or surface water with arsenic and other heavy metals.

The United States Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im Bank) voted on Wednesday to seek a final review of a $900m loan for a controversial 3,960 MW coal-fired power plant in India, reports Pacific Environment, a San Francisco-based environmental group.

Wal-Mart Stores asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to review the largest employment discrimination lawsuit in American history, involving more than a million female workers, current and former, at Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club stores.

FDA Considers Approval of GE Salmon–the First GE Food Animal–Yet Fails to Inform the Public of Environmental and Economic Risks

Sodexo...and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW)...have joined forces to improve farm worker wages and working conditions in the tomato fields of Florida.

We all know that states are dealing with huge budget deficits, and that medical costs are skyrocketing. Well, one Utah legislator believes he has come up with a partial solution to the problem: deny epidurals for any pregnant woman on Medicaid.

Americans love entrepreneurship, and no form of it is more celebrated than the family business. Most of us distrust big banks and giant corporations, but who doesn’t have warm feelings about mom and pop companies or family farms?

JoelFarm Aid's farmer advocate Joel Morton traveled to Fort Collins, Colorado, this week to stand by America's family farmers and ranchers as they speak out about the lack of competition and fair markets in the livestock sector. Here's what he had to report early this morning...

Cargill has not suspended its relationship with a palm oil company recently exposed for misleading investors and buyers on its environmental transgressions, reports the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), an activist group campaigning against environmentally-damaging forms of palm oil production.

A new report by the Environmental Integrity Project, Earthjustice, and the Sierra Club has identified an additional 39 sites in 21 states where toxic coal ash is contaminating drinking and surface water with arsenic and heavy metals. These new sites added to those already identified by the Environmental Protection Agency brings the US total to 137 in 34 states.

An editorial in Monday's Wall Street Journal, "The Case against Corporate Social Responsibility," by Associate Professor Aneel Karnani of the University of Michigan's School of Business, joins a number of other recent well-meaning, but uninformed, essays critical of corporate responsibility.

The Berne Declaration and Greenpeace Switzerland are once again on a global hunt for corporations whose social or ecological behavior stinks to high heaven.

If a tobacco company gave the World Health Organisation a $10 million grant to examine the health effects of smoking, health campaigners would be outraged. They would also treat the results with great suspicion.

Enlace is a strategic alliance of low-wage worker centers, unions, and community organizations in Mexico and in the U.S., working with member organizations in battles for workers’ and human rights.

After nearly 90 days of picketing in the broiling sun outside the sprawling Mott’s apple juice plant here in upstate New York, Michelle Muoio recognizes that the lengthy strike is about far more than whether the 305 hourly workers at the plant get a fatter or slimmer paycheck.

Just how much is that senator getting, and what companies are doling it out?

On the heels of its endorsement of a July ad campaign aimed at branding Alberta as one of the world’s dirtiest energy producing places to visit, the Polaris Institute welcomes Corporate Ethics International’s re-think Alberta campaign encouraging people in the United Kingdom to think twice about visiting Alberta.

Please take a moment to write to Christina. Let her know that genetic contamination of organic isn't an excuse to grow more Frankencrops, it's one of the reasons we need to get "biotech" out of the food business.

Sinar Mas, an Indonesian conglomerate whose holdings include Asia Pulp and Paper, a paper products brand, and PT Smart, a palm oil producer, was sharply rebuked Wednesday over a recent report where it claimed not to have engaged in destruction of forests and peatlands.

According to a recent study, percent of households living within 10 miles of the Gulf coastline that have seen income drop because of the BP oil disaster: 20.6

Help stop a 19 billion bag-a--year habit in California and put an end to plastic pollution. Tell your Senator to support the AB 1998 at http://www.HealtheBay.org/BagBill

In last month's blitzkrieg tour of Central and Southeast Asia, two of the four stops made by United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton share the unfortunate bond of enduring an invasion by US air and ground forces.

Three firms control 89% of US soft drink sales [1]. This dominance is obscured from us by the appearance of numerous choices on retailer shelves. Steve Hannaford refers to this as "pseudovariety," or the illusion of diversity, concealing a lack of real choice [2]. To visualize the extent of pseudovariety in this industry we developed a cluster diagram to represent the number of soft drink brands and varieties found in the refrigerator cases of 94 Michigan retailers, along with their ownership connections.

Dirty Energy Money is an interactive tool that tracks the flow of oil, gas, and coal money in U.S. Congress. Find out which energy companies are pumping their dirty money into politics and which politicians are receiving it.

What does the financial reform package recently signed into law in the US have to do with preventing mass rape in Africa? Quite a lot, it seems.

Eight days after returning home from his Gulf oil-spill response job, Jason Brashears has flashbacks of a scene that he witnessed one day in Lake Ponchartrain, Louisiana: Thousands of fish gasping at the surface in a sea of foamy oil and dispersant.

The TakeAway: Shareowner Activism Can Help Deter Human Rights Violations...[A] landmark agreement released on 4 August 2010...commits Nucor

With Washington silent for now on legislation championed by unions, the debate is playing out instead in the states.

The Congressional practice of quietly attaching an unrelated provision to a larger piece of legislation at the last minute has all too often been used to benefit powerful corporate interests.

A federal judge on Friday banned the planting of genetically modified sugar beets engineered by Monsanto Co in a ruling that marks a major setback for the biotech giant.

The U.S. doesn't even have such a ban, and the Basel Action Network's Jim Puckett says we are "way behind" Europe on e-waste, estimating that up to 80 percent of e-waste in the U.S. is exported, again mostly to developing countries, primarily China.

Watch the CBS 5 KPIX August 10, 2010, report in the top of the left column below for a startling report on how San Francisco is violating its own precautionary principle law by dumping toxic sludge on city gardens.

Some compare the smell to a filthy toilet, others to rotting meat; but everyone agrees that the stench comes from behind the gates of the New York Organic Fertilizer Company. The company’s Hunts Point plant processes sludge from 14 of the city’s sewage plants, amounting to nearly half of the city’s waste, and converts it into high-grade fertilizer pellets.

Activists who oppose a controversial pipeline that would bring the world’s dirtiest oil to the U.S. demonstrated outside of a fundraising event attended by President Obama here today and called on the president to reject a permit to allow the project to move forward.

A few years ago, the state of California passed a landmark bill designed to reign in carbon pollution to 1990 levels by 2020, and Governor Schwarzenegger signed it into law.

Speculation in agricultural commodities by banks caused hunger during the 2008 food crisis by amplifying price surges, World Development Movement said.

In 2005, the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community tried to lease the sacred Eagle Rock site from the State of Michigan for ceremonial use. Located in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula near Marquette, Eagle Rock and the surrounding Yellow Dog Plains are part of lands ceded to the tribe for hunting and fishing by an 1842 government treaty upheld by the courts again in 1983.

"New America Now" sat down with Sunita Sohrabji of India West Newspaper and Sheila Davis, the executive director of the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition for a 2-part discussion on the e-waste issue in India and spotlight the SVTC documentary "Citizens at Risk". Below is part 2, featuring SVTC.

Ten years ago last month, Jem Bendell published what turned out to be one of the most influential books yet on business-NGO partnerships called Terms for Endearment: Business, NGOs and Sustainable Development.

Tom shared this video on his informative blog Beyond Money, a great place on the web for learning about alternative currencies and the problems caused by business-as-usual economics.

The most reliable studies suggest that the EROI for oil shale falls between 1:1 and 2:1 when self-energy is counted as a cost. Self-energy is energy released by the oil shale conversion process that is used to power that operation.

The Central Bureau of Investigation…filed a curative petition in the Supreme Court in the Bhopal gas tragedy case to recall the order dated September 13, 1996, quashing charges under Section 304 Part II of the Indian Penal Code (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) against the accused.

International oil companies operating in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region agreed to set up a fund to cover the costs of oil spills, the country’s environment minister said.

Following a recent African conference, a substantial number of organisations, supported by their overseas colleagues, are calling for “the promotion and protection of community rights, the environment, and realisation of the aspirations of African peoples” impacted by mining.

Some of responsible investing’s best known names, such as APG, the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, Railpen and the International Corporate Governance Network, are involved in a new group looking at how to integrate ESG (environmental, social and governance) factors into corporate reporting.

It is reported Ecuador will be compensated for leaving oil reserves in Yasuni National Park untouched. This is a major victory for Ecuador, the rainforest movement, and Ecological Internet – who was the first to campaign internationally on the issue.

A US court has given approval for a lawsuit to proceed from 72 Iraqi nationals against a private contractor accused of complicity in the alleged abuse of detainees at the US-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nevada) has just announced he is withdrawing oil disaster legislation until after August recess. Following is a statement by Peter Lehner, Executive Director of the Natural Resources Defense Council:

Today’s Financial Times has a preview of a much-awaited World Bank report on land grabs. The Bank has, for months, been promising the arrival of a report that makes a cast iron case for why allowing rich foreign investors to buy land in poor countries is win-win-win-win.

Avastin for breast cancer – no evidence of improved overall survival, no improvement in quality of life, serious side effects, all at $50k a year.

The BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is 100 days old, and now another company is competing for the spotlight as a major petro-villain.

A federal court Wednesday afternoon ordered all activities under Lease Sale 193 in the Chukchi Sea off the north coast of Alaska halted pending further environmental review by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Enforcement, and Regulation, formerly the Minerals Management Service.

International humanitarian organization Oxfam America commends the US Congress for making disclosure of payments from oil and mining companies to governments around the world a legal requirement.

Some say that the Deepwater Horizon oil-gushing disaster is Obama's Hurricane Katrina. Perhaps in response to that suggestion, President Obama signed an executive order last week to create a first-ever National Ocean Policy.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today rejected petitions from Peabody Coal, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Commonwealth of Virginia and others that asked the agency to rescind its scientific finding that heat-trapping gases pose a threat to public health. The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) says the EPA made the right decision based on science.

The Montana Peace Seekers Network is blessed and deeply privileged to name you, Ann Wright, as Peace Seeker of the Year 2010, as an expression of the deep respect, appreciation and honor in which you are held by the peace and justice community of Montana.

Since 1994, the Green Scissors Campaign, led by Friends of the Earth, Taxpayers for Common Sense and U.S. Public Interest Research Group, has been working with Congress and the Administration to end environmentally harmful and wasteful spending. Working to breach party lines, the Green Scissors Campaign has helped cut more the $26 billion in environmental wasteful programs from the federal budget.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has now formally recognized the e-Stewards® Recycler Certification and associated e-Stewards® Standard for the Responsible Recycling and Reuse of Electronic Equipment.

In fact, since Bush first pushed it, not one U.S. labor union, faith group, family farm organization or pro-environmental entity has yet to endorse or support the Korea FTA, or advocate for its passage.

The Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) made the declaration this month as it published its annual online update of pollution data from industrial facilities across the continent.

This past week, three journalists in the West African nation of Cote d'Ivoire were arrested and accused of stealing confidential documents after their newspaper, Le Nouveau Courrier, published the findings of a report into graft allegations against former officials from the Coffee and Cocoa Bourse (BCC).

According to a June 26, 2010 article in the Raleigh News and Observer, companies are moving fast to sign up these mineral rights. Few landowners are getting legal advice before signing these contracts. RAFI will be working to get understandable information to farmers about what these leases actually mean and how to protect their interests.

Russia has conceded it will miss by three years a legally binding deadline of 2012 for destroying its massive stockpile of chemical weapons, the top official overseeing compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), an international treaty on chemical weapons destruction, announced late last month.

This June the City of Chicago approved Walmart's bid to open up dozens of new facilities, beginning with grocery stores in the city's chronically underserved South side.

Diane Wilson is a feisty, 61-year-old former shrimp boat captain who was recently arrested at a U.S. Senate hearing for allegedly smearing herself with oil and repeatedly shouting at Tony Hayward, the former CEO of BP, as he spoke to lawmakers.

Published in May 2010, the paper describes how the climate change and human rights issues have developed in practice, assessing its application in the work of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR).CIEL is a non-profit organization dedicated to advocacy in the global public interest, including through legal counsel, policy research, analysis, education, training and capacity building.

Silicon Valley is the epicenter of computer innovation, but the "e-waste," the debris of Californians' high-tech lifestyle, gets exported to places like India, China and Nigeria, where the electronic scraps sit in open landfills, a source of income for children and adults who sift through the piles of discarded parts in hopes of extracting copper, aluminum and other metals.

You might have read that EBASE and the Coalition for Clean and Safe Ports took our fight to fix the broken port trucking system all the way to Washington, DC this past spring. Thanks to your support, members of Congress turned up the heat on the industry.

Buried among the many features of the financial reform bill passed by Congress is a provision that could get you a raise. For this to happen, however, you have to work for a large company that is uncomfortable with having it made public how little it pays its workers.

Large numbers gathered yesterday (Saturday July 17) for a rally outside Castlerea prison in County Roscommon to celebrate the release of jailed Shell to Sea and Human Rights activist Pat 'the chief' O'Donnell.

The socially responsible investment community views the shareholder resolution process as a vehicle for allowing investors to raise and debate issues that may eventually impinge on the corporate bottom line.

The new policy requires sweat-free labor standards and a Code of Conduct for all bidders on City uniform contracts and makes a commitment to protections against slave labor, forced labor, forced overtime, excessive hours, child labor, below-poverty wages, discrimination, harassment, and other types of unfair labor practices. The new policy will be integrated into bid and contract materials and used as contracts come up for new bid.

The US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to renew for one year a ban on imports from Myanmar over alleged human rights abuses by its military rulers.

The BP Gulf oil spill is not an anomaly but the result of industry-wide recklessness, as companies employ more and more risky methods to reach inaccessible reserves as the conventional ones run dry.

With the Calgary Stampede underway, billboards asking Americans to rethink their travel plans to Alberta rolled out across four major US cities today (cities that bring the most US tourists annually to Alberta) marking the first wave of a multi-year ad campaign aimed at revealing Alberta to be one of the world’s dirtiest destinations.

Many American communities now living with heavy industry and toxic air pollution may finally get the chance for real protection from unnecessary health risks and environmental damage.

Today, a tiny handful of meatpackers and poultry processors dominates the livestock industry, making it hard for an individual farmer or rancher to get a fair deal or equitable price for cattle, hogs, or chickens. Packers are able to use their monopoly-like power to manipulate prices paid to livestock producers.

Does the Gulf Oil Spill make your angry? Wait until you learn about North America’s “other oil disaster.” The Alberta Tar Sands have been described as “the most destructive energy project on earth.”

EWG supports broad-based reform of federal farm policy by expanding farmland conservation programs to increase assistance especially to the bottom 90% of farm subsidy recipients as well as those completely left out of the current system.

As the Gulf disaster continues to unfold, people are looking at alternatives. Canada's Minister of the environment has been pitching the Alberta oil sands as a greener, safer alternative, but as Jeff Rubin said, "You know you are at the bottom of the ninth when you are schlepping a tonne of sand to get a barrel of oil."

Most of the world’s governments have ratified at least one human rights treaty or convention. Kirk Herbertson, Kim Thompson and Robert Goodland of the World Resources Institute ask why the World Bank Group – which is owned by these same governments – is hesitant to discuss human rights openly.

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), a senior member of Congress and chair of the powerful Congressional Committee on Energy and Commerce has penned a public letter to the Secretary of State, Hilary Rodham Clinton, in which he states strong opposition to a planned oil pipeline that would transport Canada's controversial tar sands oil to the US Gulf Coast.

A common complaint about U.S. trade and agricultural policies is that they have favored the economically powerful while doing li􀄴le for the average person. Labor and citizen groups say the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) gave unprecedented rights to multinational firms and investors at the expense of workers and communities.

Major U.S. companies are contributing to the destruction of Indonesia's rainforests by sourcing paper from Asia Pulp and Paper (APP), a subsidiary of Indonesia-based conglomerate Sinar Mas, alleges a new report from Greenpeace.

The amount of oil that will ultimately be released into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico as a result of the Deepwater Horizon blowout of April 20, 2010 may never be known.

Strikes are rare these days (outside China), so the walkout by a group of some 300 workers at a Mott’s juice and applesauce plant in upstate New York takes on added significance:

A delegation of indigenous and community leaders from Ecuador is visiting Louisiana this week at the invitation of the United Houma Nation, a tribe in coastal Lafourche and Terrebone parishes that has been hit hard by the BP oil catastrophe.

Featured this week at the start of the US Social Forum