A small number of student organizers from the group Athletes and Advocates for Workers’ Rights met Wednesday Dec. 2 to discuss their campaign to raise awareness around the relationship between Georgetown and Nike.
The meeting served to spread awareness about the issue and explain a change in Nike’s policy, which recently began denying access of Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) inspectors into factories that it controls, according to Jake Maxim (COL ‘17). The WRC is a monitoring organization, founded by colleges around the United States including Georgetown, that helps institutions ensure that companies with which they do business adhere to their standards. For Georgetown, all businesses that have a license to use the university’s name or logo are expected to adhere to its Code of Conduct.
On Nov. 19, Athletes and Advocates for Workers’ Rights sent University President John DeGioia a letter asking Georgetown to reconsider its business partnership with Nike in light of the denial of the WRC into its factories.
“We are asking that Georgetown refuse to do business with Nike as long as they refuse access to the WRC,” the letter reads. “We love Georgetown, we believe in Georgetown, and that is why we are asking this.”
According to Isabelle Teare (COL ‘17), the letter to DeGioia was part of a larger national movement of students asking their university administrators to reconsider their relationship with Nike. United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) organized the action with other universities across the United States.
Callahan Watson, chair of Georgetown’s Licensing Oversight Committee (LOC), wrote in an email to the Voice that the LOC has discussed recent concerns that students have raised
“We appreciate students’ engagement on this issue,” Watson wrote. “We are gathering more information and will continue to work with everyone involved.”
Student organizers were clear at the meeting that the campaign is not seeking for the university to cut all ties with Nike permanently, only until Nike allows the WRC back into its factories. Additionally, they fear the effect it will have if Nike is allowed to continue operating without the WRC allowed access to its factories.
“If Nike, who is a massive leader in the apparel industry and also one of the worst in terms of their labor violations, if they go and they say ‘you know what, we’re not allowing the WRC to monitor our factories anymore,’ that sets a precedent,” said Teare at the meeting. “And then all of a sudden, why can’t every other company be like, ‘you know what, we don’t want that to happen so we’re not going to let them monitor us either.’ That starts a ripple effect, and all of a sudden all of the progress that people have made just goes away.”
According to Maxim, other companies with a license from Georgetown may better adhere to the Code of Conduct than Nike, such as Alta Gracia, a company whose mission is to provide a living wage to all of its workers. Maxim likened buying clothes to buying healthy food and the need to spend more for a more just product. Overall, he hopes the effort can change student attitudes and habits at Georgetown.
“We hope that students begin to realize their purchasing power and become active consumers,” he wrote in an email to the Voice. “By that I mean that students that are not only educated consumers, but who are also willing to take an active role in changing their purchasing behavior.”
