Article 21: Right to take part in government; equal access to public service; the will of the people as the basis of the authority of government, expressed in periodic and genuine elections
Necessary
Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes. Others must also act.
Why shareholder democracy is necessary
Corporate money moves through elections mostly as campaign contributions, trade-association dues and lobbying rather than through what a company makes or sells, so the live question is whether shareholders can make that spending visible and accountable. The Center for Political Accountability has reached disclosure agreements with close to 200 large companies, more than half of the S&P 100. Those agreements bring previously secret payments to trade groups into the open. Average disclosure scores across the S&P 500 rose from about 42 percent in 2016 to 60 percent in 2024. As You Sow and pension funds have filed dozens of related lobbying-disclosure proposals at companies including Truist, Goldman Sachs and Exxon, with average support climbing to 42 percent in 2025. Conservative filers, chiefly the Free Enterprise Project, press companies on political and civic spending from the opposite direction, usually with single-digit support. Disclosure alone does not stop the spending, and voting rights, districting and campaign-finance law remain outside any boardroom's control.
How this was scoredNecessary
Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes. Others must also act.
What companies make or sell has only a marginal bearing on whether elections are genuine and government authority reflects the will of the people; the relevant corporate behavior is spending and lobbying, which sits on the political-influence axis rather than product or operational conduct.
Undisclosed corporate political spending, trade-association dues and lobbying have been tracked for two decades by the Center for Political Accountability. They are widely documented as a major channel through which corporate money shapes elections and policy against public preference. Other obstacles (voting rights, districting, election administration) sit outside any boardroom.
1 and 2, higher of the two, gives Necessary
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
- 2024 CPA-Zicklin Index of Corporate Political Disclosure and Accountability, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, 2024-11-06
- Corporate Political Disclosure Shareholder Proposals Draw Surprising Support, Covington & Burling LLP, 2025-08
- Investors push for more disclosure on corporate lobbying, Trellis, 2024
- More Shareholders Seek Transparency on Corporate Political Spending and Climate Change, Brennan Center for Justice, 2022
- Anti-ESG Shareholder Proposals in 2023, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, 2023-06-01
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Runs the annual CPA-Zicklin Index and has reached political-disclosure agreements with roughly 200 large companies, documented as raising the S&P 500 average disclosure score from 42.3% (2016) to 59.9% (2024).
Files recurring shareholder proposals seeking disclosure of corporate political and lobbying spending, including at United Airlines, Exxon, Duke Energy and Eli Lilly.
Filed at least 42 proposals in the 2023 proxy season, including several on corporate civic and political spending, mostly drawing 2% or less support.
Anti-ESG Shareholder Proposals in 2023, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, 2023-06-01
Engaged Danone on aligning its indirect (trade-association) lobbying with its climate commitments, contributing to Danone's improved InfluenceMap rating by February 2024.
Investors push for more disclosure on corporate lobbying, Trellis, 2024
5 campaigns on record
Disclose corporate campaign and political spending policies.
Result: 5 of the 13 proposals passed; average support across all 13 rose to 42%, up from 26% in 2024.
Five companies' political-disclosure proposals won majority shareholder approval
Disclose the company's policies and governance for both direct and indirect (trade-association) lobbying.
Result: Truist received 41.17% support; Goldman Sachs rose to 39% (from 35.6%); BNY Mellon's first such proposal got 38.4%; AbbVie fell to 27% (from 33%).
we found no documented lobbying-disclosure policy change at these companies for the 2024 cycle
Investors push for more disclosure on corporate lobbying, Trellis
Adopt board-level oversight and public disclosure of corporate political spending, including payments to trade associations and other groups that fund political activity.
Result: 394 of the S&P 500 fully or partially disclosed political spending in 2024, up from 304 in 2016; the average disclosure score rose from 42.3% to 59.9% over the same period.
Companies with board oversight of political spending rose from 229 to 319 in the index's own count. We found no sourced figure for the total value of trade-association payments disclosed.
Reverse or add board oversight over racial-equity and civic-spending commitments the filer characterizes as politically driven corporate activity.
Result: Home Depot's racial-equity-audit reversal proposal got 0.9% support; a board-oversight-committee proposal at Starbucks got 1.7%; a UPS-related proposal reached 5.6%.
we found no documented company policy change resulting from these proposals
Anti-ESG Shareholder Proposals in 2023, Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance
Review and disclose whether the company's indirect lobbying, through trade associations, aligns with its own climate commitments.
Result: Danone moved from no disclosed review of indirect lobbying to a B-minus InfluenceMap rating by February 2024.
Danone began disclosing a review of its indirect lobbying alignment with its climate policy positions
Investors push for more disclosure on corporate lobbying, Trellis
Related subjects on other maps
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is Universal Declaration of Human Rights's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.