Article 4: No slavery, servitude, or slave trade
Pivotal
Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
Why shareholder democracy is pivotal
Modern forced labor and child labor live almost entirely inside corporate supply chains: cocoa farms supplying chocolate makers, cotton fields and garment factories supplying apparel brands, and mines and farms supplying electronics and food companies. When a company changes who it buys from and how it monitors suppliers, forced labor in that chain can fall dramatically, which is why this is the strongest corporate-conduct case in the whole Declaration. Hershey published a human rights policy addressing child labor in cocoa after investors pressed it. Nike and Apple shareholders have repeatedly, and unsuccessfully, asked the companies to assess and cut ties with Xinjiang cotton and forced-labor risk. Wendy's shareholders voted 95% in favor of a transparency resolution tied to farmworker protections, yet the company still has not joined the Fair Food Program. Nike, Coca-Cola and Apple were also reported lobbying to soften the 2021 federal law banning Xinjiang imports tied to forced labor.
How this was scoredPivotal
Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
Forced and child labor mostly enters the world economy through corporate sourcing decisions: which suppliers a company uses, whether it audits and pays them, and whether it keeps buying from regions and factories where coercion is documented. When companies actually change sourcing and monitoring, forced labor in that chain falls sharply, making corporate conduct close to sufficient on its own within a given supply chain even though other actors also matter.
Reporting alleges that Nike, Coca-Cola and Apple lobbied on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, an allegation each company denies; the law passed in strengthened form in 2021, so corporate political activity slowed rather than blocked it.
3 and 1, higher of the two, gives Pivotal
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
- USA: Apple, Nike and Coca-Cola among companies reportedly lobbying Congress to weaken Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Bill, Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, 2020-12
- Corporate Actions to Address Child Labor in Cocoa Production: Case Study - The Hershey Company, Investor Advocates for Social Justice, 2019
- 95.28%! Wendy's shareholders overwhelmingly vote for social responsibility, human rights transparency resolution, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, 2021-05-20
- Wendy's, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, 2026
- Forced Labor in China: Where Pro-ESG and Anti-ESG Groups Meet, Morningstar, 2022
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Filed the 2017 shareholder resolution on ethical recruitment and forced-labor risk in Hershey's cocoa supply chain, later withdrawn after Hershey committed to publish a human rights policy.
Chocolate and child labor a hurdle for Hershey, Fortune, 2012-11-16
Led the campaign, including rallies and a national boycott, pressing Wendy's to join the Fair Food Program for farmworker protections.
Filed the 2021 shareholder proposal asking Wendy's to document how it protects supply-chain workers' human rights; it passed with 95.28% support.
Filed a 2022/2023 shareholder proposal asking Apple to report on forced-labor policies and supplier violations; it received 33.7% support.
Apple, Inc.; Rule 14a-8 no-action letter, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, 2022-12-28
Publishes benchmarks ranking apparel, ICT and food and beverage companies on their efforts to address forced labor in supply chains, used by investors to press companies for improvement.
4 campaigns on record
Report on Apple's forced-labor prevention policies and on any supplier violations found in its supply chain audits.
Result: Received 33.7% support; failed to pass.
we found no documented policy change tied to this specific vote in the sources reviewed.
Forced Labor in China: Where Pro-ESG and Anti-ESG Groups Meet, Morningstar
Conduct a human rights impact assessment of Nike's cotton-sourcing practices throughout its supply chain, given allegations of Uyghur forced labor in Xinjiang cotton production.
Result: the proposal failed on an overall basis.
we found no documented change in Nike's China/Xinjiang cotton sourcing as a result of this vote.
Forced Labor in China: Where Pro-ESG and Anti-ESG Groups Meet, Morningstar
Report on evidence of how Wendy's protects the human rights of workers in its food supply chain, including from COVID-19 risk, in the context of calls to join the Fair Food Program.
With Investor Advocates for Social Justice (spearheaded effort), ICCR, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, a coalition of six U.S. state treasurers, over 100 investors representing $1 trillion in assets
Result: Passed with 95.28% support at the May 18, 2021 annual meeting; Wendy's management reversed its earlier opposition and ultimately supported the resolution.
Wendy's committed to issue a report, but as of 2026 the company had still not joined the Fair Food Program; we found no documented change in its supply-chain sourcing practices.
Adopt a human rights policy addressing ethical recruitment, forced labor and child labor risk in the cocoa supply chain.
With Tri-State Coalition for Responsible Investment
Result: Withdrawn after Hershey agreed to develop a comprehensive human rights policy.
Hershey published a Human Rights Policy in April 2019 addressing child labor, forced labor and other salient human rights impacts in cocoa production.
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.