Target 16.1: Reduce all forms of violence
Significantly reduce all forms of violence and related death rates everywhere
Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
Why shareholder democracy is helpful
Corporate conduct matters at the margin through firearm manufacturers and retailers, via product design and distribution, and through defense contractors whose exports reach conflict zones. Most violence reduction depends on policing, justice systems and social policy. Shareholder voting has a record here. A majority of Sturm Ruger shareholders backed a gun-safety report in 2018, and a 2022 proposal asking Ruger to study the lethality of its products in a human rights impact report also passed. Human rights due diligence proposals at Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman drew 32.2 percent and 22.3 percent support in 2021. Gun-industry and defense lobbying contributes to weak regulation, but it is not the single blocking obstacle. Owners therefore help at the margin, and the lever is helpful rather than necessary.
How this was scoredHelpful
Helpful. Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
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
- Majority support for shareholder proposal at Sturm Ruger shows growing investor concern with gun violence, Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, 2018-05-09
- Episcopal Church part of successful shareholder vote pressing Ruger to study its guns' lethality, Episcopal News Service, 2022-06-01
- Shareholder Support Building for Human Rights Proposals at Defense Companies, Investor Advocates for Social Justice, 2021
4 campaigns on record
Carry out a human rights impact assessment identifying the harm the company's operations and products do to people, including the lethality of what it sells.
With Mercy Investment Services, Northwest Coalition for Responsible Investment
Result: Voted at the annual meeting on June 1, 2022 and passed. InDepthNH reports holders of 7,840,251 shares in favor, about 68.5 percent of the vote, citing a filing made with the Securities and Exchange Commission. A later notice of exempt solicitation gives the figure as 68 percent. ICCR's own account, published on the day, said the exact figure was not yet known.
Ruger did not carry out the assessment. The investors who filed reported in 2023 that the company had refused to implement the proposal and that its proxy statement showed it had no intention of completing the report.
Publish the results of assessments examining the actual and potential harm to people's rights connected with the company's high risk products and services.
With School Sisters of Notre Dame Cooperative Investment Fund, Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia, Sisters of St. Dominic of Caldwell
Result: Voted at the annual meeting on May 19, 2021. Investor Advocates for Social Justice reports 22.3 percent support; ICAN gives the figure as 22 percent.
We found no documented change.
Report on how the company identifies, assesses, prevents, reduces and puts right the harm its products and operations do to people's rights.
With School Sisters of Notre Dame Cooperative Investment Fund, Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia, Sisters of St. Dominic of Caldwell
Result: Voted at the annual meeting on April 22, 2021. Investor Advocates for Social Justice reports 32.2 percent support; ICAN gives the figure as 32 percent.
We found no documented change.
Report on what the company is doing, if anything, to promote gun safety, including how it tracks violence involving its products and what the reputational and financial risks are.
With Sisters of the Holy Names
Result: Voted at the annual meeting on May 9, 2018 and passed. ICCR reported only that a majority of shareholders supported it and gave no figure. A notice of exempt solicitation filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission the following year states that 68.8 percent of shares voted supported the measure.
Ruger produced the report for shareholders in February 2019. The chief executive said publicly that the proposal required a report and nothing more, and that it could not force the company to change its business. Investors who reviewed the report said the company rejected safety features such as smart gun technology, said it could not monitor how its products are distributed, and closed off further discussion.
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 UN Sustainable Development Goals's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.