Briefly: CSR and the Arms Industry

Corpobligation: In an age of Blackwater and Haliburton, CSR may discourage the worst abuses of the military industrial complex

• Professor Michael Hopkins outlines the links between industry and military leaders and groups in the US and many other countries
• CSR may play a role in reducing environmental or other abuses - or at least set a standard to which contractors can be held

• BAE states in its CR report that ‘Human nature creates conflict, not the defence industry.’ ,,,

• Can green bullets or strict rules of procurement and contracting make military suppliers socially and environmentally responsible?
  

The whole quote:

 

There are some promising signs. For instance, the 2006 Corporate Responsibility Report of BAE Systems, part, as they state “..of the everyday management of a responsible business”. Or is it a cynical strategy to gloss over the very unpleasant aspects of their trade? Certainly BAEs 2006 report is a very professionally produced document that covers all the issues that a CSR report might be expected to contain.

But, following Charlton Heston, President of the National Rifle Association at the time of Michael Moore’s brilliant documentary ‘Bowling for Columbine’, BAE seems to have a similar position to Heston who believes it is people that kill people not guns! BAE states in its CR report that ‘Human nature creates conflict, not the defence industry.’ There is not much doubt that the easy availability of guns in the USA leads to more injuries and deaths than in countries where arms are better controlled - fifty people were killed in 2005-06 by guns in the UK, compared with the US figure for 2004 of 10,654   i.e. 200 times as many in a population only five times a large!. A similar conjecture applied to the arms trade would mean no arms less conflict!

 

Military Procurement is a complex area: fraught with conflicting interests (cost, patriotism, departmental and intra-military disputes). CSR would at the minimum suggest some degree of transparency and clear explanations for the request for tenders and choices made by governments.

More info: There are industry groups that set minimum standards for private military contractors standards and suppliers in Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States (link to procurement process links)

See the original speech about the Military Industrial Complex by President (General) Eisenhower ,

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