Special to Corpobligation - Chanda Tannis, BA, LLL 

    What are the roles of NGO's in Corporate Social Responsibility? This was a question and concern which was reflected during the Canadian Roundtables on CSR of extractive industries during 2007. It appeared that large and small corporations felt under 'attack' by NGOs and that corporations felt that NGOs were themselves not accountable. NGOs might for example, disseminate information to indigenous communities that made the company out to be worse than it really was. Consequently, the companies were not able to let the communities decide for themselves if the increased economic benefits outweighed possible downsides, such as environmental or cultural degradation, if that were to be the case in that specific community, that specific country, with that specific corporation. Does the fact that accountability is important beyond the "corporate" sphere mean that we should remove the "corporate" from CSR?

Corporation Obligation: CSR is ripe for satire - can it change behavior?

A few years ago, the Yes Men made a film that shook the halls of power...or at least the reputations of various media outlets and corporate reputations.

The Yes Men are set on "impersonating big-time criminals in order to publicly humiliate them." Some recent "hijinks" include a mock WTO Proposal for slavery in Africa and a Keynote address at a major Canadian oil company conference:

"We need something like whales, but infinitely more abundant," said "NPC rep" "Shepard Wolff" (actually Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men), before describing the technology used to render human flesh into a new Exxon oil product called Vivoleum. 3-D animations of the process brought it to life.

In the struggle for human rights and environmental justice, it is easy to lose track of the forest because of the horrifying trees that surround us, but a new website called Bright Future is pointing the lense back towards solutions.

I don't know if there is a good way of deciding whether someone is overly cynical or optimistic. I googled the word cynical and was brought to a handy-dandy quiz that allowed users to find out just how cynical they were. Of course, my cynical side noticed that there were loads of ads and the result of the quiz was designed to be posted on a blog that would then link back to the site....

How about quotes:

The average pencil is seven inches long, with just a half-inch eraser - in case you thought optimism was dead. Robert Brault

A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing.
Oscar Wilde

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to our society. The optimist invents the airplane and the pessimist the parachute. Gil Stern - All courtesy of Quote Garden

I think that the best approach to corpobligation is to be optimistic while retaining a healthy cynicism when viewing both corporate reports. This allows you to fight the good fight but avoid getting snowed by public relations information. It also helps sorting through the realistic solutions while still aiming for idealistic solutions to modern day problems like environmental crises or excess waste. Keep up the good fight as we struggle for a "Brighter Future". We welcome feedback about whether we are getting too cynical or optimistic.

Commentary: That age old question that has plagued the greatest philosophers, will finally be ruled upon: do chimpanzees have/deserve human rights? Well maybe not age old but at least an interesting question.

• This question has arisen in a surprising context: a bankruptcy case, where the parties refused to settle. If they had settled and permitted the chimpanzee to
• The case presents great opportunities for animal rights but being the cynical character I am, it also raises concerns about the nature of human rights.
• Namely, human rights are inherent in our being "human". They are not doled out to the deserving. Whether you are Hitler or Mother Theresa you have human rights. If a court decided that chimpanzees are "close enough" to being human, then the chimanzees are in a sense receiving a discretionary grant of rights. This means that another court could take away the rights.
  
• The case also raises the very problematic value calculation that places the rights and worth of cute animals above those of uncute humans. Just like the person carrying the gourmet pet food passes the homeless person without a feeling of guilt, the legal fees in a case like this is are in my humble "anthropocentric" opinion wasteful and ridiculous.
  
• For a different perspective see Release & Restitution for Chimanzees
• Oh yes, about the title of this article. The commentary around this article has once again raised the possibility of the "humanzee " although apparently research into this possibility would raise ethical issues .