Nike Sweatshop Essay

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Since the mid 1990’s Nike has been learning the hard way what it means to be ethical. In the aftermath of the sweatshop scandal Nike is still hard at work to improve its image and be a company that is ethically responsible. Nike learned the hard way that it should have been more responsible about its production. Its motives as a company were egotistical when they should have been more considerate of the people working there. Though there could be arguments that Nike’s actions improved the lives of its poorly treated workers because no matter the conditions, it provided jobs that otherwise would not have existed, this is hardly the case. However, since this scandal in an attempt to improve its image, Nike has worked hard to improve, not only redeeming itself but becoming an industry leader in ethics. In the mid 1990’s Nike started facing criticism after several articles were released showing the poor labor conditions of its workers in sweatshops in places like China, Japan, and other Asian countries. As early as 1993 reports started being released about the poor working conditions. One such report was a CBS exposé by Roberta Baskin describing the working conditions of the Indonesian women working in the factories, explaining that they were making only $1.30 a day. During the report she criticized Nike and its factories saying things like “To them, ‘Just Do It’ isn’t just a catchy ad slogan” (Baskin). Throughout the mid 1990’s many reports like this followed including two 1996 articles by Life Magazine and the New York Times, each of which also criticized Nike for its sweatshops. Following this exposure, Nike faced severe criticism from labor rights activists about the poor treatment of its workers. After this poor exposure Nike worked to clean up its image. What started out as marketing effort to clean up with image ended up transforming the company into an

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