Interview
with ELLIS JONES
Since receiving his doctoral degree in
sociology from the University of Colorado, Boulder, Ellis Jones has focused all
of his energies on bridging the gap between academics, activists, and the
average citizen. A scholar of social responsibility, global citizenshi,p and
everyday activism, Dr. Jones continues to teach and give presentations across
the country on how to turn lofty ideals into practical actions.
How was THE
BETTER WORLD SHOPPING GUIDE born?
Originally,
in graduate school, I got together with a couple of my colleagues and, instead
of working on our dissertations, we started working on a better world handbook.
We wanted this to be a comprehensive resource about “What can I do to make a
difference in the world?” for individuals to act on a wide range of issues and use
in their every day lives. Two of the pages in that four hundred page book were
dedicated to rating corporations when you go shopping. “Which ice cream do you
buy when you want to shop more ethically?” etc. Those two pages got more
feedback from readers than any of the others, so I decided this mini handbook
might be worth pursuing. When the first edition came out I started creating a
larger database to get at this question of who are the good guys and the bad
guys and how can we make the world a better place. I took publically available
data and pulled it together and tried to translate it into A to F grades.
Why did you
decide to use a grade system for evaluating products and companies? What are
some of the advantages and disadvantages of the grade system?
I
decided to use a grade system because I’m a professor and I’ve been an educator
for so long that I think of everything in terms of grades. It’s a nice
intuitive system that everyone knows: a C is mediocre and a F is terrible I was
tired of seeing these complicated systems out there that didn’t make a lot of
sense to me. When somebody hears B or D they have a sense of what that means. I
needed something that could give consumers a very quick idea of what they’re
looking for. I also envisioned it as a color scale, which only worked out the
website. Now the disadvantages are that there are only 13 slots when you go
from A+ to F and some companies literally would get a J, but nobody knows what
that means. The grade system does limit it somewhat, but I think it’s worth
that limitation because consumers need something quick and thoughtful and
practical.
What does the
website offer that the book doesn’t?
The
website offers connections to my other work. It also offers the ability to
access five or six industries to see the raw data, like chocolate. Readers can
click and look at the actual data points that made a B company a B company or D
company a D company. They also get the visual, the color.
Part
of why I created the shopping app was so that the website can always be in your
pocket, right there all the time. I can’t keep all this information in my head.
I made the book pocket size on purpose so people are more likely to carry it
around. Even then I find myself without the guide often enough that it’s nice
to have the app.
Do you suggest
readers do their own research into companies in addition to using THE BETTER
WORLD SHOPPING GUIDE?
I
want them to double-check my work for sure. I want to encourage people to go
out and dig in on their own, but (and this is a big but) I’ve always been
frustrated when I hear other people suggest it’s important to be an ethical
shopper like “Oh, just go do your homework.” I have a PhD and this is my area
of research and this is difficult, time consuming work. I can’t imagine trying
to navigate this as the average consumer. The idea of “Oh, just go do your
homework.” makes me wonder “Why is this all on the shoulders of consumers?” This
information should all be provided. There’s no way that consumers can do enough
research or enough homework to wrap their heads around this particular
challenge. This is massive. This is not some kind of clean slate that we’re
working off where we don’t know anything, we come in and do homework, and get
some information. Some big companies have huge budgets to create images that
are a combination of fact and fiction to persuade consumers that they’re more
ethical than they are. Consumers are bombarded with information that points
them in a thousand different directions. When people make it sound like “Oh,
just go do your homework” like this is doing a crossword puzzle and you’re
done, that’s wrong. I want to say, “Yes, always do your homework, always follow
up with your own research.” In the book I provide a list of 50 websites for researching,
but the idea that a consumer could - even with something as simple as Coke
versus Pepsi - that they could go home and Google that on their own and then
have a firm understanding after a few hours is ludicrous. It’s very daunting. I
feel a lot of sympathy for the average person and that’s part of why I’m as dedicated
to this work as I am. I think we should have this homework done for us and we
should go into shopping already wielding these tools.
In the BETTER
WORLD SHOPPING GUIDE, there’s a list of the top 10 things for shoppers to
change to have the most positive impact. Bank is number 1. Why is which bank we
choose so important?
If
you go back to the original edition, that list hasn’t really changed. Bank as
always been number 1. When I did my original investigation into this research,
the financial institution is the one I found most obscure, most cloaked in
secrecy. Most major banks are graded between C and F. They’re institutions that
aren’t very accountable or transparent and often can’t answer fairly simple
questions about where the money is invested. When you don’t have accountability
it creates a space for very irresponsible behavior. There’s this incredible
correlation between the most socially and environmentally irresponsible banks
and those that receive the most bailout money. This is the ultimate
illustration about why we need to be responsible as consumers, because if we
don’t hold these institutions accountable they will come back and bite us.
Recently, I heard that since the bailouts have happened the system has not changed significantly and that if this crisis were to happen again we would do the exact same thing. The banks know we will bail them out, because we don’t have a lot of choices. When you have a bank, that bank basically has access to your dollars and they may look like they’re sitting in your account, but they’re actually being invested all around the world; while you’re eating and sleeping, that money is going out to change the world. If the money is being used for some problematic activity, that’s your money that’s causing havoc in the world. If you invest in a responsible bank, that money’s being used to make the world a better place. It doesn’t get more black and white than that. We’re constantly earning money and spending it and the bank is just the place we hold it. It is a pain to change your bank, but if you do it once you more or less don’t have to think about it afterwards and now that money’s being used for better. Those ripple effects will take place for the rest of your life.
Recently, I heard that since the bailouts have happened the system has not changed significantly and that if this crisis were to happen again we would do the exact same thing. The banks know we will bail them out, because we don’t have a lot of choices. When you have a bank, that bank basically has access to your dollars and they may look like they’re sitting in your account, but they’re actually being invested all around the world; while you’re eating and sleeping, that money is going out to change the world. If the money is being used for some problematic activity, that’s your money that’s causing havoc in the world. If you invest in a responsible bank, that money’s being used to make the world a better place. It doesn’t get more black and white than that. We’re constantly earning money and spending it and the bank is just the place we hold it. It is a pain to change your bank, but if you do it once you more or less don’t have to think about it afterwards and now that money’s being used for better. Those ripple effects will take place for the rest of your life.
It’s not like
readers can research their shopping habits once and understand their buying
choices for life. Ethical companies can slip and unethical ones sometimes
change their ways. How do you suggest shoppers keep up with a constantly
shifting market?
In
this latest edition I have put a couple of charts up: the biggest
disappointments and the biggest success stories, so people get a sense that
change is taking place. Those are all the most extreme examples, though. For
the most part, companies are very slow to move from one grade to another,
particularly with the large companies. These are enormous global operations. If
you hear of a company that you thought was not that good and suddenly there are
new stories that say it’s doing very well (or vice versa), you should be
skeptical. It’s not that the news stories aren’t true, but they are also very
susceptible to a combination of things, particularly the need to sell papers.
It sets up a system in which stories that are surprising and unexpected are
much more likely to show up in the news, which in turn creates an environment
in which consumers are confused.
For
the most part, companies shift very slowly. That’s why I put out this guide
every couple of years. I could put it out every year, but I don’t think it’s
that necessary. Companies don’t change that quickly. They promise to change quickly,
but they don’t. It’s important to keep up on these things, but they aren’t
things that change day to day. The only thing that does change quickly is
ownership. One day a company will be it’s own company and the next day it
merges with another and we have to ask, “What does that mean?” Even with
mergers, though, company behavior doesn’t flip overnight. It still takes a while
for mergers to affect company behavior.
I read an
article once that suggested people don’t change their habits even when they
learn indisputable proof about a company’s human rights or environmental
transgressions, because to make a positive change shoppers first must accept
the guilt that they’ve been, by extension, supporting such practices by
shopping there. The article went on to advise: Don’t feel guilty for, in the
past, supporting a business with unethical practices of which you were unaware,
but do feel guilty if you continue shopping there even after learning this new
information. What are your thoughts on this?
I
don’t agree with the advice, but I agree with the study. Everything I see shows
that if people find out about a company, they won’t necessarily switch to a
better company or boycott the bad company. It’s not that people are lazy, but
that people are complicated. Consumers never buy based on a single factor.
They’re always trying to balance a number of factors. They’re trying to
consider price and quality and a wide range of other things such as taste and
their needs. Socially responsible shopping or ethical consumption is just one
other factor strung into the equation. In some ways these studies are far too
primitive. It’s too simplistic. People might not buy from a good company, because
the products are too expensive or they’re still not convinced a company is
really as bad as they hear or they don’t know how it relates to companies in
the same category.
To
be honest, I don’t thin people should feel guilty. It brings up cognitive
dissonance. If we realize we haven’t been the best father or daughter or
partner or shopper, suddenly we have to struggle with that and we don’t like to
do that. I don’t think it’s about guilt or that it’s black and white. Here’s
what I do and recommend: I recommend people think about improving their overall
ethical profile. I like to call it your shopping GPA. If you take all the items
you bought in a particular year and average the grades, what would your grade
be? You’re not going to go from a C student for the last x number of years to
an A student tomorrow. It doesn’t work that way. You work your way up. If
you’re a C student, you challenge yourself to be a B student. My goal is to be
a B+ shopper and I don’t think I make that goal all the time. I don’t think we
should be unrealistic here. No one is an A shopper. So it’s not about being
perfect; it’s about being better. For me that’s not as much about grappling
with guilt as thinking about trying to do more good in the world. Sometimes the
option is between a C and an F company and you buy a C. Or sometimes you’re in
a Walmart with your family, because your family loves Walmart and even within
Walmart there’s a spectrum of better or worse products. It’s still not optimal,
but we try to make the best choice available. We take in account our budget, tastes and needs, and our
ethical stance. It’s about putting those things together and coming up with the
best choices available.
Another common
excuse I hear for lack of effort is the “I’m only one person. My choices don’t
affect the big picture.” argument. What’s your response to individuals who
believe their positive or negative choices are too small to make any difference
either way?
This
is a really important question. My undergraduate degree is in International Relations,
which is a trumped-up political science degree and I bring that to the table
when I think about ethical consumption. In the political sphere, we have
something called democracy that we’re very proud of. When the rubber meets the
road, you have to answer a particular contradiction: every two or four years
you go to the ballot box and realize that one person’s vote is probably note
going to swing the election. Statistically speaking, any one individual’s vote
does not count. So as individual, rationally, you shouldn’t vote, and yet every
vote is essential. When you have 50 % turnout instead of 80 (which is what you
typically have in a presidential election - 50%), we are a weaker country for
it. An 80% vote represents more of the population. The same goes for shopping.
When you buy a Snickers bar or a Coca Cola one day, it doesn’t seem to make
much difference, but you’re multiplying your choices across your life and
spreading them to more people. This is the largest economy in the world and two
thirds of it is run by whether you buy the orange t-shirt or the blue t-shirt.
Of
course, one person won’t make the difference. That’s the whole point. We live
in a political democracy in which every vote counts and that’s the same with
our economic system. Every single dollar is another vote. If you drop out and
say it doesn’t mater that’s like randomly voting on your ballot. Your choices
are multiplied and mimicked by millions of other people and that changes the
whole system. Every dollar pulled away from a company doing the irresponsible
thing and pushed towards a company doing the responsible thing empowers change
in that system. This isn’t a fringe ten people doing this. Millions of people
are doing this and corporations are responding to it.
One concern with
this book is that it’s so chock full of condensed information (which, granted,
is also a tremendous strength) that shoppers might feel discouraged. What would
you say to someone who sees how many D or F products they regularly purchase or
how many changes they want to make and feels overwhelmed?
I
would say use that top ten things to change list. Go down one by one. Start
changing one thing at a time. Then move up with your grades. Start by trying to
see if you can avoid the Fs. Move up the D products and then to C products. See
if you can find B or A products that fit your budget.
I
remember when I was a poor college student I couldn’t afford these more ethical
products that were more expensive. I started with fair trade bananas. That’s where
it started. Now that I have more resources and shop for a whole family, I can
do more. The other thing to keep in mind is that you aren’t taking a monastic
vow. One of my favorite products, Pringles, are made by Procter & Gamble.
Once a year I would go out and get a can of Pringles, because I enjoyed them. I
put it in a reasonable context.
Have you already
started working on another BETTER WORLD SHOPPING GUIDE?
I
never stop working on these better world shopping guides. I’m constantly
integrating new data and updating old data and creating new categories and
responding to readers and doing presentations. One of the things that I have
been toying with - and I’m not sure how long this will take me to get out there
and it may take a number of years so I don’t want to jump the gun - but I’ve
been thinking about this question of giving consumers more access to direct
data. They could look up a company like Coca Cola and just see what Coca Cola
has been doing. They could look up a company and just see for themselves, like
a dictionary of companies.
I
want to keep the book concise and small, but this might be nice for people who
have more questions about some of the top companies out there: what they’re
doing right and what they’re not. So consumers can see the raw data and get a
sense themselves for what’s happening behind the scenes. So that might be
coming out in the next 2-5 years.
Any parting
advice you want to give anyone trying their best to shop ethically and
consciously?