From Opacity to Transparency

Abstract

This chapter studies specific ways in which opacity can be reduced — through the use of niche institutions, by stimulating the internalization goals of private regulation, and through fostering a critical mindset. It draws attention to the varieties of transparency required and specifically to the integration and inclusion of workers in private regulation programs to stimulate internalization of goals, especially through worker participation in compliance auditing and through methods such as surveys by which workers' perspectives are heard. The chapter then highlights the need for more data sharing, data analysis, and predictive modeling and concludes with specific recommendations for the variety of actors in private regulation to move the institutional field from opacity to transparency. Only through data analysis can we generate the predictive models that allow for evidence-based decision making and identification of other means by which the coupling of private regulation programs with worker outcomes can be increased. Ultimately, workers and trade unions, in what has been called contingent coupling, can help “shrink the gap between practices and outcomes” for workers by leveraging the private regulation policies of brands.