Pressure Rises on Corporate Sponsors

April 28, 2008— -- The pressure on Olympic corporate sponsors is heating up as the torch relay for the games this week returns to Chinese soil for the first time.

Over the weekend under clear skies in Atlanta and New York, activists hit the sidewalks to protest Coca-Cola's sponsorship of the Beijing Olympics. Organized by high school and college students affiliated with Stand (A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition) and Dream for Darfur, teenagers and adults chanted slogans like, "Hey, China, you can't hide, help us end this genocide." (China provides economic and military support to Sudan.)

Saturday's rally in downtown Atlanta, in front of the New World of Coca-Cola museum, brought out 30 to 50 activists. Sunday's New York City rally, on 5th Avenue, saw some 75 protestors, many students (and their parents) from New Jersey's Millburn High School. Claire Arkin, a senior at Millburn and one of the rally's principal organizers, tried to engage the corporate sponsor by speaking to the crowd of the world's complicity in the Darfur genocide, quoting the British philosopher Edmund Burke: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

And on the Boston Commons, under cold, drizzling skies, close to 100 student activists turned out — linking arms, chanting, listening to speakers that included refugees from Sudan and a Massachusetts state senator — to protest Staples' support of the Beijing Olympics.

For weeks the Olympic torch's relay, which began in Athens last month, has been marked by demonstrations, last-minute re-routings and heavy police presence along the route. This weekend's demonstrations come as lines in the sand are being drawn.

On the one hand are human rights groups urging corporate sponsors to speak out publicly against China's human rights record, its suppression of the media, its economic and military support of Sudan, or its violent crackdown on Tibetan protestors.

On the other are sponsors claiming that speaking out against a sovereign government is not their role, that such protests are not in keeping with the unifying spirit of the Olympics.

Coca-Cola CEO Neville Isdell wrote a commentary in the Financial Times, published on April 18, which noted Coca-Cola's commitment of "at least $5 million to programs that address water needs in Darfur and elsewhere in Sudan" and asked "those groups and individuals to find a way to use the openness of the Olympics in a positive way, rather than to attack and undermine one of the world's last remaining unifying events."

In his commentary, Isdell criticized the tactics (without naming it by name) of Dream for Darfur, an organization which last week issued the second of its "report cards," grading 19 Olympic sponsors. In "The Big Chill: Too Scared to Speak, Olympic Sponsors Still Silent on Darfur," Dream for Darfur graded most sponsors with a D and an F.

Coca-Cola received a D, Staples an F. (For this article, Staples did not return numerous phone calls to their corporate headquarters made on Friday; Coca-Cola has in the past said through a spokesman, "We don't involve ourselves in the political decisions of sovereign nations.")

Kodak and Adidas, which manufactures close to half its shoes in China and is providing footwear to the Chinese Olympics team, each received a B+ for writing to the United Nations and allowing those letters to be made public. Neither criticized China directly and, it could be argued, in essence let China off the hook. McDonald's, which plans to open 125 restaurants in China this year, the report stated, "received a C+ for taking a private action, of which it showed evidence to our campaign."

In a press conference last Thursday, Mia Farrow, who's been to the Sudan and eastern Chad region eight times and who helped popularize the term "genocide Olympics," said it was "disheartening" that the sponsors "in their silence are complicit in the Darfur genocide."

Ellen Freudenheim, a director of corporate outreach for Dream, who spoke at yesterday's rally in New York, said, in answer to a question from ABCNews.com, "I know it's crass to say, but if there were 1.3 billion middle-class consumers in Darfur, I don't think these companies would be silent."

The ultimate effect of all these protests — of which more are planned by not only Dream for Darfur and Stand, but groups such as Students for a Free Tibet and Reporters Without Borders — remains to be seen.

David D'Alessandro, the former CEO of John Hancock Financial Services, who scaled back his company's sponsorship of the 2002 winter Olympics in Salt Lake City amid allegations of bribery by the IOC, cautions against applying "the Western protest culture" to China.

Chinese eyes, he told ABCNews.com, are already "open to how the rest of the world views their practices. My own view is, the protestors will cause enough attention that the Chinese will pay attention and may even open up talks with Tibet and other world leaders." (At the end of last week, China did agree to meet with envoys of the Dalai Lama, although how substantive those talks will prove remains an open question.)

"I think it's terrific that people feel they can protest on these subjects," continued D'Alessandro. But against the backdrop of China's violent crackdown on Tibet, its total lack of experience in public relations Western style, the protestors may be walking a fine line.

"The more violent, radical things become, the less the Chinese are going to be able to react," said D'Alessandro. "I think [the protestors] can overplay their hand and make the Chinese distrust the West even more than they do now."

Next up on the protest front are actions against other corporate sponsors, including Visa, General Electric and McDonalds, as well as protests planned against the torch when it enters Hong Kong this Friday.