Advertising, Entertainment & Media

Corporate social responsibility, once a do-gooding sideshow, is now seen as mainstream. But as yet too few companies are doing it well, says Daniel Franklin (interviewed here) Read More

A 2006 report by the Child Welfare Committee found that 12 of 22 children from a village in the impoverished eastern state of Bihar were re-trafficked, mostly to different states, within a year after being rescued from a Delhi hand-embroidery sweatshop. Read More

Toy makers are investigating whether they need to treat their tainted products with stabilization chemicals or if they must seal the toys in giant polyethylene bags. Read More

The Forest Stewardship Council -- a widely recognized third-party labeling system to identify "green" wood and paper products -- has acknowledged that some companies using its label are destroying pristine forests and says it plans to overhaul its rules. Read More

You've heard of golf junkets for politicians and pay-offs for disc jockeys who help get artists into the Top 40. But government bureaucrats invited to play Grateful Dead-style music and rock music covers from the Clash with military contractors looking Read More

A supplier and two employees of the furniture giant Ikea have admitted to using bribes in purchasing deals. Read More

A California consumer group said Wednesday it has filed a legal action against Toys R Us and Babies R Us for selling vinyl baby bibs said to contain high levels of lead. Read More

In the next few days Pope Benedict plans to issue his second encyclical - the most authoritative statement a pope can issue - which apparently will focus on social and economic inequity in a globalized economy. In the statement, he is expected to denounce the use of tax havens as socially-unjust and immoral in cheating the greater well-being of society. Read More

Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products' surfaces are covered in lead paint. According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer in China. Read More

In the wake of the multiple scandals over tainted Chinese food and drug exports in recent months, Chinese goods now have an indelible image of being not just cheap, but life-threatening as well. But the fact that wrongly labelled foods, liquor and pharmaceuticals have routinely sickened and even killed people en masse in China has been largely overlooked. Read More