Even after IPE started publishing the maps, however, enforcement continued to lag. So Ma Jun looked for ways to leverage the power of the consumer. In developed countries, companies tended to respond quickly to petitions, boycotts, name-and-shame campaigns and embarrassing press coverage. But most of the thousands of companies “blacklisted” by IPE were Chinese; only a few dozen were subsidiaries of foreign companies. Chinese companies were unaccustomed to bowing to, or even responding to, public pressure. They did not have PR machines promoting their corporate responsibility plans, or marketing executives (or lawyers) laser-focused on brand protection. Most were not household names. They were unlikely to feel the heat of angry consumers.

Ma saw a chink in the armor, however. While the companies in IPE’s database were domestic, many supplied brand-conscious multinational corporations (MNCs). China was, after all, the workshop of the world, where MNCs went for inexpensive labor, lax regulation and the hope of breaking into a market of over a billion people. In effect, Ma reasoned, MNCs were in violation of China’s environmental rules, albeit indirectly through their supply chains. This suggested to Ma one way the database could be leveraged to motivate action. People could look up international brands on IPE’s website and find out which ones had offending Chinese suppliers. The interactive map would show exactly how the suppliers were operating. The connection between foreign companies and pollution in China would be made explicit. This would be of interest to consumers and media globally.

IPE staff researched companies that had received citations to find out which MNCs they supplied. Matthew Collins, a British researcher who joined IPE in 2010, explains the process:

This is looking at public data, so usually desktop research. Sometimes these companies are very proud of the fact that they supply to a big company, so they’ll advertise it on their website [or on] other kinds of websites, like recruitment websites. They often advertise that you’ll be working with these brands if you work for this company. So there’s various different sources you can see. Obviously, it’s not 100 percent sure that this company does supply to this brand, but we have a fair idea. ^[13]

Green supply chain . The next step was to get the MNCs to acknowledge and take responsibility for supplier violations. Over the course of 2007, IPE teamed up with 21 environmental NGOs around China and formed the Green Choice Alliance (the group would grow to 50 by 2013). In August 2008, the Alliance launched a two-pronged offensive: MNCs were urged to green their supply chains, and consumers were urged to use their buying power to pressure them to do so. ^[14] The Alliance sent each of the targeted MNCs a letter introducing its mission to reduce pollution in China. The letter informed the company that manufacturers in China had been cited for exceeding discharge limits, and gave links to the supervision records maintained in IPE’s database. The letter also contained evidence that one or more of these violators was part of the MNC’s own supply chain. The letter then requested a response to a series of questions:

1. Are the above enterprises your company’s suppliers?

2. If the enterprises are your suppliers, have you been aware of their environmental violation records?

3. If you have been aware of their violations, what measures have you taken to remedy them? If you have not been aware of the violations, then, after receiving this letter what kind of measures or action will you prepare to take?

4. Do you have any other suppliers that have problems with environmental compliance?

5. Do you have environmental standards for your suppliers? Have you established an environmental management system for your supply chain? ^[15]

The Alliance aimed to be collaborative rather than combative. The MNCs (and their suppliers) were provided space on the IPE website to respond to their “blacklist” status. Some made statements about plans for improving environmental performance. They could also post supporting documents (e.g., newly obtained permits or follow-up monitoring data). If a company wanted to be removed from the list after implementing new procedures or controls, it had to agree to a third-party audit, conducted under the supervision of IPE, often with a local NGO in attendance. Each action, from responding to the initial letter, to developing and implementing a strategy for greening its supply chain, to submitting to an independent audit, to pushing its suppliers to be audited, was checked off in the database.

Companies were not always pleased to hear from IPE and its partners. Collins, who handled communication with the foreign companies, says his Chinese colleagues often had a tougher job. “Sometimes [the Chinese suppliers] can be quite angry when they call you up, and say ‘Where did you get this information? ‘and ‘How dare you contact one of my customers and tell them about this?’” The researchers had a simple answer, however:  the information was publicly available online.

Unfortunately for IPE, the citation records did not always stay public. EBPs routinely discarded or overwrote files. Some were persuaded to erase records if a company argued it had been unfairly treated, or if it had subsequently remediated its emissions problem. With public records gone, some of IPE’s blacklisted companies were emboldened to deny they had ever been officially cited and insisted that IPE de-list them. In other cases, managers simply did not know, or wish to believe, their company had received environmental citations, and demanded to see the evidence.

Quick learners, Ma and his colleagues started to take and preserve screenshots of citation records as they appeared on official websites. This proved critical to IPE’s ongoing ability to handle disputes with blacklisted suppliers. According to Ma:

Quite a few of them start with questioning the data. So if we don’t have those records, then we could be in trouble. In quite a few cases, they simply don’t know—senior management doesn’t know. They approach us and many of them feel they have been wronged. And so, what they want is the proof, the evidence that they do have problems.

Gradually, more MNCs targeted by the Alliance took the requested actions. They could no longer refuse to identify their suppliers, nor claim ignorance about their suppliers’ records; the information was available for all to see on IPE’s website. Public access to the site also meant that it was important for the companies to take—and be seen to take—corrective action. Consumers and media around the world were watching. The clear steps laid out by the Alliance, and the database of citation records, made it relatively easy for companies to take measures. New records were continually added, and foreign companies that had not been targeted began approaching IPE proactively, to find out how to source responsibly in China. (They were advised to use the IPE database to check whether a potential supplier had received citations.)