00-07-07,

Catholic Activists to live on Nike sweatshop wage in Indonesia

Jim Keady (Belmar, NJ), is a former assistant soccer coach from St. John's University. While coaching, Jim was also doing a research paper on Nike's labor practices for his MA in theology. Citing their use of sweatshop labor, Jim began to publicly protest the university's relationship with Nike. He also refused to wear the equipment that Nike provided the University. On May 12, 1998 Jim was given an ultimatum by university officials, "Wear Nike and drop this issue publicly or resign." Jim was forced to resign.

In May of 1999 Jim Keady offered to work for six months in a Nike shoe factory in Southeast Asia to dispel the myth that "these are good jobs for those people." Brad Figel of Nike's Labor Practices Department responded, "We are not interested in your offer." So Keady and project assistant Leslie Kretzu*, will do the next best thing.

Press for Change's "Olympic Living Wage Project," done in collaboration with the Nicaraguan Solidarity Committee and NikeWatch, will focus on the daily lives of Nike's Indonesian shoe factory workers. The two project participants, Jim Keady and Leslie Kretzu will adopt the lifestyle, diet, customs and culture of the factory workers and live on their prevailing wages over approximately a two-month period. They will document their experiences in the following ways: an online diary of their daily routine to run during the project; a documentary film; a book of their experiences; a press conference in Sydney, Australia; and a 10 week U.S. speaking tour.

This project will set a precedent for how modern media communications are used, particularly the Internet, to educate people about sweatshop labor. The project organizers hope that this project will encourage others to use these mediums in creative ways to bring those in the "first world" into a human relationship with those in the developing world. Finally they want this project to add to the ongoing dialogue on the ethical issues inherent to the daily operations of multinational corporations.

The project will be taking place during the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. This time frame was chosen to draw attention to the world class athletes who benefit most from Nike's exploitative labor practices. While these athletes play and receive lucrative endorsement contracts for doing so, the factory workers are forced to live and work in sub-human conditions.

* Leslie Kretzu (Philadelphia, PA), project assistant, has just returned from volunteering with the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India and Kathmandu, Nepal. She is deferring beginning her masters in theology program at Union Theological Seminary to take part in this project. Prior to her working for the California Medical Association in San Francisco, she did a year of service with the Jesuit Volunteer Corps in Anaheim, CA. She has been active in a number of campaigns for women's rights including the anti-sweatshop movement.

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