MSI Integrity, in collaboration with the Duke Human Rights Center at the Kenan Institute for Ethics and with pro bono support from the law firm Miller & Chevalier, created the MSI Database, a searchable, online overview of the landscape of transnational, standard-setting MSIs. This resource originally included information on 45 MSIs (now 40) and maps key information about each initiative’s institutional design characteristics, such as whether an initiative has external complaint mechanisms or monitors members for compliance with its standards. The Database allows researchers, MSI practitioners, and the general public to explore these initiatives by using filters to highlight key institutional design characteristics of each MSI.

In 2020, MSI Integrity released a new report on MSIs, Not Fit-For-Purpose: The Grand Experiment of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives in Corporate Accountability, Human Rights, and Global Governance, which provides more recent data, current through June 2019, on the MSIs listed in the MSI Database. The MSI Database was not updated to reflect all of this new data; specifically, we updated the names, launch dates, and some mission statements of MSIs, and eliminated five MSIs from the original list of 45 for consistency with our final set of research into MSIs. For more information about these revisions, see our Project Methodology.

Beyond the revisions stated here, the MSI Database was not and will not be updated any further. MSI Integrity is shifting to a new and exciting research focus: looking beyond corporations to support the promotion of business models that center workers and communities in their ownership and governance.

If you wish to explore more recent data on the 40 MSIs in our MSI Database, explore our 2020 report, Not Fit-For-Purpose.

The original database was complemented by our report, “The New Regulators? Assessing the Landscape of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives,” which analyzes trends across standard-setting MSIs.

View the MSI Database website here.

Download “The New Regulators? Assessing the Landscape of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives,” here.

Download the project methodology here.