Bending a Company To Your Will

This article is slightly modified from “SHAC Attack!: Targeting Companies Animal Rights Style” published in Do or Die Issue 9. The original can be found online or on pages 102-111 of the paper edition. For more information on the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty Campaign, visit shac.net —Root Force

Why Is it Called “The SHAC Model”?  – or – What is SHAC?

In 1997, a Channel 4 television documentary exposed Cambridge-based animal experimentation laboratory Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS) for numerous horrific abuses of the animals it was testing on, as well as for various breaches of regulations. The government slapped its wrist and let it off.

Meanwhile, the animal rights movement in Britain had just won a fight to shut down the beagle breeder Consort. It was also in the middle of a vigorous campaign to shut down Hillgrove Farm, the last commercial breeder of cats for vivisection in the UK, and the campaign to shut Shamrock Farm, the largest importer of primates for vivisection in Europe, was just beginning.

After tough battles the Hillgrove Farm and Shamrock campaigns were ultimately successful. On a roll, it was decided by some campaigners to move on from simply closing down the animal supply chain, and step up to take on a major component of the vivisection industry – Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), a publicly listed company and the largest animal testing facility in Europe. Building on the momentum of the Channel 4 expose and the success of the Hillgrove victory, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) was formed in 1999 as a purely volunteer, grassroots campaign, with the express purpose of closing down HLS…

Bending a Company to Your Will

For years it has been common to treat companies as giant monoliths – single entities symbolized by their great glass headquarters in which you can only ever see your own reflection, but never what is really going on inside. This was intentional on their part, to make you feel small and impotent in the face of their impressive size, and to themselves appear well armored and invincible.

Corporations depended on keeping activists ignorant of how they really worked. But look a bit closer and you will find that their armor is really quite fragmented, and if you find the right set of cracks then you can bring even the mightiest company to its knees.

For a long time campaigns consisted of running at a company full tilt and attacking whatever came to hand. Unfortunately what often came to hand was precisely what the company wanted us to attack; those bits deliberately put in place to draw the attention of activists, while the real business continued unabated behind closed doors.

What some campaigns are now doing is the complete opposite. Before announcing a company as a target, careful research is carried out. A picture of the company is built up, copies of their annual reports obtained, lists of subsidiaries, offices, research and manufacturing sites drawn up. Its activities and their weaknesses are identified. The PR flunkies and the lower management being paid to take the heat are ignored. What matters are the real decision-makers; the people at the top and the people behind the scenes pulling the strings are the real targets.

As well as going for the main corporation itself, these campaigns have spent much of their effort taking out all the secondary companies that support the corporation, keeping it alive. Each such strut has become a campaign in its own right, and each time one collapses it causes the corporation to totter that bit closer to being pushed over the edge.

With the main corporation itself every single aspect of the company is being targeted, because there is the single goal of outright closure with no escape clause. However, the majority of secondary targets don’t require that sort of campaigning, as the aim is not to close them down but simply to break their links with the corporation. This requires a more focused approach, where the supporting company is analyzed and targeted at its weakest points.

Every company can be broken down into 5 main aspects:

Top people.

Ordinary workers.

Communications.

Offices.

Public presences.

Each of these requires a different strategy, but when hit on each front, it will leave the target reeling. Companies are not accustomed to dealing with campaigns working in this fashion, and indeed they are very hard to counter – especially if a variety of above ground campaigning and underground action takes place. Large companies are too spread-out to protect everywhere at once, while small companies give a nice focused target where vital bottlenecks are easily hammered.

The really powerful tool we have as activists is that they never know what we will do next, and that if we all act in a united cohesive way we can take out parts of their infrastructure that they cannot afford to lose. It basically boils down to three things:

Putting the fear of God into them.

Costing them financially.

Dragging their name through the dirt.

Don’t waste your time appealing to their better nature – it doesn’t exist among the people who really matter in a company. What you appeal to is how much money you are going to cost them, how you are going to destroy their morale and how they are never going to know when and where you will turn up next with a new, disruptive and embarrassing tactic they can do nothing about. Always changing tactics and hitting them at different points keeps them confused and disoriented so they cannot fight back properly.

It does no harm to approach a company first, saying you are planning to campaign against them. But be very strict about what you actually want from them. Tell them that there is little room for negotiation, and that once the message that their company is being targeted reaches the wider public there is nothing that can be done to recall that message without announcing a significant victory or concession that has real meaning. Actions can start happening while you are negotiating, as this re-enforces the message that you do mean business.

However, it is useful to give the target a way out, an escape clause. Depending on the campaign, this may or may not be possible. But if it is, or can be manufactured by making yourself come across as the reasonable party, then this is a very useful tool to bring the campaign to a successful end.

1) Top People

These are the people at the very top of a company – the people who sit on the board of directors at the parent company, or the very senior management. They are the people with the most power, and also the most to lose. In general they start as very intransigent and hard to get hold of – but a few home demos and actions directed specifically at them can sort that out quickly.

They, above all, have the ability to set policy for the company and all its subsidiaries, regardless of what they might say. It does not matter if it is just one of their distant subsidiaries who are actually at fault, they still have the power to say stop. Anyone lower than this can be overridden.

2) Ordinary workers

Treat these differently from the top people, as they often have little or no say in the running of the company, and quite often you will come across disaffected employees who are willing to dish out information. You do not want to alienate these potential allies. Don’t tell them it is their fault, but that of their managers that their office is being targeted. Tell them to get on the phones to their bosses and demand that they give into the campaign’s demands.

Senior management are very aware what damage insiders can do, and if they realize their own workforce is opposing them on this issue, then you have a powerful tool. Many workers will be sympathetic to your aims themselves, and won’t like the dirty side of the company they work for. In the past this has resulted in a gold mine of information coming our way. Indeed, in some campaigns it has been the actions of employees awakened to their company’s misbehavior which provided the winning blows.

Public exposure of internal secrets is a very powerful weapon, and is much under-used. Secrets that might not seem important to protestors may be very sensitive information from a commercial point of view. In some cases whistleblowers can crash a company’s share price. It may not seem significant to campaigners, but from the company’s point of view it can be a deadly blow.

3) Communications

Modern companies cannot function without their communication systems. Blocked phone lines, faxes and email accounts mean that they are not doing business properly. Sales are lost; time is wasted weeding out the hoax orders; staff are demoralized and work less efficiently – it all affects the profits of the company, and that, at the end of the day, is what they really pay attention to.

Companies, small and large, often channel all messages through a central telephone number. This is a natural bottleneck – tie this up and you have a large knock-on effect, especially if it is their main number for doing business.

Companies also tend to own a whole subsection of numbers. Don’t just try their publicly issued numbers, but also the ones a digit or two on either side. This will often turn up interesting details as well, and can give direct lines to the top people.

Emails are very easy to target, as you can email a lot of people at once. After a while they will start blocking you, but being smart can circumvent that. Posting their emails to newsgroups and signing them up for free links pages can generate huge amounts of emails from other people, saving you the time and effort. We know of one target who ended up having their entire email system taken down, something which will have hurt them greatly given how much internal communication and networking is done by email. It is also a clear sign to employees that you are winning the campaign.

Next to targeting the top people, this is probably the most effective tactic, but it has to be done consistently and the pressure needs to be kept applied. When the call to action arrives in your email box don’t simply send one message or phone-call or fax, then forget about it. Keep at it, day in, day out until they cave in.

4) Offices

The staple of many protests, people often drift away from doing office demos because standing outside holding placards and banners is dispiriting and little reward is seen. In the past, these were often the main form of action rather than being run in conjunction with other tactics. However, they do have a large effect, both financially and in terms of morale. It demonstrates your commitment to closing them down and puts them in a defensive position.

Even better is to meet them on their own territory by entering offices and speaking directly to the staff. Demand to see a manager and bring videos and literature to offer them. This is a tactic they really hate. It is one thing to have a wall between you, but when you are in their workspace they cannot ignore you. Plus they don’t get much work done. Do it repeatedly and they start having to pay for increased security measures, as initially you will find most security is done on a low budget basis and easily dodged. Increased security makes for an unpleasant working atmosphere that only helps raise awareness of your cause and encourages people to come forward against their bosses.

5) Public presence

Most companies have a public presence. This comes in two forms: the sponsorship of awards and public events, and attendance at conferences. In both cases it is basically advertising for the company. This is very easy to disrupt and causes them acute embarrassment among the people they are trying to reach out to.

Activists locked onto their stalls at conferences or banner drops exposing them at public events are not things they can hide from. It costs them business and goodwill, and damages their brand name.

And it does not have to be just the companies. Company directors often sit on local government and charitable boards – a few visits to these and the directors will soon get the point that it is not just their company name being dragged through the dirt, but their name as well. It is at this point that many long-term campaigns rapidly come to a conclusion.

Dealing with Subsidiaries and Affiliates

An issue that regularly arises is that it is only one part of a large company which is the problem. For example, those companies dealing with HLS (Huntington Life Sciences) know that protests are to be expected. Their parent company probably doesn’t know this though, and is not prepared for it either. However, the first thing they normally say is that it is not them that’s involved, and why don’t the protestors go and target the people who are directly connected.

The response to this is twofold. Firstly, they are all part of the same overarching company and that means they all have a voice. The reason pressure is put on other subsidiaries is to make sure the message reaches the top people that the activists really do mean business. It is one thing for the top people to ignore the chants of protestors, it is another to ignore the demands of their own managers wanting to know why they are getting the grief.

The second reason is that companies are made up of separate divisions who often do not like each other. There is competition for resources and for promotion. Though we will rarely see it, behind the scenes the protests sometimes even give ammunition to different factions in the company, allowing us to divide and rule. It makes the managers of the subsidiary dealing with the corporation look to their own backs as the rest of their competitors use the opportunity to gang up on them, costing them precious resources and pay-rises.

Even if you do not get an outright victory, a well-fought, hard-hitting campaign can have major effects. It makes the target think twice about whether they want to deal with the corporation again in the future, and whether the cost of lost business and extra security is really worth it. It also sends out a strong message to the rest of the industry that you mean business.

The Worlds of Finance and Commerce

You need to think about the company itself, not just why you are taking action against it. Once you pick your target you need to remove all the struts supporting it. From the company’s point of view, its auditors, insurers and share price are all important aspects, the loss of which make it very hard to function. A good campaign creates a climate of suspicion and instability among creditors and clients and is hard to shake off, as well as being disruptive of the natural workings of the company.

Clients become reluctant to invest and will not pay out millions for a contract if there is a big question over whether the company is going to be around to complete it. Large investors only invest in companies on prestigious stock markets and with recognized auditors. Companies lacking this find it hard to attract these investors, which further damages their credibility, and once in the vicious downward spiral it is hard to climb out again.

Another effect is that, the way the system is, it makes it much harder to get loans. Loans are a vital part of the process of expanding and attracting new business. They are needed to modernize and stay on top. For large corporations, loans are very much tied into the share price – a dead share price means loans are very hard to come by. As the corporation struggles to replace support companies, it is losing the battle for credibility in the eyes of the financial people who can really matter to its future.

Success is vital. It is better to focus on one company, gain a victory, and use that as an example to hold up to others. Once one goes, it is easier to get the ball rolling. Though you may have an array of targets to hit, pick them off one at the time. They will all talk to each other, and the message that you mean business will get around of its own accord.

Never Give Up!

Once you pick your target, never give up. Even if for a while it seems you are going nowhere, let this simply spur you to more inventive and effective methods of campaigning and taking action. Giving up makes you look bad and gives other companies the belief that they can defeat you.

In the past too many campaigns have gone this way, and it has a hugely detrimental effect on the campaign and people involved. Sinking your teeth in and refusing to let go, no matter what they throw back at you, is the only way to real victory. If you show any sign of weakness your enemies will jump on it, and it will make other victories much harder to achieve. The psychology of your success is as important as the psychology of using their fear against them. Never give up!

Internationalism in Action!

Success also breeds global awareness – and global awareness breeds more success. The HLS campaign is capturing the global imagination, and now has sister organizations in dozens of countries around the world. This means that when a new target is chosen, they’re hit on an international scale, adding greatly to the impact of the campaign, as well as helping unite the global movement. When HLS moved their shares and loans to the USA in order to escape UK activism, the SHAC campaign in the USA took off and much to HLS’s horror, crushed whatever they could lay their hands on.

This global aspect of the struggle has been a significant part of the campaign against HLS. The importance of this is when targets do not have headquarters in the UK. Headquarters are vital as they are where the real decisions are made. Having the presence of activists close to home is very influential in encouraging them to make the decision to pull out from HLS. It also means that they cannot simply escape the attention of SHAC by pulling out of the UK. HLS attempted this and were humiliated. Likewise, Japanese pharmaceutical company Yamanouchi closed down their large UK research centre, only to find that there was no refuge in Holland.