Table 4 Examples of NGO impact

NGO collaboration with state officials at the subnational level in India was key to several Indian states notifying implementation of FCTC Article 5.3, particularly on limiting government-tobacco industry interactions [96]

NGOs successfully pressured a newspaper company in the US to ban advertisements of particular weapons [85] and pressured banks not to finance new extractive industry projects in Australia [129, 160]

NGO secured amendments to parliamentary bills to include compensation for communities affected by mining [48]

NGOs successfully pressured mining companies to withdraw license applications [22, 57]

NGO litigation has secured toxic clean-up, health and safety improvements, wage raises, and financial payment of damages [52, 76]

International NGO shaming of government had a negative effect on foreign investment flows into the shamed state, indicating commercial actors are sensitive to reputational damage [113]

NGO’s successfully lobbied Hong Kong to amend policy to incorporate mesothelioma as a disease for compensation [127]

NGO boycott campaigns successfully led to Uniroyal ceasing production of a pesticide [59]

NGOs secured participation in processes and greater transparency in processes e.g. transparency in reporting of extractive resource income [27, 36, 93, 117]

NGOs secured improvements to future government EIA processes [81]

In 2018, legal action by a local NGO in Mexico against a mining company led to a Supreme Court ruling that local communities had the right to participation and consultation in projects that affected their right to a healthy environment—establishing a right to consultation for future enforcement [73]

In Ghana, NGOs successfully blocked industry representation on the governing body of oil and gas production, instead securing civil society representation [134]. In Lebanon, NGOs used the FCTC to successfully campaign for industry actors to no longer be included in formal deliberations by parliamentary committees [108]

Public What You Pay Indonesia used its participation in a multistakeholder platform to shape processes to improve extractive industry governance, while litigation outside the platform by other NGOs secured processes for the public disclosure of mining licenses [27]

In Kerala, India, local officials shut down a Coca Cola bottling plant after an NGO campaigned that it drained and polluted local water [22]

Two studies attributed the global diffusion of a marine protection norm, which has informed the development of multiple marine protection areas free from industry interference, to the norming diffusion strategy of global NGOs Pew Trust and National Geographic Society [115, 116]

One study found the impact of NGO movements on shifting discourse towards food sovereignty and sustainability in Canada. [117]

In another study, while unsuccessful in stopping extractive projects, transnational NGO networks were found to have elevated framing of human rights and concerns about Indigenous people’s rights in the context of extractive industry practices at the global level [49]

NGO worker exchanges between NGOs in Canada, Mexico and USA (on behalf of workers employed by the same company) have shifted local frames from nationalist to international labor rights and global solidarity framing [52]

A study of NGO campaigning on tax justice in Australia found that the NGO campaign successfully influenced the public narrative, framing corporate tax avoidance as a “revenue” problem”, which was taken up by the Government and media [89]