Ethos, texts, and technology: Nike and its critics on the Web

This dissertation is a case study of how Nike, Inc. used the Web to respond to criticisms of its labor practices in subcontractor factories overseas. Using classical rhetorical concepts of ethos and delivery, I analyze three events involving Nike's use of the Web to (re)construct its credibility in the face of criticisms from mid-1997 until mid-2002. The first event was Nike's Web-based release of a report by Andrew Young in 1997. I argue that using Web delivery features, Nike relied on the ethos of Andrew Young and also expressed an ethos of transparency. I then argue that this dual strategy was problematic: it enabled Nike's critics to mount a sustained critique of Young and thus undermined Nike's credibility. The second event was Nike's Web-based promotion of a study by a team of MBA students from Dartmouth College, also in 1997. I argue that using Web delivery features, Nike relied on an academic ethos and again expressed an ethos of transparency. However I argue that Nike's dual strategy actually revealed how Nike failed to follow the research conventions of academic communities, and thus undermined its credibility again. The third event was Nike's Web-based release of factory audit reports, which were written primarily by Price WaterhouseCoopers, internal monitors, and college students. I argue that Nike's twin strategy of publishing the reports and using the Web to express an ethos of transparency again undermined the credibility of the reports. However, I argue that Nike's posting of the student reports demonstrated how Nike could use the Web to develop an ethos that would resonate with diverse audiences. I conclude by reviewing how in the Nike case delivery features of the Web show a tension that develops when the cultural assumptions on which ethos is grounded are revealed. I then suggest a means of using Web delivery features to construct what I call an ethos of acknowledgment: a multidimensional and interactive ethos that presents a complex of cultural positions, while also freely revealing the constructed nature of these positions, and also revealing their change over time in response to interactions with diverse audiences.