The competitive nature of the market is a powerful driver for change. The Corporate Human Rights Benchmark will build on a competitive approach to drive better human rights performance by companies through developing a transparent, publicly available and credible ranking of corporate human rights performance. The Benchmark Initiative is a new project that brings together six leading organisations to establish the world’s first free and public benchmarking of human rights policy and performance of hundreds of companies around the world. There is already considerable evidence that public transparency combined with public rankings of companies’ performance is a powerful tool in driving a ‘race to the top’. The Initiative can make an important contribution to creating greater corporate accountability, incentivising business behaviour and creating greater leverage for policy-makers, investors, communities and consumers.