Abstract Drawing on the work of Donaldson and Walsh, this article explains why for-profit companies in industries denominated by intrinsic values such as health, education and justice, have heavier responsibilities when it comes to honouring the human rights reflected in their industry identity. Optimized collective value, the overarching aim of any system of business, is defined in terms of the satisfaction of intrinsic values, a definition that gives special meaning to firms operating in industries themselves defined in terms of intrinsic values. Nor are such companies’ responsibilities to human rights, such as the right to healthcare, conveniently reducible to the ‘enlightened’ pursuit of profit. For example, a pharmaceutical company such as Pfizer or Moderna may be required to make its COVID-19 vaccine more accessible to COVID-19 victims in developing countries at the expense of optimizing profits over the long run. Such companies have a special and mandatory correlative duty to honour the right to healthcare that derives from their corporate constitutional purpose.
{"title":"Intrinsic Values and Human Rights: Corporate Duties Depend on Industry Values","authors":"T. Donaldson","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2022.13","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2022.13","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Drawing on the work of Donaldson and Walsh, this article explains why for-profit companies in industries denominated by intrinsic values such as health, education and justice, have heavier responsibilities when it comes to honouring the human rights reflected in their industry identity. Optimized collective value, the overarching aim of any system of business, is defined in terms of the satisfaction of intrinsic values, a definition that gives special meaning to firms operating in industries themselves defined in terms of intrinsic values. Nor are such companies’ responsibilities to human rights, such as the right to healthcare, conveniently reducible to the ‘enlightened’ pursuit of profit. For example, a pharmaceutical company such as Pfizer or Moderna may be required to make its COVID-19 vaccine more accessible to COVID-19 victims in developing countries at the expense of optimizing profits over the long run. Such companies have a special and mandatory correlative duty to honour the right to healthcare that derives from their corporate constitutional purpose.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"189 - 200"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42934491","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The area of business and human rights (BHR) has a gap in its means to effectively remedy human rights violations. In pursuit of implementing the third pillar of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, which focuses on providing an effective remedy to rightsholders affected by corporate human rights violations, it has been proposed to utilize arbitration as a new platform to deal with such violations. The Drafting Team that instigated this initiative has prepared a set of procedural rules for BHR arbitration, called the Hague Rules. The Rules were officially launched on 12 December 2019. These arbitral rules are tailored to the specific needs of settling human rights disputes. In this article, the general idea of BHR arbitration will be analysed and assessed in light of the normative concept of ‘effective’ remedy, using the Hague Rules as a focus point. This article will discuss not only what the Hague Rules would introduce to the general concept of BHR arbitration, but also what limitations might still remain in securing an effective remedy.
{"title":"The Potential of Arbitration as Effective Remedy in Business and Human Rights: Will the Hague Rules be Enough?","authors":"Andi Baaij","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.36","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.36","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The area of business and human rights (BHR) has a gap in its means to effectively remedy human rights violations. In pursuit of implementing the third pillar of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, which focuses on providing an effective remedy to rightsholders affected by corporate human rights violations, it has been proposed to utilize arbitration as a new platform to deal with such violations. The Drafting Team that instigated this initiative has prepared a set of procedural rules for BHR arbitration, called the Hague Rules. The Rules were officially launched on 12 December 2019. These arbitral rules are tailored to the specific needs of settling human rights disputes. In this article, the general idea of BHR arbitration will be analysed and assessed in light of the normative concept of ‘effective’ remedy, using the Hague Rules as a focus point. This article will discuss not only what the Hague Rules would introduce to the general concept of BHR arbitration, but also what limitations might still remain in securing an effective remedy.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"271 - 290"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-05-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45658188","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Cloud computing underlies many of the most powerful and controversial technologies of our day – from large-scale data processing to face recognition systems – yet the human rights impacts of cloud computing have received little scrutiny. This article explains what cloud computing is, how it works, and what some of its most significant human rights impacts are through three case studies. It offers some initial thoughts on the human rights responsibilities of cloud computing providers under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and concludes by suggesting directions for future research.
{"title":"With Great (Computing) Power Comes Great (Human Rights) Responsibility: Cloud Computing and Human Rights","authors":"V. Krishnamurthy","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2022.8","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2022.8","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Cloud computing underlies many of the most powerful and controversial technologies of our day – from large-scale data processing to face recognition systems – yet the human rights impacts of cloud computing have received little scrutiny. This article explains what cloud computing is, how it works, and what some of its most significant human rights impacts are through three case studies. It offers some initial thoughts on the human rights responsibilities of cloud computing providers under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and concludes by suggesting directions for future research.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"226 - 248"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-05-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44067240","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
be this ambitious collection of thought-provoking and timely writings by women about the role of gender in corporate cultures and the power of women to catalyse change in the business community. Starting from the premise that regulation is never neutral, Creating Corporate Sustainability: Gender as an Agent for Change presents a compelling case for bringing a gender perspective to regulatory reforms intended to promote sustainable business practices. The collection considers how women influence corporate sustainability and is instructive for readers interested in gender-based approaches to existing and emerging business and human rights issues.The volume is organized in three parts: (I) Women as Influencers of Corporate Action, (II) Current Strategies for Corporate Sustainability and (III) Feminist Theories and Corporate Sustainability. The diverse contributors bring multi-disciplinary and feminist approaches to the study of corporate law with a focus on how gender dynamics influence corporate governance and culture. Each chapter situates the substance of its subject matter in the context of existing inequalities and power imbalance. Subjects as varied as stakeholder consultation, quotas, social enterprise and corporate reporting are covered. business ethical fair labour
{"title":"Beate Sjåfjell and Irene Lynch Fanon (eds.), Creating Corporate Sustainability: Gender as an Agent for Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018) 337 pp.","authors":"Erika George","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2022.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2022.2","url":null,"abstract":"be this ambitious collection of thought-provoking and timely writings by women about the role of gender in corporate cultures and the power of women to catalyse change in the business community. Starting from the premise that regulation is never neutral, Creating Corporate Sustainability: Gender as an Agent for Change presents a compelling case for bringing a gender perspective to regulatory reforms intended to promote sustainable business practices. The collection considers how women influence corporate sustainability and is instructive for readers interested in gender-based approaches to existing and emerging business and human rights issues.The volume is organized in three parts: (I) Women as Influencers of Corporate Action, (II) Current Strategies for Corporate Sustainability and (III) Feminist Theories and Corporate Sustainability. The diverse contributors bring multi-disciplinary and feminist approaches to the study of corporate law with a focus on how gender dynamics influence corporate governance and culture. Each chapter situates the substance of its subject matter in the context of existing inequalities and power imbalance. Subjects as varied as stakeholder consultation, quotas, social enterprise and corporate reporting are covered. business ethical fair labour","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"329 - 332"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42123803","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
While Coca-Cola portrays itself as a ‘water neutrality’ leader, its failures during Cape Town’s water crisis exemplify the changing nature of corporate human rights obligations in the face of climate change. Between 2015 and 2018, drought conditions plunged Cape Town into a crisis, leading to increasingly strict household water restrictions and depriving families of their constitutionally guaranteed water allowance.1 However, in December 2017, when Cape Town officials called for a 45% reduction in commercial water use, Coca-Cola’s local independent bottler – Coca-Cola Peninsula Beverages (CCPB) – refused to reduce its 44 million-litre monthly withdrawals.2 The city subjected households to water restrictions and price increases up to 556%, while businesses only saw a 104% price increase with no consumption restrictions.3
{"title":"Coca-Cola’s Cape Town Crisis: Examining Companies’ Water Rights Obligations in a Changing Climate","authors":"Shannon Marcoux","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.64","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.64","url":null,"abstract":"While Coca-Cola portrays itself as a ‘water neutrality’ leader, its failures during Cape Town’s water crisis exemplify the changing nature of corporate human rights obligations in the face of climate change. Between 2015 and 2018, drought conditions plunged Cape Town into a crisis, leading to increasingly strict household water restrictions and depriving families of their constitutionally guaranteed water allowance.1 However, in December 2017, when Cape Town officials called for a 45% reduction in commercial water use, Coca-Cola’s local independent bottler – Coca-Cola Peninsula Beverages (CCPB) – refused to reduce its 44 million-litre monthly withdrawals.2 The city subjected households to water restrictions and price increases up to 556%, while businesses only saw a 104% price increase with no consumption restrictions.3","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"298 - 302"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44119274","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This piece uses the Doce River case (2015) to illustrate the gendered impacts of the failure of corporate human rights due diligence. We also ask the question: would the Gender Dimensions of the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights1 (Gender Guidance) have made a difference to the way women were treated in preventive measures taken and in the application of redress mechanisms? Taking this specific case, we seek to illustrate the importance of integrating gender into international business and human rights (BHR) frameworks if women’s rights are to be protected and respected in the context of business activities.
{"title":"A Feminist Analysis of the Legal Mechanisms of Protection and Repair in the Context of the Brazilian Extractive Industry: The Doce River Case","authors":"Juliana Bertholdi, Danielle Anne Pamplona","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.45","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.45","url":null,"abstract":"This piece uses the Doce River case (2015) to illustrate the gendered impacts of the failure of corporate human rights due diligence. We also ask the question: would the Gender Dimensions of the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights1 (Gender Guidance) have made a difference to the way women were treated in preventive measures taken and in the application of redress mechanisms? Taking this specific case, we seek to illustrate the importance of integrating gender into international business and human rights (BHR) frameworks if women’s rights are to be protected and respected in the context of business activities.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"175 - 180"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47960877","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The business and human rights field and the international LGBTI human rights agenda have evolved almost entirely separately. The United Nations ‘Standards of Conduct for Business on Tackling Discrimination against LGBTI People’ (2017) is the primary effort to bridge this gap. Although drafted in a way that strongly aligns with the second pillar of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights on corporate responsibility, the dissemination of the Standards has mainly been untethered from the human rights framework and system. This article identifies the need to reassert the human rights foundations of the Standards and leverage their existing momentum to set out a more robust research and policy agenda for meaningfully accounting for sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and sex characteristics in business and human rights frameworks. To that end, the article sets out priority areas for greater attention from researchers, decision-makers and advocates.
{"title":"Reclaiming the Human Rights Foundations of the UN Standards of Conduct for Business on Tackling Discrimination against LGBTI People","authors":"A. Lyons, Cooper Christiancy","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.32","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.32","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The business and human rights field and the international LGBTI human rights agenda have evolved almost entirely separately. The United Nations ‘Standards of Conduct for Business on Tackling Discrimination against LGBTI People’ (2017) is the primary effort to bridge this gap. Although drafted in a way that strongly aligns with the second pillar of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights on corporate responsibility, the dissemination of the Standards has mainly been untethered from the human rights framework and system. This article identifies the need to reassert the human rights foundations of the Standards and leverage their existing momentum to set out a more robust research and policy agenda for meaningfully accounting for sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, and sex characteristics in business and human rights frameworks. To that end, the article sets out priority areas for greater attention from researchers, decision-makers and advocates.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"134 - 156"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47637969","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract Inspired by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the international development community is driving digital ID programmes in low and middle income countries (LMICs) such as Kenya. Kenya has had experience with state-issued identity registration such as that proposed in digital ID programmes for over a century. Identity registration has gendered impacts, stemming from the historical exclusion of women in the system, lack of recognition of their contribution to new uses of the system, as well as lack of engagement with women regarding remedies. Digital ID risks continuing and exacerbating these injustices, as it is based on the existing system. This article uses the ‘protect, respect, remedy’ framework of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights to analyse how decolonial approaches could be applied in digital ID to untangle it from colonial legacies, check the ever-increasing power of businesses involved in digital ID systems, and broaden intersectional understanding of human rights.
{"title":"The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, Women and Digital ID in Kenya: A Decolonial Perspective","authors":"Grace Mutung’u","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.60","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.60","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Inspired by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the international development community is driving digital ID programmes in low and middle income countries (LMICs) such as Kenya. Kenya has had experience with state-issued identity registration such as that proposed in digital ID programmes for over a century. Identity registration has gendered impacts, stemming from the historical exclusion of women in the system, lack of recognition of their contribution to new uses of the system, as well as lack of engagement with women regarding remedies. Digital ID risks continuing and exacerbating these injustices, as it is based on the existing system. This article uses the ‘protect, respect, remedy’ framework of the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights to analyse how decolonial approaches could be applied in digital ID to untangle it from colonial legacies, check the ever-increasing power of businesses involved in digital ID systems, and broaden intersectional understanding of human rights.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"117 - 133"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44828786","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This special issue uses feminist perspectives to explore the field of business and human rights (BHR). Gendered inequalities, based on embodied, assigned or presumed gender identities and sexual orientations, have long been eclipsed from international law; the same has occurred in BHR. Rarely is gender addressed holistically to fully encompass the systemic discrimination and deep-seated patriarchal and neo-colonial structures that create and perpetuate inequalities. The contributions in this special issue challenge both the absence of attention to gender in BHR as well as conventional approaches used to address gendered inequalities within BHR discourses and frameworks. Three recurring themes characterize the special issue: (1) bodies and embodiment; (2) women’s positionality in the marketplace; and (3) borderlessness. Collectively, the contributions proffer feminist approaches to BHR that embed gender justice as foundational, rather than an afterthought.
{"title":"From Formalism to Feminism: Gender, Business and Human Rights","authors":"Nora Götzmann, Joanna Bourke Martignoni, Bonita Meyersfeld, Harpreet Kaur","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.61","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.61","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This special issue uses feminist perspectives to explore the field of business and human rights (BHR). Gendered inequalities, based on embodied, assigned or presumed gender identities and sexual orientations, have long been eclipsed from international law; the same has occurred in BHR. Rarely is gender addressed holistically to fully encompass the systemic discrimination and deep-seated patriarchal and neo-colonial structures that create and perpetuate inequalities. The contributions in this special issue challenge both the absence of attention to gender in BHR as well as conventional approaches used to address gendered inequalities within BHR discourses and frameworks. Three recurring themes characterize the special issue: (1) bodies and embodiment; (2) women’s positionality in the marketplace; and (3) borderlessness. Collectively, the contributions proffer feminist approaches to BHR that embed gender justice as foundational, rather than an afterthought.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"1 - 11"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49405123","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract In this paper I use South Africa as a reference point to discuss the company as a juristic person and its relationship to natural persons through the concepts of subjectivity and personhood. I do this in an attempt to reveal that granting of juristic personality as ‘the company’ is not a neutral, organic or inevitable product of the law and economy but a construct symbiotically bound to the colonial state. Underlying this juristic personhood is colonial ideology which perpetuates racialized and gendered poverty and inequality as systemic oppression, in order to deliberately facilitate and maintain conditions of domination and exploitation. Rather than taking the conventional business and human rights starting point that accepts the corporate structure without critique, it is argued that by reorienting away from juristic personality as purportedly ‘neutral’ and reframing the construct, the powers of the company might be curtailed, thereby interrupting these continuing colonial logics.
{"title":"Reframing Corporate Subjectivity: Systemic Inequality and the Company at the Intersection of Race, Gender and Poverty","authors":"C. Samaradiwakera-Wijesundara","doi":"10.1017/bhj.2021.63","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/bhj.2021.63","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract In this paper I use South Africa as a reference point to discuss the company as a juristic person and its relationship to natural persons through the concepts of subjectivity and personhood. I do this in an attempt to reveal that granting of juristic personality as ‘the company’ is not a neutral, organic or inevitable product of the law and economy but a construct symbiotically bound to the colonial state. Underlying this juristic personhood is colonial ideology which perpetuates racialized and gendered poverty and inequality as systemic oppression, in order to deliberately facilitate and maintain conditions of domination and exploitation. Rather than taking the conventional business and human rights starting point that accepts the corporate structure without critique, it is argued that by reorienting away from juristic personality as purportedly ‘neutral’ and reframing the construct, the powers of the company might be curtailed, thereby interrupting these continuing colonial logics.","PeriodicalId":9399,"journal":{"name":"Business and Human Rights Journal","volume":"7 1","pages":"100 - 116"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48957865","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：