Negotiating the Terms of Corporate Human Rights Liability Under Federal Law

This Article addresses the question of federal tort liability of major corporations for serious human rights violations, particularly in the context of aiding and abetting such violations. The Article largely sets aside the familiar project of seeking right answers to perpetually unresolved doctrinal issues. Instead, the Article encourages an actual or hypothetical broad negotiating process among representatives of all interested parties. In the course of such negotiations, human rights advocates would be well-advised to seriously consider at least temporarily bargaining away their ideally preferred positions on corporate mens rea, punitive damages, standards of proof, admissibility of remedial measures, statutes of limitation, criminal liability, and other matters, if necessary to obtain broad corporate acquiescence in realistically enforceable corporate tort liability, particularly on an aiding and abetting theory, for at least the most serious underlying human rights violations.