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Jernej Letnar Cernic and Nicolás Carrillo-Santarelli (eds), The Future of Business and Human Rights: Theoretical and Practical Considerations for a UN Treaty

Document Cited in Related
Vincent
Pages146-147
Date01 January 2019
Author
Published date01 January 2019
DOI10.3366/elr.2019.0541

This book provides critical and timely insights into the debate on the role and responsibility of business to prevent and protect human rights and the challenging path toward ratification of a UN treaty. Corporate power, both financially and politically, in the global economy is far-reaching and powerful. In developing countries where governance and legal systems can be weak, states lack the resources and sometimes the will to provide proper safeguards to protect their citizens from human rights abuses by multi-national corporations. Whether it is an unsafe factory in Indonesia or the cocoa fields in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, holding businesses accountable and providing a remedy to those harmed has been a challenge. This book provides a detailed look at this problem, highlighting the opposing views of stakeholders.

The authors are professors with expertise in human rights and international law from universities around the world, along with contributions from the Director of the Indian Law Institute and FIAN International in Geneva. Each chapter offers differing opinions and analyses on the best approach to protect victims of human rights abuses by multinational corporations, as well as the obligations of states to hold parties accountable. It is a valuable resource to properly understand the history of this issue and why a solution or consensus, like a binding UN treaty, has been widely debated but remains unresolved or at a point that does not satisfy all parties. Binding versus voluntary accountability of multinational companies is weighed thoroughly throughout the book. As one author, Surya Deva, notes, it is “an exploratory journey” (31).

The issues posed are not necessarily new...

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