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Assessing the roles of multi-stakeholder initiatives in advancing the business and human rights agenda

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

Scott Jerbi
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Abstract

Growing reliance on ‘multi-stakeholder initiatives’ (MSIs) aimed at improving business performance with respect to specific human rights-related challenges has become a significant dimension of the evolving corporate responsibility agenda over recent decades. A number of such initiatives have developed in direct response to calls for greater state and corporate accountability in areas of weak governance and violent conflict. This article examines the evolution of key MSIs in light of the 2011 adoption of the United Nations (UN) Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and addresses challenges facing these initiatives in the future.

Keywords

multi-stakeholder initiativesUN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights
Type
The Practice
Information
International Review of the Red Cross , Volume 94 , Issue 887: Business, violence and conflict , September 2012 , pp. 1027 - 1046
Copyright
Copyright © International Committee of the Red Cross 2013 

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References

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29 The Voluntary Principles Association, a non-profit organisation based in the Netherlands, was announced on 21 November 2012. The Association is intended to address administrative needs of the Voluntary Principles Initiative ‘in order to enhance the Initiative's capacity to pursue its objective of facilitating the collaborative work of companies, governments, and non-governmental organizations seeking to find solutions to complex security and human rights challenges’. See Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights, ‘The Voluntary Principles Initiative announces the formation of the Voluntary Principles Association: new organization will facilitate efforts by extractive sector companies to protect human rights’, available at: www.voluntaryprinciples.org/files/Voluntary_Principles_Association_Press_Release_-_November_21_2012.pdf.

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34 As of November 2012, these include Afghanistan, Albania, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Côte d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Guatemala, Guinea, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, the Republic of the Congo, São Tomé and Principe, Sierra Leone, the Solomon Islands, Tanzania, Togo, and Trinidad and Tobago. See: http://eiti.org/countries.

35 See Scanteam, Achievements and Strategic Options: Evaluation of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, Final Report, Oslo, May 2011, available at: http://eiti.org/files/2011-EITI-evaluation-report.pdf.

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40 For more information on the Kimberly Process initiative, see: www.kimberleyprocess.com.

41 See, for example, UNSC Res. S/RES/1173, 12 June 1998 (concerning Angola), and S/RES/1306, 5 July 2000 (concerning Sierra Leone and Liberia).

42 UNGA Res. A/RES/55/56, 29 January 2001, on ‘The role of diamonds in fuelling conflict: breaking the link between the illicit transaction of rough diamonds and armed conflict as a contribution to prevention and settlement of conflicts’.

43 UNSC Res. S/RES/1459, 28 January 2003.

44 World Trade Organisation, ‘Waiver concerning Kimberley Process Certification Scheme for rough diamonds’, Doc. G/C/W/432/Rev.1, 24 February 2003.

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46 Global Witness, ‘Why we are leaving the Kimberley Process – a message from Global Witness Founding Director Charmian Gooch’, 5 December 2011, available at: www.globalwitness.org/library/why-we-are-leaving-kimberley-process-message-global-witness-founding-director-charmian-gooch.

47 Kimberley Process Administrative Decision on Marange (Zimbabwe), Doc. 001/2011, 1 November 2011, available at: www.kimberleyprocess.com/documents/10540/40001/2011%20-%20AD31%20Marange%20%28Zimbabwe%29.pdf?version=1.1&t=1327595170000.

48 Global Witness, ‘Global Witness leaves Kimberley Process, calls for diamond trade to be held accountable’, Press Release, 5 December 2011, available at: www.globalwitness.org/library/global-witness-leaves-kimberley-process-calls-diamond-trade-be-held-accountable.

49 Kimberley Process Certification Scheme Core Document, Section I, ‘Definitions’, available at: www.kimberleyprocess.com/documents/10540/11192/KPCS%20Core%20Document?version=1.0&t=1331826363000.

50 See, for example, Naren Karunakaran and Ahona Ghosh, ‘Diamond trade versus human rights’, in Economic Times, 19 June 2012, available at: http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-06-19/news/32317729_1_conflict-diamonds-blood-diamonds-kimberley-process-certification-scheme.

51 Ibid.

52 Kimberley Process, p. 4, available at: www.kimberleyprocess.com/documents/10540/49668/Milovanovic.pdf.

53 UN Human Rights Council, Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework, UN Doc. A/HRC/17/31, 21 March 2011, available at: http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G11/121/90/PDF/G1112190.pdf?OpenElement.

54 UN Human Rights Council Resolution on ‘Human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises’, UN Doc. A/HRC/RES/17/4, 6 July 2011, para. 5.

55 Norway's statement is available at: www.business-humanrights.org/media/documents/ruggie/statements-norway-uk-business-human-rights-16-jun-2011.pdf.

56 See UN Human Rights Council, above note 54.

57 Report of the Working Group on the Issue of Human Rights and Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises, UN Doc. A/HRC/20/29, 10 April 2012, para. 75.

58 See UN Human Rights Council, above note 53, Principle 30, p. 26.

59 Ibid., Principle 30, Commentary.

60 See FLA, ‘Third party complaint process’, available at: www.fairlabor.org/third-party-complaint-process.

61 See Charter for the Oversight Mechanism for the International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers, 2013, available at: http://www.icoc-psp.org/uploads/ICoC_Articles_of_Association.pdf.

62 John G. Ruggie, ‘Keynote Remarks at Extraordinary Plenary Voluntary Principles on Security & Human Rights Department of Foreign Affairs & International Trade, Ottawa, Canada, 15 September 2011’, available at: http://voluntaryprinciples.org/files/Ruggie_Speech_VPs_September_2011.pdf.

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66 UN Human Rights Council, UN Doc. A/HRC/RES/21/5, 16 October 2012, para. 11 requests ‘the Secretary-General to undertake a feasibility study to explore the establishment of a global fund to enhance the capacity of stakeholders to advance the implementation of the Guiding Principles … the conclusions should be presented to the Human Rights Council and included in the report of the Secretary-General in June 2014’.