2. Introduction
• Number of reasons why the Guiding Principles
were not made a treaty
• What is the legal nature of the principles?
• What is soft law?
3. Harder than law?
• The Guiding principles well grounded in
international law
• Cite international principles in almost every
principle
• Legal theory that creation and application of
law cannot be clearly separated
• Standard setting
4. Operational principles for
companies
• Guiding principles to identify corporate
responsibility:
Respecting human rights
Take account of impacts
Create a policy
Internal due diligence
Integration into internal processes
Reporting
Remediation of problems
5. How?
• Addressing strategy
• Addressing risk
• Addressing operations
• What about reporting?
6. A lesson from Sustainable
development
• Companies embracing sustainability
• Strategic reviews
• Procurement
• Supply chain management
• Stakeholder engagement
Not binding. Unlike declarations, resolutions or recommendations by international organizations they have not been negotiated by States. They don’t even constitute typical soft law
Looking at the Guiding principles in the context of company reporting adds a further dimension to the issue of how much impact these principles might have. There is wide recognition by governments, companies and stakeholders of the value of E&S reporting as :A useful management tool An important mechanism for the communication of riskA vital basis for wider company stakeholder engagement Number of companies produce a separate CSR report or as part of their annual report. In uk all companies are subject to narrative reporting requirements in the form of a Business reviwe . For quoted companies there are explicit requirements to include information about environmental, employee, social, community and supply chain issues ‘ to the extent necessary for an understanding of the development, performance or position of the companies businessSo fart eh standards have been variable and in many cases the quality of information has fallen short of expectationsThe issues covered in each narrative report will depend of on the company the sectors in which it operates, activities and future objectives. Impacts of human rights are not explicitly mentioned in Sect 417 of list of factors but can arguable be be covered by reference to ‘social and community issues’. NO of reasons why human rights impacts should be given a special mention:- 1) negative human rights impacts can have sufficient impact on corporate performance and prospects to warrant disclosure under corporate reporting rules. 2) it would introduce clarity for companies on what is expected of them in terms of human rights reporting. 3) increasing number of international initiatives in this area including the work of ISO, the UN Global Compact and SRSG4) a distinction is warranted in the Act between human rights issues ( which derive from international legal standards) and other voluntary social initiatives which companies may undertake to improve their reputation. The first setpe is identifying the broad environmental and social risks or opportunities potentially raised by their activitiesOrganisations such as GRI , theCDP and International standards board provide good starting points.
Supply chain management is becoming key to organisations from a reputation point of view. Look at Nike and Primark examples. Human rights impacts can be key depending on the sector and