Business &
Human Rights
Cividep India considers corporate accountability to be the most fundamental aspect of responsible business conduct.
Corporations have ethical, moral and legal obligations to their employees and workers, and to communities directly impacted by corporate activities.
With the erosion of the state and privatisation of economic and welfare functions, the responsibility of transnational companies towards human and environment rights is more critical than ever. In this context, Cividep believes that corporations should be made responsible for the impact of their actions, and held accountable for labour rights violations and environmental degradation in their supply chains. Corporate accountability seeks to address this need for placing social and environmental duties and obligations on corporations.
Corporate accountability is distinct from Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), which is not articulated in terms of rights and obligations and does not adequately address the negative impacts of business activities. Corporate accountability entails respecting human rights through responsible and accountable conduct on the part of businesses in relation to workers, suppliers, consumers, the environment, communities, civil society and the government of the country where production is carried out. In addition, this framework demands enforceability, instead of merely encouraging businesses to improve standards or adhere to voluntary reporting measures.
Corporate Accountability in
Global Supply Chains
Cividep India’s research on working and living conditions of workers employed in the labour-intensive garment, electronics, leather and plantation sectors has demonstrated that workers are systemically exposed to precarious working conditions, poverty wages, long working hours, flexible contractual system, harassment and violence, severe restrictions on freedom of association, and very poor access to remedy. Workers in these sectors already face marginalisation on account of age, gender, caste, religion, poverty, sexuality, and migrant status. The multi-tiered system of production in supply chains more often than not reinforces and embeds these existing inequalities. Most workers are therefore caught in a web of multi-generational poverty and poor health.
Some of the key corporate accountability and governance measures that global brands ought to follow in supply chains include:
Adopting costing models that take into account total cost of labour and social compliance, including living wages and social security benefits for workers
Public disclosure of sourcing and purchasing practices
Ensuring supply chain transparency by disclosing factory lists, production sites, and names of subcontractors and agents
Establishing robust Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) mechanisms in order to actively identify, prevent and mitigate risks that contribute to labour rights violations and dilution of environmental standards
Ensuring that HRDD mechanisms are transparent and allow for independent monitoring and review
Adopting costing models that take into account total cost of labour and social compliance, including living wages and social security benefits for workers
Enabling freedom of association and collective bargaining in factories
Establishing effective governance structures and grievance mechanisms in factories by allowing workers’ participation in the design, governance and monitoring of grievance mechanisms
Ensuring that workplaces are free of harassment and violence
Engaging in regular social dialogue with communities and civil society organisations in setting-up and meeting social, labour and environmental standards
Business and Human Rights (BHR)
Global efforts to hold corporations accountable for their harmful impacts on workers, communities and the environment are not new. However, the unanimous adoption of the UN Guiding Principles (UNGPs) on Business and Human Rights by the UN Human Rights Council in 2011 brought to light the requirement for a yardstick to measure corporate responsibility. The UNGPs thus offered the “Protect, Respect, Remedy” framework as a standard to evaluate responsible business conduct.
The BHR discourse has been, in part, a response to CSR’s failure to sufficiently address the negative impacts of businesses. BHR is also a response to increasing pressure from civil society to tackle the concentration of corporate power, the primacy of the profit motive, and to address the lack of access to remedy for people affected by corporate actions.
Since their adoption, civil society actors have tried to leverage the UNGPs to push for behavioral change in corporations, most notably by advocating governments to adopt National Action Plans on BHR. In addition, other mechanisms such as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises (MNEs), private regulation led by multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs), calls for a Binding Treaty on TNCs, legislations on due diligence and modern slavery, etc. point to the growth of an increasingly multi-layered approach to corporate governance and accountability, involving governments and intergovernmental organisations, civil society actors and multi-stakeholder institutions, and businesses.
Cividep has actively collaborated with partners, nationally and internationally, in engaging and evaluating the effectiveness of these initiatives in contributing to corporate accountability in global supply chains.
Some of our work in the BHR space includes:
- Applying a critical lens to and building awareness on international mechanisms including the UNGPs, OECD Guidelines for MNEs, the Binding Treaty etc.
- Conducting workshops on accessing the OECD dispute resolution mechanism
- Publishing guidelines on UNGPs, non-judicial grievance mechanisms, Freedom of Association etc.
- Working with MSIs (Fair Wear Foundation, Fair Labour Association, Ethical Trading Initiative and the German Partnership for Sustainable Textiles) in addressing key issues such as living wages, social dialogue, gender-based violence and freedom of association