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Sullivan, Rory --- "The Influence of NGOs on the Normative Framework for Business and Human Rights" [2005] ELECD 210; in Tully, Stephen (ed), "Research Handbook on Corporate Legal Responsibility" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2005)

Book Title: Research Handbook on Corporate Legal Responsibility

Editor(s): Tully, Stephen

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781843768203

Section: Chapter 16

Section Title: The Influence of NGOs on the Normative Framework for Business and Human Rights

Author(s): Sullivan, Rory

Number of pages: 16

Extract:

16 The influence of NGOs on the normative
framework for business and human rights
Rory Sullivan




Introduction
Over the past ten years, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working in
the human rights field have focused significant attention on the role of compa-
nies for protecting and promoting human rights. NGO activities, mirroring the
traditional NGO campaigning strategies of confrontation and protest against
governments, have included high-profile boycott campaigns against clothing
and shoe manufacturers and retailers, support for litigation against companies
accused of involvement in human rights violations, shareholder resolutions,
protests outside company offices and reports highlighting company involve-
ment in or complicity with human rights violations. Human rights NGOs have
also engaged directly with companies and have lobbied governments and
international organisations to implement measures to encourage companies to
improve their human rights performance.
This chapter focuses on the influence of these engagement and lobbying
activities on the normative framework within which companies operate, with
a particular emphasis on the campaigning activities of international human
rights NGOs (such as Amnesty International) and the responses of interna-
tional companies (referred to here as `transnational corporations': TNCs) and
governments.

Why are companies of concern?
The relationship between foreign direct investment and human rights is not an
easy one to assess. On the one hand are the arguments that TNCs can provide
significant benefits through providing much needed jobs and development. On
the other hand, recent years have seen a series of allegations of human rights
violations by companies, especially in developing countries. ...