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The global business environment has changed rapidly in the past decades, but the human rights and business discourse has often lagged behind. At the international level, hard law regulations still seem decades away. United Nations initiatives such as the Guiding Principles and the UN Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises are more than a step in the right direction. However, they alone are insufficient to prevent violations and ensure victims receive justice. This edited book uses a broad and pluralistic understanding of direct human rights obligations, concentrating on legally enforceable standards. The enforceability can come directly from international law, through national legislation, or through non-state actors. The contributions engage both with the law as it is as well as the law as it needs to be developed. In doing so, the book challenges the current reticence to recognise direct human rights obligations of corporations by highlighting the various tools already available for remedying corporate human rights impacts while pushing for the development of further mechanisms

The issue of the responsibility of states for human rights violations is examined. The issues of the recognition of human rights violations were discussed at a recent roundtable meeting at the Center for International law and International Security of the Institute for Contemporary International Studies in Russia. Adapted from the source document.

State responsibility in international law is considered one of the cornerstones of the field. For a long time it remained the exclusive responsibility system due to the primacy of States as subjects of international law. Its unique position has nonetheless been challenged by several developments both within and outside the international legal order, such as the rise of alternative responsibility ideas and practices, as well as globalization and its consequences. This book adopts a critical and holistic approach to the law of State responsibility and analyzes the functionality of the general rules of State responsibility in a changed international landscape characterized by the fragmentation of responsibility. It is argued that State responsibility is not equally relevant across the broad spectrum of international obligations, and that alternative constructions of responsibility, namely international criminal law and international liability, have increased in standing.

This groundbreaking book offers a compelling articulation of the right of access to justice for individuals facing human rights violations by international organizations. Following an examination of the human rights obligations of a variety of international organizations, the author scrutinizes their dispute settlement mechanisms as well as the conflict between their immunities and the right of access to justice before national jurisdictions. Highlighting recent examples, such as the cholera outbreak in Haiti, this book reveals how individual victims of human rights violations by international organizations are frequently left in the cold, due to the lack of an independent, impartial dispute settlement mechanism before which they can file such claims. Considering both global mechanisms and current mechanisms established by international organizations such as administrative jurisdictions for employment-related disputes, Pierre Schmitt finds that they either are not competent or that they have a limited scope. He concludes by offering normative proposals addressed both to international organizations and to national judges confronted with such cases. Offering a wealth of empirical and practical wisdom, this book will appeal to scholars in public international law and human rights. It is also a must-read for practitioners, judges and legal advisers working in the field and will prove a useful tool for national authorities negotiating immunity conventions with international organizations --Back cover