Corporations and Human Rights: A Survey of the Scope and Patterns of Alleged Corporate-Related Human Rights Abuse

In his 2006 report to the then United Nations Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Business and Human Rights (SRSG) presented findings from a survey of alleged corporate-related human rights abuses. 1 The sample for that survey was relatively small (65 instances reported by NGOs), providing an overview of patterns of corporate impact on human rights. Since 2006, the SRSG has conducted a number of other surveys, including a comprehensive review of over 300 firms’ publicly available human rights-related policies and practices—contained in Addendum 4 to the SRSG’s report to the Human Rights Council in 2007.

At the March 2007 session of the Human Rights Council, a group of NGOs questioned how the SRSG intended to analyze patterns of corporate-related human rights abuses and their impacts on individuals and communities. 3 In response to this question, and wishing to complement the initial survey of alleged abuses with a more comprehensive study of the nature and scope of alleged corporate human rights abuse, the SRSG is grateful for the resources provided by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to undertake the present study. In brief, it reviews 320 cases of alleged corporaterelated human rights abuse, providing a study that is equivalent in size to the abovementioned review of corporate human rights policies and practices completed in early 2007.

Preliminary findings of this study were presented in December 2007 at a consultation convened by the SRSG, in collaboration with Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, on the Corporate Responsibility to Respect Human Rights. 4 This paper is a completed presentation of the findings.