Access to Remedies for Corporate Human Rights Impacts

On 20-21 November 2008, the Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative at Harvard Kennedy School and Oxfam American jointly hosted a consultation entitled: ‘Access to Remedies for Corporate Human Rights Impacts: Improving Non-judicial Mechanisms’. The consultation was a contribution to the work on access to remedy of the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Business and Human Rights, Professor John Ruggie and follows two previous consultations on non-judicial grievance mechanisms in 2007. (Work on access to remedy through judicial mechanisms is the subject of separate work under the mandate.) The forty participants at the event included individuals from a broad range of backgrounds with some expertise in the issues under discussion. They came from academic institutions, international organisations, business, NGOs, government, ADR organisations and law firms. The list of participants is attached. Discussions were conducted under the Chatham House Rule requiring that comments not be attributed to specific speakers. The hosts are endebted to Foley Hoag for providing the venue and refreshments for the event in Boston and to the UK Government for funding NGO participation.