1. On human rights (HR), governments and civil society must consistently hold corporations to account. When it comes to HR, neither flashy-management-slogans nor corporate nitpicking over HR terms and principles are even near good enough*. If civil society does not promptly and decisively act to make corporations respect overall HR, development (and environmental) matters, the future will indeed be bleak.
*: Corporations are quick to mention international HR covenants, but often fail to mention the concrete duties contained in them.
2. Corporations simply cannot themselves self-righteously determine what is acceptable and legitimate –and much less what is ‘responsible’ corporate management. That is up to society as a whole to judge…which is why much attention is being paid to the discourse on the social and societal responsibilities corporations should live-up to.
3. As we saw in the previous Reader, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a vague term. Different corporations associate all kinds of things with it; with their different vested interests, they adopt definitions of CSR that basically best suit them. Moreover, the emphasis is on ‘voluntary’ enforcement…and without binding-HR-duties, social responsibility remains a very moot concept.
4. In HR work, we prefer to speak of ‘corporate accountability’ rather than of corporate social responsibility, i.e., companies having to fulfill HR duties as defined by law, as enforced by the state and as monitored by civil society.
5. Through those laws, corporations must be held accountable for a number of things. They have to: not market harmful products, not manipulate consumers through advertising, not promote superfluous consumption, not lobby against any interests opposite to society overall, promote sustainable patterns of consumption and of production, uphold labor standards, and pay all their taxes.*
*: We remind you of the devastating effect that low tax rates and the proliferation of loopholes in tax systems have had on public budgets. No doubt, there needs to be active opposition to powerful corporate lobbies abusing/dodging poor (and rich) countries’ tax laws. There must be: stricter obligations for companies to report their income, fair taxation of the same to the benefit of society; and effective national and international enforceable sanctions and liabilities for companies that evade taxes.
6. Corporations like to tell us that CSR benefits the people of poor countries –as if profit interests suddenly went hand-in-hand with HR and environmental protection. In reality, CSR often flies in the face of those goals. Experience with the implementation of voluntary-codes-of-conduct shows that this approach does not suffice; at best, it has led to some isolated temporary improvements especially when independent audits are conducted and breaches of conduct sanctioned. Nonetheless, no systemic improvements can be reported in this context. For these voluntary codes to have a chance to work, the locally affected people and their organizations would have to be involved –but they are not.
7. A focus on HR from a merely technocratic management-based approach, devoid of a grassroots political input, does not deliver what it promises. The question is no longer: How can a voluntary-code-of-conduct be effectively enforced? Instead, concerned people need to unambiguously know how they will be involved in improving these codes to make them work for the environment and to improve overall living conditions and people’s livelihoods. This hardly happens even in the case of CSR campaigns that look good at first glance. So we are left with the questions: How can pressure be put on powerful corporate players open to voluntary codes? How can they be made to truly respect HR principles?
8. Bottom line, it is high time to do away with the illusion that markets will take care of everything best, if simply left alone. Politicians and society at large must impose clear and binding HR (and other) duties on corporations. If we are not willing to stand for what is right –and shy from boycotting companies whose business practices and products harm society– then we cannot expect to move beyond the current state of affairs.
Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City
cschuftan@phmovement.org