Essex Business and Human Rights Project
Examples of ongoing projects
Foreign direct investment and social
conflict, Kosovo
Contemporary
Kosovo faces on the one hand the challenge that longstanding property disputes
caused by social conflict and exacerbated by the displacement of populations
need to be addressed. On the other hand, there is the emerging demand for the
creation of conditions favourable to inward investment, and the projects that
result risk disrupting patterns of property holdings in different communities,
as well as the pace and nature of settlement of socially and politically
sensitive property disputes. The presence of the World Bank is likely to
stimulate this process, both directly and via encouragement of other projects
which will receive mixtures of domestic and international lending. Consequently,
investors, civil society, and government require adequate tools for a proactive
approach to building and regulating the framework within which foreign direct
investment would be most beneficial. The study focuses on this need.
Environmental damage and Human Rights
violations through oil extraction, Nigeria
The impacts of international oil companies' operations in the Niger Delta on
the environment and Human Rights of the local population have previously been
raised by various non-governmental organisations worldwide. Lawsuits had been
filed for reparation by the individual victims of these violations both in
Nigeria and abroad. However, it seems that these efforts had not been sufficient
for urging international oil companies to clean up the pollution resulting from
oil extraction in the Niger delta, to disclose the information they hold on
pollution in the region and to prevent the adverse human rights impacts of its
operations on the lives and livelihoods of the locals. The purpose of this
project is, in collaboration with Amnesty International UK, to motivate
international oil companies to take action by generating investor pressure on
those companies who are operating in the Delta.
Non-judicial mechanism of redress, multi-site study
Workers and local communities currently face an inadequate availability of
means of redress for harms suffered at the hands of businesses operating outside
their home country. Despite the growing interest in filling this gap with
non-judicial redress mechanisms over recent years, the operational dynamics of
this kind of mechanism remain poorly understood. The degree to which governments
play a more active role in monitoring companies abroad will determine a
mechanisms' powers of investigation and enforcement, and available remedies.
However, there are limits to the range of regulatory powers that can or should
be extended to non judicial mechanisms. As such, it is unclear how they should
be designed and managed to achieve stronger compliance by transnational business
actors. This study looks therefore at the weaknesses of current regulatory
systems intended to enforce acceptable standards of corporate conduct on
businesses operating outside their national regulatory jurisdictions, to
identify practical means by which to improve the system.
Short-term projects
For Global Witness, a team of members and associates of the Essex Business
and Human Rights project is currently analyzing the human rights and
environmental features of an investment contract between the Government of
Afghanistan and a Chinese Mining Consortium, as well as a model investment
agreement and legislation for the petroleum industry in Liberia.