Global Environmental Law at a Crossroads

Is The Time Ripe for Binding Norms for Corporate Accountability?

Ceremonial Mootcourt Room

International voluntary corporate social responsibility initiatives such as international codes of conduct, non-financial reporting standards and governance principles have displayed an exponential growth trend in recent decades, in response to growing recognition of the need for a policy response to the harmful social and environmental effects of globalization. Corporate accountability was a major topic in 2002 at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, resulting in the strengthening of voluntary frameworks and the launching of several new voluntary initiatives. The expansion of the realm of corporate social responsibility, sustainability reporting and accountability through voluntary means has not, however, blunted calls by international civil society organizations, IGOs, states and business associations for the adoption of a binding international legal framework on corporate accountability. Discussion of a “global policy framework” for corporate accountability that may lead to binding norms took place during the preparation of this year’s Rio+20 Conference in the development of a vision of “The Future We Want.” Against the backdrop of more than three centuries of operation of the corporate form in international environmental politics, the paper tracks the rise of concern over corporate accountability and the explosion of voluntary initiatives, assesses the limitations of the latter, and examines the implications of a binding legal framework, as well as the possible principles, criteria, norms and structure that such a framework could take on, with regard for legal diversity, collateral legal constraints, and capacity and other issues.