The importance of law in development discourse, especially in times of global crises as captured under Sustainable Development Goal 16 is a critical factor in establishing and maintaining the rule of law by empowering the most vulnerable persons and groups in society to exercise their fundamental human rights against unfettered legal regimes and political leadership.

This contribution delivers an overview of OECD documents that tackle Responsible Business Conduct in general and Due Diligence in particular, sharing some of the author’s views on challenges for implementation of due diligence in Latin America.

Due diligence can be required under both legal and extra-legal understandings. It has had a long presence in international law, under different regimes, offering a flexible approach that demands reasonable responses in light of the concrete circumstances. However, because of its actual demands depending on primary law, how it is and will be made operative in business and human rights law cases will depend much on its understanding, negotiations and law-making. Thus, it is important to identify risks of a “weak” multi-level adoption due to potential “corporate or economic capture” and other dynamics.

El pasado 21 de mayo, profesoras y profesores que integran la Rama Latinoamericana de la Global Business and Human Rights Scholars Association realizaron el webinar “La Debida Diligencia en el régimen de Empresas & Derechos Humanos: Una visión desde América Latina”. El propósito del evento fue analizar la debida diligencia y su potencial impacto en las discusiones sobre el régimen de empresas y derechos humanos en dicha región.

On May 21, members of the Latin American Branch of the Global Business and Human Rights Scholars Association organized the webinar “Due Diligence in the Business & Human Rights regime: A Latin American view”. The purpose was to analyze the potential impact that the implementation of due diligence norms and policies may have in advancing the business and human rights field in the region.

Now that the commencement of AFCTA has been postponed in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a need for a clear conceptualisation of flexibility in relation to the commitments and obligations created in African RTAs including the AFCTA. There is also a need to identify how some narratives that are subsumed in the flexibility paradigm may end up doing more harm than good to informal trade engagements in the continent.

The Association of Media Women in Kenya (AMWIK) is a National Media Association established in 1983 and registered under the Societies Act as a non-profit membership organization for women journalists from the print, electronic and digital media and other areas of communication. AMWIK seeks to develop a five year Strategy for 2020-2025, the key document that will define its mission and goals.

The Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Gl-ESCR) is a non- governmental organisation that believes transformative change to end endemic problems of social and economic injustice is possible through a human rights lens.

The Namibia Law Journal invites contributions from authors with regard to the impact of Covid-19 on the Namibian society and developed countries, from legal and socio-economic perspectives, regarding the effects that the global pandemic will have on such countries’ developmental aspirations and the realisation of their Sustainable Developmental Goals (SDGs). 

In this blog, using the First City Monument Bank (FCMB) solar initiative as a case-in-point, I attempt a pragmatic and actionable framing of the sustainability transition of Nigeria within the Covid-19 context.