Business and Human Rights: Dialectics of Interaction

DOI

10.2991/aebmr.k.200318.008How to use a DOI?

Keywords

business, human rights, European Court of Human Rights, Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, obliged to respect human rights, OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises

Abstract

Adoption of the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises indicates gradual change in human rights theory. However the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms is the most universal international treaty and the European Court of Human Rights was created to ensure its implementation The Convention lays down vertical dimension of human rights and the practice of the Court allows to speak about the necessity to adjust the theory of human rights in the context of extending the duty to respect human rights to business. The classical theory of human rights, according to which the addressee of human rights is the state (which has responsibilities for human rights recognition, provision and protection) does not meet modern challenges with the spread of influence of business upon the field of human rights and the activities of transnational corporations, in particular, because of the necessity to extend the duty to respect and provide human rights to businesses. Business is an important subject in the field of human rights implementation, but until recently, it was not obliged to respect human rights. An important factor in changing the theory of human rights was the activities of transnational corporations. The main provisions implemented in international law are the following: the state has both positive and negative obligations in the field of human rights, an obligation to protect them from breaches by third parties, in particular, by business. To do this, the state should adopt quality legislation providing for the liability of persons breaching human rights; the state is obliged to create effective remedies for human rights violations, both judicial and extrajudicial; the state is also obliged to create conditions for functioning of non-state remedies; business must respect human rights by exercising human rights due diligence. Aspects of the mutual influence of human rights and business at the international level are determined by the practice of the European Court of Human Rights (the Court), the analysis of which allows to conclude on both the impact of business on human rights and the impact of rights on business. The impact of business on human rights can be both positive (when business promotes further human rights development or directly implements human rights) and negative. However, the most common in practice of the Court are cases in the field of media, legal business and financial and property cases. Human rights might constrain the development of a particular business (Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and the Dignity of the Human Being with regard to the Application of Biology and Medicine: Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine stipulates that development of biology and medicine should be used for the benefit of society, but without prejudice to human dignity). One of the aspects of interaction between human rights and business is that businesses can apply for human rights protection to the European Court of Human Rights.

Copyright

© 2020, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Orlova Olena
AU  - Kuchuk Andrii
AU  - Ivanii Olena
PY  - 2020
DA  - 2020/03/23
TI  - Business and Human Rights: Dialectics of Interaction
BT  - Proceedings of the  III International Scientific Congress Society of Ambient Intelligence 2020 (ISC-SAI 2020)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 56
EP  - 62
SN  - 2352-5428
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/aebmr.k.200318.008
DO  - 10.2991/aebmr.k.200318.008
ID  - Olena2020
ER  -