Global Business and Human Rights

Globalization includes the promise of economic development and wellbeing for all. However, from the early days of international trade until today this scarcely came without unfavorable, sometimes dreadful consequences for humans, be it slavery in colonial crop plantations, health and safety risks for coal miners throughout industrialization or, more recently, discrimination of factory workers in sweatshops. With an ever more complex framework of human rights establishing around the world and stakeholder expectations towards business conduct, managers of modern companies need to find ways for their organizations how these comply with laws and regulations on the international arena and to manifest as responsible corporations. This course delivers a fundamental understanding of the connections between business conduct and human rights in a globalized world for an audience, who are generally interested in globalization and human rights and for individuals who are working at such interfaces in companies, civil society, intergovernmental or government organizations. In this course we illustrate the various connections and impacts between globalization, company activities and human rights from an ethical, historical, cultural and legal perspective. It gives an overview of important institutions and their role in the discussion about human rights, and on relevant concepts, approaches and tools that companies use to address and manage human rights.