The UN Responsible Business and Human Rights Forum for the Asia-Pacific region took place last week in Bangkok and what struck me most was rights holder frustration and a desire for less talk and more action.

Rights holders make up just 8% of the total number of speakers at the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights over the past 6 years. This post, coming after the conclusion of the 12th UN Forum, updates previous data on rights holder speakers and calls for more efforts to include rights holder perspectives.

In an earlier blog post, I introduced the argument that the conceptual language of epistemic injustice would be a useful tool for helping address harmful practices of corporate power. My recent paper takes that idea and runs with it a bit further, and using access to remedy through non-judicial grievance mechanisms (NJGMs) as an example, it argues not only that the conceptual language of epistemic injustice is useful for BHR, but also that it is an ethical obligation to “interrogate and address” epistemic injustice if BHR sees itself as a field that contributes to justice and if it truly aims to centre rights holders. 

This post, coming after the conclusion of the 11th UN Forum, updates previous data on rights holder speakers to include the information from this year and reflects on what the rights holders spoke about at the Forum and what that suggests about the way forward to advance business respect for human rights.

Over the past four years, rights holders have comprised only 6% of the speakers at the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights. This post provides several rights holders’ perspectives on the Forum and concludes that the Forum is failing to be inclusive.

This post examines data on who gets to speak at the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights, points to systematic issues that are sidelining rights holders at the Forum and ultimately seeks to spark conversations on how to make the Forum better.

The consultative process for UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights’ s thematic report to the 77th session of the UN General Assembly framed the topic as “ensuring business respect for human rights in the political and regulatory sphere and preventing “corporate capture.” So why was corporate capture missing from the report?

The UN Forum on Business and Human Rights needs an overhaul. As the world’s largest annual gathering on business and human rights, it is an important venue for exchange of ideas and good practice — but one that has not provided sufficient space for rights holder expertise and input.

Analytical frameworks offer a more detailed lens through which to understand and talk about power imbalances in the BHR context. The different approaches highlighted in this post map out the various ways in which corporations exercise power in the BHR space, and help to identify less visible forms of power used in company-community engagement, and consider the epistemic dimensions of power and its material impact.

There is an urgent need to understand and promote processes for mitigating and remedying corporate human rights harms in ways that lead to rights-respecting outcomes for local communities. This article explores how companies may use remedial mechanisms that on their face appear adequate to fairly address negative impacts on local communities, but nonetheless fail to remedy those harms.

Human rights work is a praxis of possibility when it is based in learning from and collaborating with people directly impacted by systemic injustice and oppression. This isn’t happening enough. This post examines this issue through the lens of epistemology, drawing on Santos’ book The End of the Cognitive Empire.