Uno de los últimos cambios en la evolución de los derechos humanos señala tanto el creciente papel de las organizaciones no estatales en la evaluación de los derechos humanos en el mundo (Amnistía Internacional, Human Rights Watch y otras) como la ampliación del listado de sus potenciales agresores más allá de la tradicional observancia de los Estados.
En este polo de la novedad, el hecho de que las corporaciones multinacionales son también capaces, como los individuos y los Estados, de perpetrar graves violaciones de derechos está atrayendo la atención de instancias nacionales e internacionales y del ámbito académico en un contexto de interdisciplinariedad pero también está interesando a la sociedad civil, y aquí no sólo a las organizaciones no gubernamentales sino también a aquellas personas que, concernidas por la realidad de su tiempo se sienten interpelada a comprenderlo un poco mejor.
Con esa intención, de echar luz sobre una novedad epocal, La responsabilidad de las multinacionales por violaciones de derechos humanos acoge una serie de investigaciones de especialistas en derecho internacional y derechos humanos realizadas específicamente para este volumen de la colección Derechos Humanos y Democracia que editan conjuntamente la Universidad de Alcalá y el Defensor del Pueblo.
El libro editado por los profesores de la Universitat Jaume I Francisco J. Zamora, Jesús García Cívico y por la profesora de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, Lorena Sales, pretende avivar el debate sobre la responsabilidad de las corporaciones internacionales en las violaciones de derechos humanos desde una perspectiva crítica y actual.
Para ello Ignacio Aymerich, director del Centro de Investigación de la Efectividad de los Derechos Humanos (CIEDH) y uno de los investigadores que participan en este volumen, comienza invitando al lector a preguntarse si es posible que las causas abiertas contra las corporaciones internacionales por violaciones de derechos humanos se sigan de unos hechos que no están aislados sino que integran una corriente de cambio más general. A continuación se profundiza en las últimas iniciativas a cargo de la comunidad internacional y el sistema de Naciones Unidas, en la vigencia de los principios avanzados por John Rugie con el trasfondo de la reciente solución al caso Kiobel ante el Tribunal Supremo de los EEUU y en distintos ejemplos de la desgraciada actualidad de la cuestión de la responsabilidad de las multinacionales en las violaciones a derechos humanos en relación con el impacto ecológico, diversas injusticias en el ámbito civil, dictaduras y otros regímenes políticos odiosos o nuevas formas de esclavitud.
Para ello Ignacio Aymerich, director del Centro de Investigación de la Efectividad de los Derechos Humanos (CIEDH) y uno de los investigadores que participan en este volumen, comienza invitando al lector a preguntarse si es posible que las causas abiertas contra las corporaciones internacionales por violaciones de derechos humanos se sigan de unos hechos que no están aislados sino que integran una corriente de cambio más general. A continuación se profundiza en las últimas iniciativas a cargo de la comunidad internacional y el sistema de Naciones Unidas, en la vigencia de los principios avanzados por John Rugie con el trasfondo de la reciente solución al caso Kiobel ante el Tribunal Supremo de los EEUU y en distintos ejemplos de la desgraciada actualidad de la cuestión de la responsabilidad de las multinacionales en las violaciones a derechos humanos en relación con el impacto ecológico, diversas injusticias en el ámbito civil, dictaduras y otros regímenes políticos odiosos o nuevas formas de esclavitud.
Estructurada en tres grandes apartados, esta obra colectiva dedica las primeras aportaciones a la responsabilidad activa por violaciones de derechos humanos desde una perspectiva sociohistórica y a una visión general de los llamados “principios rectores”. A continuación se abordan el ámbito europeo y la experiencia en EEUU para dar paso a una mirada a cuestiones que van desde la cooperación de entidades financieras privadas en el caso de aún recientes dictaduras, a la diligencia debida de las empresas ante los derechos humanos o la siempre actual cuestión de la vulnerabilidad del medio ambiente ante la actuación de determinadas corporaciones internacionales.
One of the most significant changes in the evolution of human rights in the world nowadays concerns the increasing role of the NGO´s in respect of their monitoring and evaluation tasks (for example, International Amnesty, Human Rights Watch and others) but another, unfortunately, has to do with the way in which many private actors, specially multinational corporations, are agents or complicit in violating human rights and the environment.
As a result, there is a remarkable extension of the already wide list of potential violators of human rights across the world, beyond the traditional and historical observance and duties of the States. In this order, the fact that corporations are also capable, as private individuals and the States, of perpetrating serious violations of human rights, is focusing the attention of national and international public instances, as well as the academic field. Furthermore, not only public institutions but also many civil actors and individuals as global citizens, feel the need to know more about the challenges of globalization and its threats, in order to a better understanding of the world where we live.
Having this in mind, and in order to contribute with some light on this new chapter and remarkable challenge in history of human rights, the book “The responsibility of corporations for human rights violations” contains recent essays of various specialists in Human Rights and International Law, specifically conceived for this new volume of the collection “Human Rights and Democracy” (University of Alcala - Ombudsman, Spain).
The book is edited by two Professors of the Universitat Jaume I and researchers of the Human Rights Effectiveness Research Center (HURIERC), Francisco J. Zamora and Jesus Garcia Civico, and Professor Lorena Sales, from the UCLM, and is directed to intensify the general debate on the responsibility of the corporations in respect of their violations of human rights by the means of a multidisciplinary, critic and actual perspective.
The initial chapter by the Director of HURIERC, Ignacio Aymerich, invites the reader, from a social and historical view, to wonder if it is possible that cases developed against the corporations by violations of human rights are the results of facts that are not isolated but integrated into a more general social, juridical and political change. While the remaining ones, on the other hand, deal with several matters of interest, as the well- known Ruggie Principles, direct action in European Regulation 44/2001, access to remedy in the European setting, the fight against supply chains as new forms of slavery, the extraterritorial question in Kiobel Case, financial complicity and transitional justice in Brasil, due diligence of enterprises in the field of human rights and two final chapters on the human right to an healthy environment and the right to water and procedural ways on responsibility due to environmental harms, respectively. Written by well-known authors, they all amount to an important effort towards the consecution of a critical knowledge on the subject of multinationals’ responsibility.
*
One of the most significant changes in the evolution of human rights in the world nowadays concerns the increasing role of the NGO´s in respect of their monitoring and evaluation tasks (for example, International Amnesty, Human Rights Watch and others) but another, unfortunately, has to do with the way in which many private actors, specially multinational corporations, are agents or complicit in violating human rights and the environment.
As a result, there is a remarkable extension of the already wide list of potential violators of human rights across the world, beyond the traditional and historical observance and duties of the States. In this order, the fact that corporations are also capable, as private individuals and the States, of perpetrating serious violations of human rights, is focusing the attention of national and international public instances, as well as the academic field. Furthermore, not only public institutions but also many civil actors and individuals as global citizens, feel the need to know more about the challenges of globalization and its threats, in order to a better understanding of the world where we live.
Having this in mind, and in order to contribute with some light on this new chapter and remarkable challenge in history of human rights, the book “The responsibility of corporations for human rights violations” contains recent essays of various specialists in Human Rights and International Law, specifically conceived for this new volume of the collection “Human Rights and Democracy” (University of Alcala - Ombudsman, Spain).
The book is edited by two Professors of the Universitat Jaume I and researchers of the Human Rights Effectiveness Research Center (HURIERC), Francisco J. Zamora and Jesus Garcia Civico, and Professor Lorena Sales, from the UCLM, and is directed to intensify the general debate on the responsibility of the corporations in respect of their violations of human rights by the means of a multidisciplinary, critic and actual perspective.
The initial chapter by the Director of HURIERC, Ignacio Aymerich, invites the reader, from a social and historical view, to wonder if it is possible that cases developed against the corporations by violations of human rights are the results of facts that are not isolated but integrated into a more general social, juridical and political change. While the remaining ones, on the other hand, deal with several matters of interest, as the well- known Ruggie Principles, direct action in European Regulation 44/2001, access to remedy in the European setting, the fight against supply chains as new forms of slavery, the extraterritorial question in Kiobel Case, financial complicity and transitional justice in Brasil, due diligence of enterprises in the field of human rights and two final chapters on the human right to an healthy environment and the right to water and procedural ways on responsibility due to environmental harms, respectively. Written by well-known authors, they all amount to an important effort towards the consecution of a critical knowledge on the subject of multinationals’ responsibility.
VVAA, La responsabilidad de las multinacionales por violaciones de derechos humanos, Francisco J. Zamora, Jesús García Cívico, Lorena Sales (eds.). Cuadernos de la Cátedra de Democracia y Derechos Humanos, nº 9, Universidad de Alcalá-Defensor del Pueblo, 2013, 245 páginas. ISBN: 978-84-15834-25-0.
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario