TITLE

THE UN GLOBAL COMPACT: THE CHALLENGE AND THE PROMISE

AUTHOR(S)

Williams, Oliver F.

PUB. DATE

October 2004

SOURCE

Business Ethics Quarterly;Oct2004, Vol. 14 Issue 4, p755

SOURCE TYPE

Academic Journal

DOC. TYPE

Article

ABSTRACT

The UN Global Compact is a voluntary initiative designed to help fashion a more humane world by enlisting business to follow ten principles concerning human rights, labor, the environment, and corruption. Although the four-year-old Compact is a relatively successful initiative, having signed up over eleven hundred companies and more than two hundred of the large multinationals, and having begun some important projects on globalization issues, there is a serious problem in that very few of the major U.S. companies have joined. While the premier U.S. companies are interested in meeting the legitimate expectations of society, there is concern centering around accountability issues. The accountability issues are in four major areas: I. Accountability showing that the globalization of the economy actually helps the poor. 2. Accountability showing the corporate performance matches rhetoric. 3. Accountability that provides legitimacy to a two-tier pricing system and other measures that are designed to assist the poor in developing countries. 4. Accountability in the human rights area; what societal expectations are multinational companies accountable for? The article outlines the problems that the Compact brings to the fore and offers some insight from the ethical literature that may address U.S. company concerns or provide new ways of thinking about the issues. It further argues that the forum provided by the Compact may be the most effective means to gain consensus of the role of business in society.

ACCESSION #

14687855

Tags: BUSINESS ethics;  GLOBALIZATION;  HUMAN rights;  ENVIRONMENTAL protection;  UNITED Nations;  SOCIAL responsibility of business;  INDUSTRIAL management;  INTERNATIONAL cooperation;  INTERNATIONAL business enterprises

 

Related Articles

• Human Rights, Transnational Corporations and Embedded Liberalism: What Chance Consensus? Whelan, Glen; Moon, Jeremy; Orlitzky, Marc // Journal of Business Ethics;Jul2009 Supplement 2, Vol. 87, p367 

  This article contextualises current debates over human rights and transnational corporations. More specifically, we begin by first providing the background to John Ruggie�s appointment as �Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human rights and transnational...

• Business and the International Human Rights Regime: A Comparison of UN Initiatives. Seppala, Nina // Journal of Business Ethics;Jul2009 Supplement 2, Vol. 87, p401 

  This article argues that the extension of the international regime of human rights to companies has not changed the essentially state-centric nature of the regime. The analysis focuses on three recent United Nations initiatives: (1) �Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations...

• BUSINESS AND HUMAN RIGHTS: THE STRUGGLE FOR ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE UN AND THE FUTURE DIRECTION OF THE ADVOCACY AGENDA. Feeney, Patricia // Sur: Revista Internacional de Direitos Humanos;Dec2009, Vol. 6 Issue 11, p160 

  Over the past 40 years the United Nations has made various attempts to develop global standards to hold companies accountable for their involvement in human rights abuses. This article traces the growing awareness of business-related human rights abuses and the limitations of the traditional...

• Transnational Corporations and the Duty to Respect Basic Human Rights. Arnold, Denis G. // Business Ethics Quarterly;Jul2010, Vol. 20 Issue 3, p371 

  In a series of reports the United Nations Special Representative on the issue of Human Rights and Transnational Corporations has emphasized a tripartite framework regarding business and human rights that includes the state "duty to protect," the TNC "responsibility to respect," and "appropriate...

• A GLOBAL ETHIC IN AN AGE OF GLOBALIZATION. Kung, Hans // Business Ethics Quarterly;Jul97, Vol. 7 Issue 3, p17 

  Starting from the four theses that globalization is unavoidable, ambivalent, incalculable, and can be controlled rationally, ethics has an indispensable and important role to play in the process of globalization. Indeed, a number of international documents published in the 1990s not only...

• CSR and the Debate on Business and Human Rights: Bridging the Great Divide. Wettstein, Florian // Business Ethics Quarterly;Oct2012, Vol. 22 Issue 4, p739 

  Human rights have not played an overwhelmingly prominent role in CSR in the past. Similarly, CSR has had relatively little influence on what is now called the "business and human rights debate." This contribution uncovers some of the reasons for the rather peculiar disconnect between these two...

• Emerging International Human Rights Norms for Transnational Corporations. Mantilla, Giovanni // Global Governance;Apr-Jun2009, Vol. 15 Issue 2, p279 

  This article analyzes the emergence of new human rights norms for transnational corporations. It first explores voluntary norm-making approaches, which have been a staple of this issue area since the 1970s. Second, it analyzes the formulation and eventual fall of the UN Draft Norms on the...

• Building Civil Society. Theobald, Robin; Arkani, Sep // Journal of Corporate Citizenship;Autumn2007, Issue 27, p37 

  Despite the apparent advance of democracy over the last decade there is abundant evidence of continuing human rights (HR) abuse across the globe. This means that transnational corporations (TNCs) are often operating in states where such abuses are endemic. The upsurge of interest in responsible...

• The Collateral Protection of Rights in a Global Economy. LEADER, SHELDON // New York Law School Law Review;2009, Vol. 53 Issue 3/4, p805 

  An essay analyzing the collateral relationship of human rights and the economic objectives amid emerging globalization is presented. The collateral role is described by the ability of an institution to put the rights in question at the core of its obligations and many businesses that favor this...

Read the Article