ABSTRACT
Chapter 1 describes the evolution of the regulatory landscape on CSR and business and human rights from a legal perspective. It traces the origins back to the 1970s when the first steps were taken towards individual and industry-wide codes of conduct, international standards, and cooperation. It notes the agenda of the business community to promote voluntary approaches and the notion of CSR. As the media continued to bring to public attention the unpunished corporate human rights abuses, thereby exposing the limitations of voluntary approaches, justification for mandating CSR and businesses’ human rights responsibilities increased. It notes the emergence of the BHR discourse and how the quest by victims for legal corporate accountability and access to remedies led States towards a legalisation of businesses’ human right responsibilities in relation to human rights. This is followed by an analysis of the initiative of the UN Norms, which preceded the UNGPs and from whose failure the SRSG drew important conclusions. The chapter sheds light on the significance and justifications of attempts at ‘legalizing’ businesses’human rights responsibilities during the previous decades.
