Human rights in global supply chains: Measuring the effectiveness of home state regulatory models on corporate behaviour

Since the adoption of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) in 2011, various national legislative developments are being aimed at turning the voluntary UNGPs into binding legal obligations for corporate human rights impacts within global supply chains. The leading examples of such laws are those of the Germany, France, and the proposed EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive. Although these laws are built on the concepts of the UNGPs, they each follow different models in terms of scope, types of duties imposed, and level of enforcement , and they are all enacted by the so-called "home states" of transnational corporations (countries where the companies at the top end of global supply chains are based).

This study will investigate and compare the effect of each of these home state legal models on corporate practice. In particular, the focus will be on eight jurisdictions in which key developments have or are taking place: the Germany, France, Norway, the Netherlands, Switzerland, UK, the EU and the forced labour import bans already in existence in the US and currently proposed by the EU.