Prerequisite: None

Exam Type: No Exam

This seminar will operate as a lab and explore the growing field of business and human rights by examining live issues and pressing problems surrounding efforts to advance community-centric corporate responsibility and accountability. In recent years, a robust debate has emerged around the challenge of extending human rights norms to corporate actors. Historically, human rights advocates have focused on state actors, but as the reach and influence of private actors and companies has grown, their impact on human rights has become impossible to ignore. Today, the human rights movement has squarely engaged the private sector, marking a critical shift and raising a host of issues for practitioners.

The field of business and human rights now touches on a dizzying array of policy and legal areas, including company due diligence standards, judicial and non-judicial grievance mechanisms, relations between businesses and communities, extraterritorial application of domestic laws, supply chain systems, and whether there should be an international human rights treaty to regulate the conduct of corporations. The field now also includes a growing body of domestic and international standards and mechanisms, which are helping to define these policy and legal arenas as well as the precise scope of corporate human rights obligations.

The seminar will focus on community-centric approaches to business and human rights, and efforts to elevate community power and incorporate them into current legal and policy frameworks and legislation as well as company community engagement policies. The class will give students an opportunity to explore the work of practitioners experimenting with current live problems in the field, including emerging due diligence standards. Throughout the seminar, students will work collaboratively in teams to explore such problems in particular contexts, while also reflecting on the implications of the issues for the field of business and human rights more generally.

A limited number of seats in the seminar are reserved for clinical students enrolled in the Human Rights Entrepreneurs Clinic, which offers students the opportunity to support human rights entrepreneurs and innovators as they translate their ideas for change into reality. The Clinic operates as a lab to support partners as they develop and incubate ideas to pursue innovative strategic approaches that advance human rights. In particular, the Clinic focuses on frontier litigation related to climate justice and corporate accountability as well as community-centric approaches to business and human rights. The Clinic also supports student entrepreneurs whose work relates to human rights.

To learn more about the Clinical Curriculum and Registration, please visit our Clinical Registration Center. You can also find more information on How to Register for Clinics and How Clinical Credits Work.