Business & Human Rights Initiative

The Business and Human Rights Initiative at UConn seeks to develop and support multidisciplinary research, education, and public engagement at the intersection of business and human rights. A partnership founded by Dodd Human Rights Impact Programs, the UConn School of Business, and the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, our initiative collaborates with programs and units throughout UConn.

business-Girl-Takes-A-Break-From-Carrying-Rocks-At-A-Gravel-Quarry-edited-compressor
From the U. Roberto (Robin) Romano Papers, Archives & Special Collections, University of Connecticut

Upcoming Events

Panel on Design For Freedom Initiative (Grace Farms)

April 2, 2024 | 3:00 PM - 4:30 PM | Hybrid, Konover Auditorium & Livestream | Reception to Follow
Co-sponsored by the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute; Business & Human Rights Initiative; Engineering for Human Rights Initiative; UConn School of Social Work

Panelists: Anna Dyson (Yale Center for Ecosystems in Architecture), Nora Rizzo and Sharon Prince (Grace Farms)
The Design for Freedom movement brings industry leaders together to eliminate forced labor in the building materials supply chain, create true market transformation, and build a more equitable future.

Registration Forthcoming

Past Events

2023

March 1, 2024
Global Business Leadership in Sustainability Summit
Hosted by the School of Business Global & Sustainability Initiatives Office and co-sponsored by the Business and Human Rights Initiative.
The Global Business Leadership in Sustainability Summit (GBLSS) is a half-day event that gathers professionals, alumni, faculty, and students to discuss key sustainability topics for business. Highlighted at this year's event are existing sustainability initiatives ongoing across the University of Connecticut and the State of Connecticut. The summit aims to create a space to build productive relationships with sustainable business partners while continuing to educate and prepare our students.
 
February 22, 2023
What’s Business Got to do With It? The Role of the Private Sector in Transitional Justice and Peacebuilding
Co-sponsored by Human Rights Research and Data Hub (HuRRD)
Businesses of all sizes play many roles in armed conflict, repression and other situations that lead to widespread human rights violations. Yet, when the violence ends and the arms are put down, only a handful of governments have considered how to involve companies in their transitional justice processes. This paper offers a taxonomy to help classify the different types of roles that companies play in episodes of the break-down of the rule of law and violent conflict and argues that this approach encourages governments to widen their focus to include the private sector in forward-looking peacebuilding processes such as community reconciliation, collective reparations, institutional reform, and even development.
 
December 1, 2023
Business & Human Rights in Collegiate Apparel Sourcing
Co-hosted by the Economic & Social Rights Program and Business & Human Rights Initiative
Verifying human rights standards are upheld in global supply chains is no easy task, but one essential for both ethical and legal compliance. To hear how professionals that work with UConn maintain this standard, come join us for a student-facing conversation with those who oversee ethics and compliance in one of UConn’s top licensed apparel manufacturers, Colosseum Athletics.
 
November 9, 2023
Abolition Redux? Rethinking Conventions on Slavery and Forced Labor in the Interwar Years
Co-hosted by the Economic & Social Rights Program and Business & Human Rights Initiative
Presenter: Mishal Khan, Yale Gilder Lehrman Center for Study of Slavery, Resistance & Abolition
 
October 3, 2023
‘We, the Data: Human Rights in the Digital Age’ Discussion with Author Wendy Wong
Co-hosted by the Economic & Social Rights Program, Business & Human Rights Initiative, Engineering for Human Rights Initiative, Human Rights Research & Data Hub, and the UConn School of Law
Prof. Wendy Wong, The University of British Columbia
 
September 19, 2023
Ethical Dilemmas: Corporate Response and Market Reaction to the Russia-Ukraine War
Presenter: Prof. Lingling Wang, UConn School of Business
Discussant: Bennett Freeman, Principal, Bennett Freeman Associates LLC
 
April 13, 2023
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Connections, Gender, and Access to State-Facilitated Private-Sector Development: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Senegal
Presenter: Prof. Abhit Bhandari, Temple University
 
March 1, 2023
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Human Rights, Multinational Enterprises, and Legitimacy
Presenter: Prof. Rita Mota, ESADE Business School
Discussant: Prof. Harry Van Buren, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
 
February 24, 2023
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Business & Human Rights in an Unequal World: A Genealogy
Presenter: Prof. Michelle Kelsall, SOAS University of London
Discussant: Prof. Tara Van Ho, University of Essex School of Law

2022

November 1, 2022
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Understanding the Effectiveness of State & Worker-Led Efforts to Combat Forced Labour in Supply Chains
Co-sponsored by the Economic & Social Rights Group, UConn Human Rights Institute
Presenter: Prof. Genevieve LeBaron, Simon Fraser University School of Public Policy
Discussant: Prof. Rachel Chambers, UConn School of Business, Human Rights Institute

 

October 27, 2022
Business & Human Rights Forum: The Financial Case for Systemic Social Change
Presenters: William Burckart, CEO, The Investment Integration Project (TIIP)
Kilian Moote, Managing Director, Georgeson

 

October 13, 2022
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Upending Capitalism as We Know It? Public Policy Experimentation & Its Implications for Business
Co-sponsored by the Economic & Social Rights Group, UConn Human Rights Institute
Presenter: Prof. Tricia Olsen, Daniels College of Business, University of Denver
Discussant: Prof. Lyle Scruggs, UConn Department of Political Science

 

September 20, 2022
Business & Human Rights Forum: Climate Change, Business, & Human Rights
Presenter: Prof. Danielle Anne Pamplona, Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná (Brazil), School of Law

 

April 25, 2022
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Stigma & Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Black September, Ethnic Enclaves, & New Venture Performance in Jordan
Presenter: Prof. Ryan Coles, UConn School of Business
Discussant: Prof. Michael Rubin, UConn Human Rights Institute, Schools of Engineering & Business

 

March 31, 2022
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Coupling & Coupling Compromises in Supplier Factories’ Responses to Worker Activism
Presenter: Prof. Jodi Short, UC Hastings Law
Discussant: Prof. Vivek Soundararajan, University of Bath

 

March 10, 2022
Business & Human Rights Workshop: Business, Human Rights & The Triple Planetary Crisis
Presenter: Prof. Sara Seck, Dalhousie University
Discussant: Prof. Chiara Macchi, Wageningen University

 

February 25-26, 2022
Symposium on The Changing Faces of Business Law & Sustainability
Co-hosted by the Business & Human Rights Initiative, UConn; Center for the Business of Sustainability, Smeal College of Business, Penn State University;
College of Business, Oregon State University; & the American Business Law Journal

 

February 9, 2022
Business & Human Rights Forum: Model Contract Clauses for Human Rights
Presenters: Prof. Sarah Dadush, Rutgers Law School, & Olivia Windham Stewart
Commentator: Prof. Erika George, University of Utah

 

February 4, 2022
Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum: Human Rights & Corporate Sponsorship in the Beijing Olympics
Speakers: Minky Worden, Director of Global Initiatives, Human Rights Watch
Bennett Freeman, Principal, Bennett Freeman Associates LLC
Daniela Heerdt, Researcher Sport & Human Rights, Centre for Sport & Human Rights & T.M.C. Asser Instituut.
Hosted by: Teaching Business & Human Rights Forum

2021

November 30, 2021
Business and Human Rights Workshop: Contractual Deterrence and the Ethical Supply Chain
Presenter: Robert Bird, University of Connecticut School of Business
Discussant: Gastón de los Reyes, Glasgow Caledonian New York College

 

November 11, 2021
Business and Human Rights Workshop: Is Human Rights Due Diligence the Next Form of Greenwashing?
Co-Presenters: Justine Nolan, UNSW Law and Robert McCorquodale, University of Nottingham School of Law
Discussant: David Hess, University of Michigan Ross School of Business

 

October 22, 2021
What Role Should Central Banks Play in Dealing with Environmental and Social Challenges like Climate Change and Inequality?
Hosted by: Project on Public Finance and Human Rights

 

October 21, 2021
Business and Human Rights Forum: Task Force on Inequality-related Financial Disclosures (TIFD)
A presentation and discussion on the Task Force on Inequality-related Financial Disclosures (TIFD) by Joanne Bauer, Rights CoLab
Commentator: Todd Cort, Yale School of Management

 

September 23, 2021
Financial Services Human Rights Benchmark
A presentation and discussion on the Financial Services Human Rights Benchmark by David Kinley, University of Sydney Law School and Kym Sheehan
Commentator: Ariel Meyerstein
Hosted by: Project on Public Finance and Human Rights

 

August 26, 2021
Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum: Reviving the Great Debate
Business and human rights teachers often pride themselves of the relevance of their field to practice. But are we preparing our students adequately so that there is no disconnect between theory and practice? Join us to debate this question with provocative speakers who will endeavor to convince us whether ‘The current mode of teaching business and human rights is disconnected to the reality of business and human rights in practice.’

Arguing in favor of this proposition will be:
Justine Nolan, Australian Human Rights Institute, UNSW
Amol Mehra, Laudes Foundation
Mike Posner, NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights

Arguing against the proposition will be:
Jena Martin, West Virginia University
Debbie Stothard, Altsean-Burma
Tara van Ho, University of Essex
Moderated by Robert McCorquodale, Inclusive Law

Hosted by: Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum

 

June 21, 2021
Second Roundtable for University-Based Business and Human Rights Programs
In collaboration with the Sié Center for International Security and Diplomacy at the University of Denver, the Initiative co-hosted a virtual roundtable with the dual objectives of exploring the ethical and practical challenges of supporting business and human rights research and engaging with companies and identifying and articulating best practices for university-based BHR programs.

 

March 18, 2021
Business and Human Rights Workshop: A Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for Human Rights
Rachel Chambers, University of Connecticut Human Rights Institute & Jena Martin, West Virginia University College of Law
Discussant: John Anderson, Mississippi College School of Law

 

March 12, 2021
Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum: Our First Decade: From the UNGPs to mHRDD
The Teaching BHR Forum celebrates its tenth anniversary by bringing together newer voices and the wisdom of experience to discuss mandatory human rights due diligence. The speakers will contextualize today's developments in the EU and discuss the key areas of progress and promise, the "no go" areas, and corporate board liability and governance.

Claire Bright, NOVA Knowledge Center for Business, Human Rights and the Environment
John Morrison, Institute for Human Rights and Business
Chris Patz, European Coalition for Corporate Justice
John Ruggie, Harvard Kennedy School

Hosted by: Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum

 

March 4, 2021
Business and Human Rights Forum: Human Rights, Social Justice, and Investment: Opportunities and Challenges
A panel discussion on advocacy, activism, and engagement at the intersection of finance and human rights with:
Sara Blackwell, Business and human rights consultant
Ryan Bowers, Activest
Jillianne Lyon ('18), Investor Advocates for Social Justice
Bart Robertson, Global Fund to End Modern Slavery

 

February 18, 2021
Business and Human Rights Workshop: Black Star Line, Inc.: Race in the Historical Life of the Corporation
Aaron Dhir, Osgoode Hall Law School and Yale Law School
Discussant: Larry Catá Backer, Penn State Law
Co-sponsored by: Eversource Energy Chair in Business Ethics

2020 & Before

December 11, 2020
Transnational Corporations and Human Rights: Overcoming Barriers to Judicial Remedy

A conversation to mark the publication of Transnational Corporations and Human Rights: Overcoming Barriers to Judicial Remedy and to celebrate the scholarship of Gwynne Skinner (1964 - 2017) with a panel of her co-authors and co-contributors.

Rachel Chambers, Co-Director, Teaching BHR Forum; Postdoctoral Research Associate, Human Rights Institute, University of Connecticut
Jennie Green, Clinical Professor of Law, University of Minnesota
James Yap, Lawyer, Toronto, President, Canadian Lawyers for International Human Rights

Moderated by Sarah McGrath, Director of International Engagement, Business and Human Rights, Australian Human Rights Commission

 

November 20, 2020
Business & Human Rights Roundtable on Collegiate Sourcing

 

November 12, 2020
Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: Four Thought Leaders, Four Sectors, One Dialogue

Hosted by: Teaching Business and Human Rights Forum

 

October 22, 2020
Unavoidable Power and Unaccountable Impacts? The Roles and Responsibilities of Central Banks in Global Economic Governance

Hosted by: Project on Public Finance and Human Rights

 

March 5, 2020
We Are Not Pricing Climate Risk: A Wall Street Perspective
Robert Litterman, Chairman of Risk Committee, Kepos Capital
Hosted by:  Edwin Way Teale Lecture Series

 

November 8, 2019
Business & Human Rights University Network Roundtable
The Initiative hosted a roundtable of North American university-based human rights programs to discuss their multifaceted roles in the study and practice of business and human rights.

 

November 22, 2019
Corporate Social Responsibility and Human Rights Summit
Hosted by:  President’s Committee on Corporate Social Responsibility at UConn

 

October 10, 2019
Book launch for "Tethered Fates Companies, Communities, and Rights at Stake" by Shareen Hertel, Associate Professor of Political Science and Human Rights
Book (Oxford University Press, 2019)

 

October 4, 2019
HRI Lunchtime Seminar, Sheila Hayre, Visiting Associate Professor of Law, Quinnipiac University, "Lessons from the T Visa on Protecting Victims of Trafficking: What States Can Learn"

 

September 20-21, 2018
Symposium on Finding the Human Face of Finance
Keynote address by Amy Domini, Founder and Chair of Domini Impact Investments
Workshop
Co-sponsored by: RBS Greenwich Capital Economic Seminar Series | UConn School of Business – Finance Department | Eversource Energy Chair in Business Ethics

 

October 5-6, 2017
Protecting Rights at the End of the Line: Stakeholder Engagement in Light Manufacturing
White Paper
Co-sponsored by: Research Program on Economic & Social Rights (ESRG), Human Rights Institute | UConn Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER) | Eversource Energy Chair in Business Ethics

 

March 30, 2017
Roundtable on Business and Human Rights in an Era of Anti-Globalization
Report

 

March 23, 2016
Divestment, Engagement, and How to Change the World A Perspective on South Africa, Darfur, and Fossil Fuels
Lecture by Bennett Freeman, former Senior Vice President for Social Research and Policy at the Calvert Group
Hosted by and sponsored by: Dodd Human Rights Impact as part of the RBS Greenwich Capital Economic Seminar Series

 

April 23-24, 2015
Social Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Conference: Creating Value for Business and Society
Co-hosted and co-sponsored by: Dodd Human Rights Impact | Eversource Energy Chair in Business Ethics | Connecticut Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship

 

April 8, 2014
Implementing Dodd-Frank 1502/1504: Advancing Human Rights through Financial Reporting
Hosted and sponsored by: Dodd Human Rights Impact

 

February 28, 2013
Just Business: Multinational Corporations and Human Rights
Lecture by John Ruggie, Berthold Beitz Professor in Human Rights and International Affairs at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University

 

March 1, 2013
Roundtable on Implementing the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights
Hosted and sponsored by: Dodd Human Rights Impact
Roundtable Report

Business & Human Rights News

Research

The Initiative supports and promotes scholarly research by UConn faculty in business and human rights. Reflecting the broad scope of the human rights challenges and opportunities in business, these research areas encompass:

Stakeholder Engagement

A Comparative Analysis of Stakeholder Dialogue Regimes

Principal Investigator: Shereen Hertel

Stakeholder dialogues are integral to conflict negotiation in business settings worldwide. They are a central tool in the business and human rights field, legitimated and professionalized in the early 2000s during the mandate of the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Business & Human Rights, John G. Ruggie. This project analyzes the scope of stakeholder dialogues taking place globally (drawing on the 6,000 company dataset of the New York and London-based Business & HR Resource Centre); explores the historical evolution of varying forms of public dialogue around business harm and benefits from the 1970s to present; develops a two-company in-depth case study of successful and failed stakeholder dialogues in a single industry and geographic region; and explores concrete mechanisms for enhancing the practice and content of stakeholder consultation with a view toward empowering the most vulnerable among workers and community members.

 

Featured Publication

Tethered Fates: Companies, Communities, and Rights at Stake
by Shereen Hertel
Oxford University Press, 2019

Finance & Human Rights

Assessing the Human Rights Impact of Sustainable Finance Instruments

Principal Investigator: Stephen Park

The global capital markets—and, by extension, private issuers, investors, and other financial market participants—are expected to play a growing role in supporting the fulfillment of economic and social rights. A key challenge for the incorporation of human rights is determining how to measure, assess, and report on the human rights performance of a given financial instrument by a given issuer. This project addresses this challenge in the context of green bonds, social bonds, sustainability bonds, and similar fixed-income debt instruments that are used to finance projects with a specific social benefit (such as education, employment, housing, or healthcare). The use of proceeds of these financial products, as well as the process by which they are created, sold, traded, marketed, and applied, can be defined by reference to specific human rights. This project examines the use of metrics and indicators, reporting standards, due diligence, and third-party assessment for the purpose of evaluating regulatory approaches to innovation in finance and human rights.

 

Featured Publication

Social Bonds for Sustainable Development: A Human Rights Perspective on Impact Investing
by Stephen Park
Business and Human Rights Journal, 2018

Digital Human Rights

Speech Remedies: Toward State and Corporate Accountability for the Harms of Online Speech

Principal Investigator: Molly Land
This project develops an interdisciplinary framework based on human rights law for responding to harmful speech online in ways that balance protection from the harms of speech with safeguards for freedom of expression. Current approaches to harmful online speech ignore important lessons from the history of media regulation while also failing to recognize the ways in which the internet ecosystem presents unique challenges. Lack of deep engagement with theories of speech harms and remedies also results in a misalignment of policy that elides critical distinctions between types of harms.

This project seeks to connect online speech regulation to both history and theory to understand what, if anything, is new about these problems and how law can and should respond. It draws on international human rights law to develop recommendations for both state and corporate actors in responding to harmful speech online. Its goal is to use human rights law as the basis for a global law of the internet that can be applied by companies and states alike to address the very real harms of speech while also protecting free expression.

Corporate Accountability Mechanisms

Corporate Accountability Mechanisms

Principal Investigator: Rachel Chambers
The key accountability mechanisms in the business and human rights field may be summarized as judicial and non-judicial processes, and domestic laws requiring non-financial disclosure and, increasingly, human rights due diligence. Tort litigation is one of the primary mechanisms of judicial accountability. The project explores the legal trends in tort liability for human rights violations by corporate actors in the U.S. and other home states, both as a matter of substantive and procedural law, and the role of human rights due diligence in the development of this law. Statutes mandating modern slavery disclosure continue to be enacted, despite widely expressed concern about their fitness for purpose as an accountability mechanism. The project focuses on regulatory and litigation approaches that enable human rights disclosure to be used as an accountability mechanism. A common theme that links the threads of research is the challenge of employing extraterritorial accountability mechanisms to address corporate misconduct, in particular from the perspective of the victim.

As part of its mission of engaged research, the Initiative facilitates related public engagement by UConn faculty in order to bridge the gaps between academia, business, civil society, and government. In addition, we host the Business and Human Rights Workshop, which is dedicated to the development and discussion of works-in-progress and other non-published academic research.

Education

Business and human rights education equips students with the knowledge and skills to create value for business and society. The Initiative supports and promotes business and human rights learning both in and outside of the classroom by:

Molly Land teaches a class

Public Engagement

To advance respect for human rights, UConn faculty engage with policymakers, businesses, advocates and other stakeholders to support student learning and professional opportunities in business and human rights. Examples of our engagement include:

United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR)

Participation in stakeholder consultations on the day of general discussion regarding State Obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the Context of Business Activities.

Our Written Contribution (PDF)
News Article
Adopted General Comment No. 24

Global Network Initiative (GNI)

GNI is a multi-stakeholder group of companies, civil society organizations, investors, and academics dedicated to protecting and advancing freedom of expression and privacy in the information and communications technology sector. Molly Land, professor of law and human rights and a member of our steering committee, is an alternate member of GNI's Board of Directors.

Read more.

Our People

Leadership

Stephen Park

Co-Director, Business and Human Rights Initiative
Associate Professor, Business Law

stephen.park@uconn.edu

Rachel Chambers

Co-Director, Business and Human Rights Initiative
Assistant Professor, Business Law

rachel.2.chambers@uconn.edu

People

Rachel Chambers

Assistant Professor, Business Law

rachel.2.chambers@uconn.edu

Shareen Hertel

Shareen Hertel

Wiktor Osiatyński Chair of Human Rights
Professor, Political Science & Human Rights

shareen.hertel@uconn.edu

molly land

Molly Land

Graduate Certificate Coordinator, School of Law
Catherine Roraback Professor of Law
Professor, Human Rights

molly.land@law.uconn.edu

Kathryn Libal

Kathryn Libal

Director, Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute
Associate Professor, Social Work & Human Rights

kathryn.libal@uconn.edu

Stephen Park

Co-Director, Business and Human Rights Initiative
Associate Professor, Business Law

stephen.park@uconn.edu

Michael Rubin

Michael Rubin

Director, Human Rights Research and Data Hub
Assistant Research Professor, Human Rights, Engineering & Business

michael.a.rubin@uconn.edu

Cory Runstedler

Graduate Assistant

cory.runstedler@uconn.edu