Corporate consensus and the OECDs human rights mechanism

The OECD Guidelines on Multinational Enterprises are uniquely placed as a corporate responsibility instrument. It is the only standing international mechanism available to lodge complaints directly against transnational corporations that has legal force obliging signatory governments. This chapter assesses the efficacy of the Guidelines in addressing human rights violations by corporations. It analyses a data set of complaint outcomes made using the OECD Guidelines procedure in order to assess their ability to resolve conflicts. This analysis finds that that 12 per cent of cases were resolved to the mutual satisfaction of both parties. On average this adds up to between three and four cases every year. The chapter concludes that we are therefore dealing with a few cases that can, in global terms, only be described as token. Therefore, rather than providing a mechanism that encourages consensual decision-making, National Contact Points have a different role: they ‘manage’ rather than resolve complaints.