The advantages of a proactive business response to human rights reporting

In a globalizing world, with shifting production, labor and consumer markets and increased competitiveness, human rights are gaining new practical relevance. The UN Global Compact presented by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to the World Economic Forum at Davos in 1999, sought to create a voluntary international corporate citizenship network to bring together private-sector and other social actors. Its central aim is to advance responsible corporate citizenship and universal social and environmental principles to meet the challenges of globalization. The business (and ethical) case for corporate engagement in human rights reporting is strengthening, although much still needs to be done. The Danish Human Rights and Business Project launched its 2006 educational project on company codes of conduct aimed at developing models for business in the pharmaceutical, steel, agricultural, logging, lumber, paper and cardboard, and apparel and textile industries, assessing company codes against international human rights standards.

Saving human rights from its friends : a critique of the imaginary justice of Costas Douzinas

Costas Douzinas has argued that human rights arise from a universal but unconscious need for recognition of oneself by others as unique and whole. According to Douzinas, humans' activities and interrelationships are determined by their desires and human rights are a manifestation of those same deep characteristics. Because the basic desires are by their nature incapable of being satisfied, the aspiration for human rights is likewise doomed to frustration. Douzinas' analysis of human nature is derived from a reading of Jacques Lacan's theory of psychoanalysis in which an imaginary and a symbolic realm of experience are defined. Douzinas attempts a synthesis between the Lacanian imaginary and the ethical arguments of Emmanuel Levinas. It will be argued here that the synthesis proposed by Douzinas is itself doomed to failure and that Douzinas' negative approach to human rights and to justice should be rejected in favour of a positive approach.

Are we speaking the same language? Corporate perceptions of human rights responsibilities

Over the last several years, notions of corporate social responsibility and corporate responsibility for human rights have developed on several fronts, including under international human rights law, through voluntary initiatives and in the discourse and the reporting of the corporations themselves. But are all protagonists on all these fronts speaking the same language? Are these developments truly improving the realisation of human rights?
As one aspect of its three year Australian Research Council project examining the legal human rights responsibilities of multinational corporations, the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law set out to discover the perceptions that multinational corporations have of their own human rights responsibilities, the types of activities undertaken by corporations to fulfill those responsibilities and the appropriate extent, if any, of the imposition of legally binding human rights obligations on corporations.
While not setting out the formal findings of that empirical study, this paper reports on some interesting discoveries as to how corporations see their place in the human rights debate. It notes a divergence among corporations' views of the nature of human rights responsibility - whether an obligation or a benevolence - as well as its content. In considering whether corporations ought to have legally binding human rights obligations, a surprising number of corporations replied in the affirmative, citing reasons such as certainty in dealing with suppliers and instituting a level playing field against rogue operators.
However,  perhaps the most important finding is the different understandings of human rights as they relate to a corporation's operations. Agreement on potential reforms would be meaningless if they were not employed towards a commonly understood end. After examining the various responses of the corporations and the evidence they cited to support their contentions, the paper concludes that the various protagonists of human rights responsibility for corporations may be using the same words, but they are not yet speaking the same language.

Limiting the list : human rights and intangible cultural heritage

UNESCO's Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Heritage came into force in April 2006, signalling a major expansion of the global system of heritage protection from the tangible to the intangible. It is an expansion that some heritage professionals see as opening up a Pandora's box of confusions and complexities. The conservation of inanimate objects tangible sites and monuments and artefacts - is difficult enough; but the protection of heritage embodied in people raises new sets of ethical and practical issues. The paper canvasses these concerns and focuses on how the notion of human rights must be used as a way of limiting and shaping the Intangible List. In particular it outlines the ways in which the protection and preservation of cultural heritage is linked to 'cultural rights' as a form of human rights. This linkage is not clearly recognised by cultural heritage practitioners in many countries, who view their work merely as technical, or even by human rights workers, despite the abundance of opportunities around the world to witness people struggling to assert their cultural rights in order to protect their heritage and identity.

Human rights and the treatment of sex offenders

Human rights create a protective zone around persons and allow them the opportunity to further their own valued personal projects without interference from others. All human beings hold human rights and that includes sex offenders, although some of their freedom rights may be legitimately curtailed by the State. In this paper we apply the concept of human rights to sex offenders. First we briefly analyze the concept of human rights, their structure, and justification. Second, we apply our own model of human rights to the assessment and treatment of sex offenders. We conclude that a significant advantage of a human rights approach is that it is able to integrate the value and capability aspects of offender treatment.

The vacuousness of rights in the euthanasia debate

It has been claimed that the arguments for and against euthanasia have not changed in the last 120 years. Throughout this period, two rights claims have been thought to be central to the debate. The right to autonomy is invoked by many euthanasists as the main argument in support of euthanasia. This is often countered by the claim that euthanasia violates the right to life. This article argues that the relevance of these rights claims to the euthanasia debate has been overstated. More generally, it is argued that the bluntness of the rights claims in the context of the euthanasia debate is illustrative of the fact that the concept of rights is an unsuitable device for resolving moral disputes which involve conflicting rights.

Making the pedagogic relay inclusive for indigenous Australian students in mathematics classrooms

Many students are unsuccessful in the study of school mathematics, not because of some innate ability, but because of pedagogical practices. Bernstein (1996) has argued that pedagogy serves as a mechanism for cultural reproduction, so that for those students whose cultures are different from that represented in and through pedagogy, the task of constructing school mathematics is made more difficult. The paper explores the ways in which a teacher changes the pedagogic relay in order to be more inclusive of her students. Her practice is informed by understanding the ways in which pedagogy is a subtle tool for marginalization in mathematics.

Children's status and children's rights, historically and cross-culturally

In this thesis, my goal is to construct a vision of an ideal setting for children. By examining different ways of thinking about children and childhood, and by considering different approaches which have worked or do work practically, I will seek to envision something better for children. Trying to reach a better context for children will also include an inherent criticism of current conditions. Based on these criticisms, I will identify the elements that I believe can contribute to an ideal setting in which children can not only lead safe, healthy and happy lives, but also develop their own unique potential. The discipline of the history of childhood as well as cross-cultural studies show the relativistic nature of childhood. The concept of childhood, expectations of children, and societal roles for children have changed drastically over time and differ across cultures today. Children's advocates and the children's rights movement both reflect and promote changes in the context of childhood. As attitudes about childhood change, efforts arise to bring reality into line with the new ideals and images. Efforts toward improving children's rights also spread new ideas about children through the society.

Opting out of shareholder governance rights: a new perspective on contractual freedom in Australian corporate law

One of the classic debates in corporate law relates to whether the rules of corporate law are ar should be 'mandatory', in that companies must comply, or 'enabling' - meaning a set of default rules which companies have the choice of adopting or 'opting out' of through alternative contractual arrangements. The so-called 'mandatory/enabling' debate has been especially prominent in the United States fro numerous reasons, yet has also received some attention in Australia. That said, the extent to which companies can 'opt out' of corporate law has rarely been considered as a practical issue in Australia - particularly whether Australian companies can 'opt out' of provisions under the Corporations Act ("the Act"). However, just recently, two high-profile events in Australia have made 'opting out' of corporate law a relevant issue, especially the question of whether companies are free to 'opt out' of provisions of the Corporations Act  which provide express governance rights to shareholders. These events were Boral's constitutional amendment in 2003 to restrict the ability of shreholders to propose amendments to the company's constitution, and the contemplation and introduction of so-called 'pre-nuptial' agreements- designed to by-pass the right of shreholders to vote on removing directors in public companies. In the light of these two recent events, in this article the authors revisit the mandatory/enabling debate. However, rather than going over old ground as to whether a mandatory or enabling approach to corporate regulation is desirable, the authors approach the issue from a fresh perspective: that Australian Securitiesand Investments Commission's ("ASIC") existing relief powers under the Act should be extended to provide a means for companies to opt out of provisions containing shareholder governance rights.