A SYNOPSIS
What is the relationship between corporations and human rights? On 3rd December 1984, a chemical plant owned by Union Carbide Corporation from the United States located in Bhopal, India, leaked, emitting a gas called methyl isocyanate (MIC) which, according to some estimates, killed 8,000 people within a few weeks. Another 8,000 have died since from gas-related diseases. Bhopal, the greatest industrial catastrophe in history, is a grim reminder of the disastrous impact of corporate neglect of safety standards upon the most fundamental of all human rights — the right to life.
Though safety and maintenance standards have improved since Bhopal, corporate violation of human rights continues to happen in various parts of the world. Factories owned by multinational textile and footwear companies in Indonesia pay such pitiable wages to their workers that they are barely able to survive. In the Philippines, 22.9% of the 33 million employed Filipino workers in 2006 received very low wages and worked for long hours in unsafe working conditions. Vietnam is another country where very low wages, long working hours, and dangerous working environments, have earned the ire of human rights groups. Even in a middle-income nation like Malaysia, categories of workers remain un-unionized, and are thus denied a basic human right.
Why are the human rights of workers not respected to the fullest in all these ASEAN states? The corporations that operate in these states, whether domestic or international, it is obvious, are more concerned about maximizing their profits than about protecting the rights of their workers. But that is not the only explanation. Domestic companies in many instances do not have the revenue to enable them to protect the socio-economic well-being of their employees. Besides, laws that protect the health and safety of workers, or ensure their political and civil liberties are woefully inadequate in a number of ASEAN societies. Even when they exist, they are not effectively enforced. On top of it, in order to lure foreign Multi-National Corporations (MNCs) to invest in their countries, ASEAN governments have been rather soft on these MNCs when it comes to worker wages, conditions of work, health and safety standards, skill and technology transfers, re-investment in worker training and education programs, and of course, the repatriation of profits.
Given the global economic decline, rising unemployment levels in the Western economies in particular, the depletion of non-renewable resources such as oil, and the contraction in global investments and global trade, it is not inconceivable that ASEAN governments, in their haste to attract both international and domestic capital, may further curb and curtail the human rights of the ASEAN worker. Human rights advocates should be cognizant of this possibility.
In a situation like this, what are the solutions that human rights advocates can put forward? For convenience sake, these solutions will have to be categorized into ‘national’ and ‘regional’ and ‘international’
National.
1) Improve the standard of living of the majority by strengthening the agrarian base of society; expanding and reinforcing small and medium-sized enterprises; investing heavily in research and development; encouraging innovation and creativity; discovering new sources of wealth; and eliminating corruption, leakages, wastage, and extravagance.
2) As society as a whole becomes more prosperous, introduce legislation that would require corporations to increase wages of workers significantly; enhance their working conditions, including their health and safety; provide more opportunities for education and skill acquisition; and focus upon saving schemes and retirement benefits for workers.
3) Encourage NGOs, media, think tanks and universities to monitor corporations to ensure that they comply with laws and policies that demand that they protect and enhance the human rights of their workers.
Regional.
1) National efforts aimed at reducing poverty should be buttressed by regional initiatives that seek to raise the standard of living of the majority by directing intra-regional investments in education, training, health-care, and infrastructure to the vulnerable and the marginalized in ASEAN.
2) Establish an ASEAN monitoring mechanism that will examine the policies and practices of a corporation from a certain ASEAN state that is operating in another ASEAN state to ensure that it protects the rights and dignity of the workers under its care. This monitoring mechanism will also look at the activities of a corporation that has ASEAN wide investments.
3) Regional NGOs and other bodies committed to workers’ rights will cooperate with the ASEAN monitoring mechanism.
International.
1) National and regional efforts at reducing poverty and bridging the gap between those who have a lot and those who have a little, should be augmented by a global endeavor to eradicate both absolute and relative poverty. Towards this end, the global financial system should be reformed to curb speculation and capital volatility; global trade should be made fairer from the standpoint of the Global South; and the rules pertaining to intellectual property rights should be made more equitable, to enable the Global South to benefit from, and contribute towards, scientific development.
2) A Center should be established — or rather re-established — in the United Nations under the aegis of the UN General Assembly, to monitor all MNCs with the aim of ensuring that they protect and uphold the economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights of all those who work for them in whatever capacity. At the very least, these rights should include health and occupational safety, and prohibition of the employment of children under a certain age. The Center will replace the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Business and Human Rights appointed in 2005. The Center’s long-term goal should be to create an environment whereby MNCs would automatically adhere to the highest standards of corporate social responsibility.
3) The Center on MNCs will cooperate with the proposed ASEAN monitoring mechanism and with NGOs at national, regional and international levels concerned about the dignity of the worker.
The institutional arrangements that we have put forward here will not achieve their laudable goals unless there is a significant change in the mindset of those who own, control and manage corporations and businesses. As long as “maximizing profits” is their credo, one cannot expect the well-being of the worker, his rights and his dignity, to be accorded importance. And yet it was not always like this. There was a time when the businessman, the trader, made his profits, and yet cared about those who worked for him as if they were his own family, cherished his relationship with his fellowmen, helped the community in whatever way he could, and most of all, remained ever conscious of his role as a trustee on earth, answerable to the Almighty.
22 September 2010
The above is a synopsis of a presentation made at the The ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR) meeting held in Kuala Lumpur from 20-24 September 2010.