The Human Rights Fitness of Audits and Certifiers: A Position Paper

Corporate responsibility is currently on the political agenda of the German government as well as the European Union. The question at stake is: what should mandatory human rights due diligence (mHRDD) legislation look like? The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) define human rights due diligence as a method for business enterprises ?to identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their adverse human rights impacts.? This covers adverse human rights impacts that a business may cause or contribute to through its own activities or business relationships, which may be directly linked to its operations, products or services. The UNGPs are the international standard that the German government as well as the EU are following as they are considering mHRDD legislation.