Professora Doutora Claire Bright

The COVID-19 pandemic has sadly illustrated the difficulties arising out of unregulated global supply chains. In addition, business responses to the pandemic have shown the risks of adverse human rights impacts in companies’ operations and in their global supply chains. Examples include allegations of inadequacy of the health and safety measures taken by certain multinational companies, such as Amazon, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, affecting their right to health and potentially their right to life, or the invocation of the force majeure clause by many international brands such as Urban Outfitters in their contracts with suppliers, preventing the delivery and payment of produced orders, leaving workers in their supply chain with no wages.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sadly illustrated the difficulties arising out of unregulated global supply chains. In addition, business responses to the pandemic have shown the risks of adverse human rights impacts in companies’ operations and in their global supply chains. Examples include allegations of inadequacy of the health and safety measures taken by certain multinational companies, such as Amazon, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, affecting their right to health and potentially their right to life, or the invocation of the force majeure clause by many international brands such as Urban Outfitters in their contracts with suppliers, preventing the delivery and payment of produced orders, leaving workers in their supply chain with no wages.

On 23 April 2020, Secretary-General António Guterres called on COVID-19 responses to adopt a ‘human rights lens’. Such a human rights lens is central to business responses to the pandemic and could form the basis of a new social contract. Ultimately, failure for companies to meet the expectations in terms of human rights due diligence will subject them to the courts of public opinion (employees, communities, consumers, civil society and investors) and may entail that they lose their social licence to operate.

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