The activities of multinational enterprises

The activities of multinational enterprises: the complaints of the most notorious cases of
violation of fundamental human rights
Multinational enterprises, often triggered
negative trends in the  host countries . The strategic objectives of the
multinationals are often entered into conflict with the interests of workers,
local populations and, more generally, for purposes of social character. in
running the reasons for internationalization of multinationals have responded
in most cases to the logics of a purely economic. the
decisions to make direct investments in developing countries were
determined by the benefits in terms of cost of labor, exploitation
technological innovation for one cycle longer time due to
decentralization of technology in the process of obsolescence, of taxation, of
labor legislation, environmental legislation and regulations to protect the
fundamental rights of the individual. Lower costs, and fewer constraints interlocutors
weaker social have been seen as a great opportunity to expand
profits and gain market share at the cost of trampling rights
individual's fundamental.
One of the main criticisms is now directed to the alleged 'race to the bottom' that
multinational corporations lead among countries receptors, through the pressure that the
themselves can have on host states to lower standards
national protection of human rights.
The tough global competition between multinational enterprises door
in many countries to a real 'run-down' as regards the
workers' rights, wages, hours and working conditions.
Occur, in fact, situations in which governments and the local bureaucracy to attract
financial investments or for fear that multinational companies decide to
invest elsewhere, are willing to offer any kind of tax incentive to
allow it to face destruction of the environment, to turn a blind eye to
conduct prejudicial to the individual and collective rights.
But there are many other practices with which multinational enterprises can
adversely affect the respect for human rights, namely through a
direct or indirect involvement in the violation of the same.
Companies can, in fact, be involved in the abuse through the complicity
with repressive governments or political authorities or directly violate the rights
humans through their mode of recruitment or through
the impact that their production processes have on workers, local communities and
the environment.
They were numerous and well-publicized cases in which known enterprises
multinational companies have been involved in an impressive number of violations of
human rights in the most diverse areas of the world in which they conduct their activities
productive.
Among the numerous scandals that have seen some of the most famous protagonists as
multinational companies should be mentioned those related to the activities of
Shell in Nigeria, by Coca Cola in Colombia, from Bhopal in India, by Unocal
in Burma, the Del Monte in Kenya, the Nike in Indonesia, Nestle in more than twenty
Countries in the global South.
Shell in Nigeria
Are known to all the serious damage suffered by the Nigerian communities who have suffered the
social and environmental consequences of oil production
Anglo-Dutch multinational Shell without perceiving any benefit.
Oil spills, flames and other ongoing operations in high-impact
the nature of the environment ravaged region of the Niger Delta and
seriously damaged the health and chances of survival
local populations. The extraction of oil has led the community
indigenous Ogoni to ruin the land, streams and creeks are
seriously polluted; the atmosphere is poisoned by highly toxic substances
emitted by gas which is burned 24 hours a day in the vicinity of dwellings;
acid rain and oil remains devastated arable land of the Ogoni.
The peaceful protests of the indigenous communities of the Niger Delta against Shell
have been most often repressed homicidal violence by the forces of
Nigerian security.
The killing by police of protesters in Umuechen in 1990,
the killing of nine activists of the Ogoni community in 1995 and the most recent
murder and destruction of houses in the Niger Delta in 2005 are a clear proof
the excessive use of force with which the government has frequently answered
demands and protests of various communities.
The protests, repressed with disproportionate force, find their origin and
reason for the failure of the government, often run by the military, to ensure
actually the respect and protection of social and economic rights of
the local population.
In fact, no concrete measure has been taken with respect to the excessive use of
strength and no action was taken in relation to the proximity to homes,
farms and rivers of oil spills and oil and gas.
For many people the only resource is the possibility of obtaining a
compensation through endless, costly and uncertain legal action against
powerful oil companies as part of a trial system widely
corrupt.
The Nigerian government, often ruled by the military, has always been
characterized by the poor functioning of the administrative system, the
corruption, repression against activists and communities in the fight for a
healthier environment for the cessation of abuse and for a more equitable distribution
of resources.
For many years, the people living in the Niger Delta suffer violations
of their rights by the Nigerian security forces: imprisonment, torture,
rape and other human rights abuses are common practice towards those who oppose
Shell in Nigeria.
The Coca Cola in Colombia
The multinational Coca Cola was in turn accused of complicity with the
actions of right-wing paramilitary groups in Colombia along with the massive withdrawal
of ground water in India, cases have amply demonstrated what can
to make a firm to protect its profits.
The North American multinational company has been accused of violation of freedom
union of countless cases of kidnapping, intimidation, torture, imprisonment
and the arbitrary persecution and murder of workers enrolled in
trade unions in Colombia.
The Coca Cola bottling agreements with several companies in Colombia,
involved in numerous incidents of violence against activists
unions associated with the action of the right-wing paramilitary groups in the region.
The Colombian union Sinaltrainal said that since 1989 seven union leaders
and a friendly plant manager, employed in the bottling operations of Coca
Cola, were murdered by right-wing paramilitary groups in Colombia.
Hundreds of other Coca-Cola workers and their families have been tortured,
kidnapped and / or illegally detained by violent paramilitaries, often in close
contact with the Directorate of bottling plants who use it
as part of a strategy to cancel the trade union organization.
Union activists murdered in the bottling plants of Coca
Cola are not alone in a country where trade unionists were killed in 4000
last 18 years. What makes it different, however, the situation of workers in Coca
Cola is one of the largest multinational companies in the world is complicit in serious
human rights violations.
The repression of organized labor to the corporation facilitates the cutting of
production costs through the dismissal of thousands of workers and the
reduction of wages in the face of increases in production and profits.
The multinational Coca Cola has been accused of pursuing a policy of total
casualization of the workforce through the use of temporary workers
in Colombia do not enjoy any protection, not even the right to a minimum wage.
With this system, next to the policy of relocation and closure of
systems, the remuneration may fall below the minimum wage provided by
law.
Have caused severe environmental damage instead bottling operations
Coca-Cola in some parts of India, given the deleterious impact they have
had on the aquifers of the areas where these plants were placed. the
bottling plants, draining aquifers, they removed the
local populations in the region of Kerala fundamental right to obtain
drinking water and toxic waste generated that seriously threaten
the environment and public health.
The representatives of the tribes and peasants denounced the contamination
of aquifers and springs, as well as the boreholes which carried out without
criterion, seriously affecting crops.
Coca Cola is also alleged to have passed on to villagers, under
form of fertilizer, toxic waste products from its factory. tests carried out
have shown that these fertilizers have a high percentage of cadmium and
lead two carcinogens.
For details see Dossier information and complaint of Coca
Cola in Colombia, 2003, available at http: // www.tmcrew.org/ killamulti / Coke /
The Bhopal in India
In December 1984, newspapers around the world reported the dramatic
Bhopal accident. The release of a cloud of toxic gas from a plant
owned by American multinational Union Carbide caused the death of 3000
and injury to persons, including permanent, more than 15,000 people, in addition to thousands of
animals, diseases contracted as a result of the gas and pollution of groundwater
environment.
After the accident at Bhopal, still considered the largest chemical disaster
of history, the Union Carbide abandoned industrial site precipitously without
ensure that any rehabilitation of the area, leaving behind huge amounts of
polluting compounds.
The Dow Chemical Company, the largest manufacturer of plastic, which acquired Union
Carbide in 1999, has always refused to take charge of the legal consequences and
the biggest financial disaster in the history of the chemical industry.
The Unocal in Burma
Unocal, a major American oil multinationals, is accused of
forced labor, rapes, murder, torture and forcible transfer of the population of a
fifty villages in Myanmar, the former Burma.
The company Unocal and Total SA, together with a subsidiary of Petroleum
Authority of Thailand and with the State Oil Company of Myanmar, have
started in the 90s the "Yadana project", ie the construction of a gas pipeline
that connects the oil fields in the Gulf of Martaban in Myanmar, with the central
Ratchaburi in Thailand.
Unocal has been accused of using the military forces of Myanmar to
ensure safety in the construction of the Yadana pipeline, knowing that
previously, in the areas affected by the project, the military had already been
responsible for human rights violations.
To make room for the pipeline, in fact, in the peninsula of Tenasserim, a remote region
the extreme south of Burma, the Burmese army razed villages, has
forced to flee the local population or the labor force has enlisted as the
forced labor.
Well, the multinational Unocal was accused of complicity in the killings, in
reduction of forced labor, rapes and violence committed by the Burmese army
within the Yadana project.
Sued in the United States by the lawyers of the International Labor Fund in
behalf of 15 Burmese peasants for the violation of human rights in Myanmar
committed by the military of the Asian country between 1993 and 1998 during the
construction of the pipeline, the multinational Unocal has denied all charges of
about, both directly affected, is borne of its subsidiaries,
declaring that it had "never participated, tolerated or encouraged in any way
violations of human rights "and arguing that Total, operator of the main
project, had strictly complied with the rules and standards
international.
The Del Monte in Kenya
Violation of workers' rights and environmental damage are the most frequent abuses
of which Del Monte is responsible for the pineapple plantations in Kenya and
Philippines.
Since 1998, Del Monte, South African company, is owned 70% of the Group
Cirio, who in Kenya and the Philippines produces pineapple plantations within
which have been discharged working conditions unworthy and pollution processes
serious for the environment and for the health of workers.
The Del Monte is accused of producing pineapple with intensive cultivation, making a
extensive use of pesticides and fertilizers, as well as in time lead to cancer,
sterility and birth defects, can cause acute poisoning with damage
to the lungs, liver, kidneys and nervous system.
Union sources reveal that Del Monte plantations using pesticides that
The World Health Organization classifies as very dangerous pesticides
which severely contaminated soils and surrounding rivers and very often
are provided with air although there are laborers at work in
plantations.
The Del Monte is also alleged to be accustomed to lay off most of the
permanent employees by offering them a resumption economically unfavorable as
seasonal, with reduction in salary of 45% and no right to organize.
The dwellings assigned to laborers from Del Monte Royal are crumbling,
unsanitary and unhealthy. There is no compulsory medical and hospital care for
law which provides that every employer should bear the costs of
health.
Several, also, are the cases of union repression sprung attention
public opinion in recent years, of which he is accused Del Monte Royal:
are in fact many union leaders dismissed and excluded from any type of
reinstatement.
The Nike in Indonesia
In 1987 the first resounding denunciation of behavior seriously
unfair to workers in Asian factories that produced the Nike.
Six million pairs of shoes are produced only in Indonesia by
American multinational annually, with schemes work incredibly
oppressive.
The workers earn lower wages in Nike's Indonesian legal ones, in
unsafe working conditions and dangerous to their health: employees
Indonesians working for 12 hours a day exposed to the vapors of glue, solvents and
paints.
The repressive government of Indonesia has long restricted the development
of the union.
Since the 60s, the labor movement was controlled by the government
through a single legal union, the SPSI - Union of Workers of the whole
Indonesia - a result of not recognizing the right to freedom of organization
of workers.
The free trade unions are illegal and therefore are systematically repressed
army, union leaders fired, imprisoned, tortured and sometimes even
killed.
The Nike is considered to be among the first places in the world for the serious examples of
irresponsible marketing if you think that spends about 180 million
dollars a year in advertising would be sufficient when 1% of this budget
to improve the conditions of 15,000 Indonesian workers.
Nestle
Nestle, the world's most powerful corporation in the agro-food industry,
sells 25% of its products in developing countries and accounts for about 35-50% of the
global market for baby food.
The Swiss company is held responsible for the death of a very high
number of children in the Global South.
As repeatedly pointed out by UNICEF, Nestle violates the code drawn up
World Health Organization and Unicef ​​same prohibiting
the promotion of powdered milk for infant feeding.
In hospitals supply free milk powder Nestle causes of
Therefore, the lack of attachment to mother's milk making it necessary to have recourse to
artificial milk. The multinational is made in this way complicit in the death
of millions of babies a year. The high cost of milk powder, dilution with
unclean water, poor hygiene of bottle cause high risks for children,
thus making them vulnerable to death than if they were naturally fed.
Being also the largest food company in the world and one of the most
important in the trade of cocoa and coffee, is one of the major causes of
poor conditions in which there are millions of farmers in the Southern Hemisphere.
The multinational company is accused of exploiting workers and oppose the
improvement of their working conditions: as a result of a strike by
Workers of one of his chocolate factory against the shameful conditions
employment, including discrimination against women, the lack of clothing
Protective and inadequate security conditions, the company has laid off 40
of his workers, including most of the organizers of the strike.
Impunity of multinational enterprises
The geography of the scandals that have seen how some of the protagonists
known multinational companies directly or indirectly involved in situations
harmful to the rights of host communities seems to have no boundaries.
Human rights, the environment, workers' rights with the explosion
of economic globalization and trade liberalization seem
constitute more than ever real barriers to the free market and the
unbridled profit, triggering a rapid growth of their violations by
of multinational companies.
A landscape that raises complex issues and problems, including that
recognizable to the urgent need for the increased power of corporations
multinationals is accompanied by an actual extension of liability
of these new players, both in respect of internal stakeholders - be they
employees or suppliers - both to the host communities, the environment and the community
as a whole.
The power of multinational companies, however, has increased
exponential and inverse with respect to the ability of the organs of the right to impose a
control over their work. Consequently, although multinational enterprises
often have direct or indirect responsibility on the conditions of life and work
the communities affected by their productive activities, are rarely
called to answer for their acts remain completely unpunished.
It would be enough a cursory glance to the initiatives promoted by companies, organizations
non-governmental organizations, universities, and national governments to realize that social responsibility
business has become a much debated topic. At the end of Corporate Social Responsibility
(CSR), in English Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), is not yet a definition
unambiguous. Secono the European Commission, the corporate social responsibility is "the integration
voluntarily by companies of social and environmental concerns in their business
commercial and in their relationships with stakeholders. "In the Green Paper specifies that
being socially responsible means "not only fulfilling legal obligations
applicable, but also going beyond compliance and investing more in human capital, the environment and
relationships with other stakeholders. "A definition is given to the partially divergent
term both by the European Parliament that the recent Norms on the Responsibilities of companies
corporations and other business enterprises with regard to human rights of the United Nations which are
reference to '"obligation to promote, respect, ensure respect of and protect the rights
human rights recognized by international law "on the part of transnational corporations and other
businesses. All these definitions seem however to rotate around a common concept,
ie on the need for businesses, more and more globalized, carry out its production activities
in full respect of fundamental rights of individuals, local communities and the environment.
In most papers discussing corporate social responsibility using the
two English words 'shareholder' and 'stakeholder'. The first is to indicate in the disciplines
managerial individuals and groups who have a major stake in the conduct
enterprise and that can have a significant influence on it, according to the stakeholders
ie individuals or groups whose interest is involved due to the fact that they suffer the consequences
external positive or negative of the company's activities, which therefore includes many more actors.
In paragraph 22 of the Rules proposed by the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights
UN human in 2004 emphasizes that the firm should take into account these parts
concerned that would include "shareholders, other owners, workers and their representatives,
as well as any other individual or group that is affected by the activities of the company
corporations or other businesses. The term 'stakeholders' include indirect stakeholders
when their interests are or will be substantially affected by the activities of the company
corporation or other business enterprise. In addition to parties directly affected by the activities of
enterprises, stakeholders can include parties which are indirectly affected by the activities
multinational corporations or other businesses such as consumer groups, customers, governments,
neighboring communities, indigenous peoples and communities, non-governmental organizations, lending institutions
public and private providers, professional associations and others. "
The reasons for the violations committed by multinational corporations of rights
humans are not usually convicted are relatively easy to understand and
locate.
International law is formally addressed to the Member and the same system
international legal protection of human rights, as it has developed
since World War II, is a state-centric system.
In the past, the protection of human rights was seen as an issue that
involving Member States but not the sphere of the private sector. historically,
therefore, international standards of human rights protection have been developed which
instrument for the protection of individuals from any arbitrary use of power
state, not firms or other private actors.
According to the classical view, international law, applying only to
relations between States can not impose legal obligations on companies and, accordingly,
international obligations in the field of human rights, with the originally planned
order to protect individuals from the excesses of state power, are binding only
states.
It follows that at the international level there is not a single legal system
recognized by states and their sovereignty prevailing on the
regulation of the activities of transnational corporations.
In the aftermath of World War II, especially with the establishment of the Nations
United, we are witnessing the revolution characterized by the internationalization of human rights. the
treatment of man, considered solely in its capacity as a citizen, was until then
entrusted exclusively to the internal legal and all matter is believed fell within
in the domestic jurisdiction of any State. Since the Second World War the Community
International began to feel the need for protection of the individual as a person,
protection to be prepared at the international level just to ensure greater protection
when the individual is not sufficiently protected by national legal systems. it is
therefore witnessed the establishment of a copious legislation is of a nature that conventional
customary, in order to ensure effective protection at the international level by the individual
unjustified interference by the State.
The absence, therefore, of international standards that directly impose on
multinational companies in obligations to protect human rights and that of
Consequently involve direct responsibility for any of the same
violations, allows companies to act with impunity in an unlawful manner.
To this is added that in the current state, except that in some cases and restricted, the
International law does not require the State of origin to control the activities
transnational of multinational enterprises will operate in full compliance with the
people's human rights on which the impact. In this context one can not delineate
a state responsibility for international activities possible extraterritorial
illicit put in place by the company itself.
Measures implemented at the international level in the field of corporate social responsibility that
could effectively contribute to the effective regulation of enterprises
multinationals, since it is directly addressed to regulate their conduct, all belong to the soft
law, which is not legally binding.
Despite international law does not impose direct obligations to the current state in the field of
human rights chief to firms, many scholars interpret the rules of the various tools
conventional as also applicable also to the latter. Since some instruments
International expressly stipulate their applicability in each individual boss, you might
extend their sphere of action to firms. Among these, for example, the Preamble of
Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that "every individual and every organ of
company "will promote respect for the rights covered and protected by the Convention. of
consequently, the company, which organ of society, should comply with the same
obligations. Similarly, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Covenant
International Convenant on Economic, Social and Cultural both refer, in
preamble, the obligations imposed on every individual in the following terms: "[...] finally considered
that the individual as having duties to other individuals and to the community to which he belongs, is
responsibility to strive for the promotion and observance of the rights recognized in the present Covenant [...]. "
Similar provisions are contained in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the
Crime of Genocide, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Racial Discrimination, the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel,
inhuman or degrading treatment.
In certain areas of international treaty law is moving towards the recognition of
an obligation on Member States of origin to control, through legislation, the activities
carried out by national companies abroad and consequently towards the recognition of a
state responsibility in relation to the conduct of private actors into being out of the
territorial jurisdiction of the State concerned. These are some conventions on the protection
environment, corruption and the exploitation of children.
The rules on international responsibility of the State do not support, in fact,
the assertion that any damage caused by the multinational to those
Foreign states, on whose territory they are operating affiliates or subsidiaries of the group, giving
rise to international responsibility of the State of origin.
If according to the classical doctrine states are, however, considered the main
responsible for the protection of human rights, we must stress, however, that
this obligation is limited, at present and in general,
within the national territory.
It follows that, because of gaps at both national and
Internationally, the extraterritorial activities of multinational enterprises not
are in fact governed either by national law or international law. in
conclusion we can state that, despite the increased awareness
within the international community of the impact that business
multinational companies can have on the human rights of millions of people, businesses
responsible for violations in the countries in which they operate remain
basically unpunished.