• Business and Human Rights
    Whether it is an oil company that relies on abusive private security forces, a tech company that censors or spies on users at the behest of a repressive government, or a corrupt government that siphons off the wealth of its nation, businesses and other economic activities can have negative impacts on people’s rights. Human Rights Watch investigates these and other situations to expose the problems, hold institutions accountable, and develop standards to prevent these activities. This work has included research and advocacy on human rights problems caused by corruption in resource-rich countries such as Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Nigeria, and Burma.
  • Internet café in Lalibela, Amhara Region, Ethiopia.
    © 2010 Hemis.fr/AFP Photo
    Ethiopia: Telecom Surveillance Chills Rights
    The Ethiopian government is using foreign technology to bolster its widespread telecom surveillance of opposition activists and journalists both in Ethiopia and abroad.
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  • World Report 2013

    Without Rules: A Failed Approach to Corporate Accountability

    By Christopher Albin-Lackey, senior researcher

    Some of the most powerful and sophisticated actors on the world stage are companies, not governments. In 2011 alone, oil and gas behemoth ExxonMobil generated revenues of US$467 billion—the size of Norway’s entire economy. Walmart, the world’s third-largest employer with more than 2 million workers, has a workforce that trails only the militaries of the United States and China in size.

    Many global businesses are run with consideration for the well-being of the people whose lives they touch. But others—whether through incompetence or by design—seriously harm the communities around them, their workers, and even the governments under which they work.

    Read the full essay >>

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Business

  • Time to Get Children Out Of the Hazardous Supply Chain
    Jun 12, 2014
    Many multinational companies now ban children from working in their operations, but child labor is still a central issue for them. In the globalized economy, products have long and complex supply chains, often reaching down to a multitude of small, local producers. Companies may source from businesses that use child labor without knowing – unless they take steps to ask the question.
  • Dispatches: Spain Restricts Eviction Relief Even Further
    Jun 12, 2014
  • World Bank: Reconsider Uzbekistan Projects
    Jun 9, 2014
    The World Bank should not proceed with projects directly benefiting Uzbekistan’s cotton industry until the Uzbek government has taken meaningful steps to end grave human rights violations in cotton production, including forced labor.
  • Human Rights Watch Submission: The World Bank Group’s New Approach to Country Engagement
    May 27, 2014
    An approach to country engagement that analyses, articulates, and addresses human rights risks is critical to meeting the “twin goals” of ending extreme poverty and promoting shared prosperity. The World Bank Group’s New Approach to Country Engagement as outlined in the 2013 World Bank Group Strategy can be a meaningful first step to achieving this. It presents the Group with an opportunity to both identify key obstacles to poverty reduction and inclusive growth, including human rights obstacles, and align priorities with the steps needed to tackle such challenges.
  • US Senate: Salvage Surveillance Reform
    May 22, 2014
    It is up to the US Senate to salvage surveillance reform. The version of the USA Freedom Act that the US House of Representatives passed on May 22, 2014, could ultimately fail to end mass data collection.
  • World Health Assembly: Pledge to Act on Mercury
    May 20, 2014
    Health ministers should pledge to take comprehensive action to prevent and treat the negative health effects of mercury, a toxic chemical. The World Health Assembly is scheduled to discuss a resolution on the new international treaty on mercury, the Minamata Convention, on May 21, 2014.
  • US: Modest Step by Congress on NSA Reform
    May 8, 2014
    The US House Judiciary Committee took a long overdue step on May 7, 2014, with its move to reform one aspect of the government’s mass surveillance programs. The committee approved unanimously a revised version of the USA Freedom Act that would aim to end the government’s bulk collection of telephone metadata and other records in the United States.
  • Cotton Campaign: Letter to US Secretary of State John Kerry
    May 2, 2014
  • When Spain Does Business Abroad
    May 2, 2014
    King Juan Carlos is visiting Kuwait and Bahrain this week, after Abu Dhabi and Qatar two weeks ago in a series of visits to the gulf region that will also take him to Oman and Saudi Arabia over the next two months. He is traveling with a high-level delegation that includes the ministers of foreign affairs, transport, defense and energy, as well as the heads of some of Spain’s biggest companies.
  • Dispatches: Georgia Governor Should Veto Probation Bill
    Apr 28, 2014
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