Workshop on International Law, Natural Resources and Sustainable
Development
Regulating the Resource Curse: The Devil versus God in Human Rights Discourse and
Operationalizing Remedies
Janet Dine
School of Law, Queen Mary, London
Some scholars consider that Human Rights are found in Christian principles particularly in
the intractable tension between property rights and community rights; individual rights
versus the commons. However Islamic principles also show a similar tension in particular in
commercial finance where there is a balance between individuality and community rights.
These stresses are endemic in capitalism and Human Rights and particularly in modern
economies where structures and hegemony allow powerful actors. The Western world is in
the grip in aggressive capitalist model founded by the modern neo-liberal economists but
founded originally in various religions characterised as a devil versus god struggle: material
riches versus spiritual riches. Now Multinational Companies are often more powerful than
many states leaving the International Human Rights structure in disarray because states are
unable to control these actors. Numerous solutions have been mooted; universal
jurisdictions; Corporate Social Responsibilities initiatives; voluntary Codes and the Ruggie
initiative. This paper will moot a national solution. Resources are often found in the ground
in national territories this allows the government to legislate and regulate the issues. As well
as this governments should control and regulate all of business enterprises in their
jurisdiction, the parent company and all of the subsidiaries. An expanded German
Konzernrecht (a system lifting the company veil in particular situations) could allow more
transparency and accountability for Multinational companies. Such a system has been
legislated in the Balkans and if other jurisdiction could follow this model more sustainable
capitalism could ensue. This paper will track other initiatives on company groups to see
whether this is possible. Already the German Konzenrecht has been copied in Brazil,
Portugal, Slovenia, Croatia, and Taiwan. In the Balkan experiment has added another aspect
because it includes extraterritoriality.