Two ways of linking economic activity to human rights

The modern enterprise is ambivalently both sensitive and insensitive to the demands of human rights. To some extent, this is a matter of discrepancy between words and deeds. This article, however, focuses on another, more fundamental difficulty. The obstacle facing attempts to turn the moral impulse behind corporate social responsibility into a plausible result arises from fundamental clashes between the fundamental principles that drive the institutions designed to protect certain fundamental rights and the fundamental principles that fix the norms of performance for commercial life. To assess whether the conflict is irreconcilable, the problem needs to be seen in terms of the divergent ways in which adequate respect for and protection of those rights and obligations is understood. Certain resolutions of competition among fundamental rights – based on “functional” or “consensual” justification – can carry hidden bias, while others – based on “civic” justification – might allow the full potential of such rights to be realised. The test for compatibility between human rights and the economy is therefore whether economic imperatives can integrate the demands of civic justification.