Research and publications

‘Pressure points’ to address corporate human rights abuses

With support from the United Nations Development Programme’s B+HR Asia, the A2J Lab is developing policy briefs on various ‘pressure points’ that affected individuals and communities, or their representatives, could use to seek access to justice for corporate human rights abuses.

Pressure points are a combination of mechanisms, tools and strategies employed strategically to pressurise corporations to appreciate human rights concerns of affected rightsholders and respond to these concerns. Putting pressure may often create new ‘engagement windows’ that will result in action on the part of corporations to take seriously the concerns of affected rightsholders and try to address these concerns in a meaningful way.

The policy briefs are being developed for the following seven pressure points:

1. civil society advocacy, including social media campaigns
2. complaints to National Contact Points under the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises
3. communication to the UN Special Procedures
4. shareholder activism
5. strategic litigation
6. National Human Rights Institutions
7. human rights benchmarks.

These open access policy briefs will provide practical guidance to the affected rightsholders and/or their representatives as to which pressure point/s to use in a specific case and in what combinations or sequence.

Benchmarking gender equality performance of top ASX companies

The A2J Lab is applying the World Benchmarking Alliance’s Gender Benchmark methodology to assess the gender equality commitment and policies of 20 Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) companies. The ASX companies are from the following four sectors:

• apparel and retails
• pharmaceuticals, biotechnology and life sciences
• media and entertainment
• mining.

It is hoped that the project findings will encourage the assessed, as well as other ASX companies, to strengthen their commitments to contribute to achieving gender equality in line with the relevant international standards.

Strengthening responsible sourcing in the Australian stone industry

The A2J Lab is collaborating with ESG Strategy to conduct a mapping of the human rights risks (including modern slavery risks) that exist in the Australian natural and engineered stone industry and its key supply chains. The project will also assess the steps taken by Australian companies which are importing stone to identify, prevent and mitigate such risks and identify the existing good practices in the stone industry.

This mapping is envisaged to support the government, the Australian Stone Advisory Association (ASAA) and companies in scaling up efforts to stay ahead of the curve in preventing risks to people or the environment and in turn risks to business.

Advancing responsible business conduct in Hong Kong

This research project focuses on promoting responsible conduct on the part of companies based in or operating from Hong Kong, a leading financial centre. The A2J Lab aims to map the current regulatory landscape as well as corporate practices in Hong Kong and in turn develop practical recommendations to advance responsible business conduct (RBC) in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and other emerging mandatory human rights due diligence laws.

We will develop and publish a policy paper on promoting equity, diversity and inclusion reporting. Applying an intersectional lens, it will identify ‘marginalised groups’ that may be adversely impacted by business operations and activities, including consideration of:

• women
• people with disabilities
• LGBTIQ+ people.

The policy paper will analyse these findings to identify how companies in Hong Kong may be incentivised to embed promotion of equity, diversity and inclusion as a key component of RBC.

Assessing the human rights performance of Australian companies

The A2J Lab has published a report assessing the commitment of top 25 companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange to respect human rights, in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). The report, accompanied by a supplementary data report, was launched at a multi-stakeholder roundtable in Sydney on 19 February 2025.

We find that none of the 25 assessed companies are fully embedding their responsibility to respect human rights under the UNGPs. To make this assessment, the report applies the World Benchmarking Alliance’s methodology of the Corporate Human Rights Benchmark Core UNGP Indicators. This methodology categorises its 12 indicators into three broad themes:

• policy commitments to respect human rights
• embedding respect through ongoing human rights due diligence
• enabling accessible remedies and grievance mechanisms for workers and external individuals and communities.

This report is timely as the Australian government seeks to strengthen the Modern Slavery Act and large companies globally are preparing to comply with mandatory human rights due diligence legislation in Europe. The assessment findings and recommendations are relevant not only for large Australian companies, but also:

• the Australian government
• investors
• business consultants
• academia
• civil society organisations
• lawyers and law firms.

The impact of strategic human rights litigation on corporate behaviour

The A2J Lab, in collaboration with the Australian Human Rights Institute, has published a pathbreaking report assessing the impact of strategic human rights litigation on corporate behaviour. The report, which was solicited by the Freedom Fund, was launched in Geneva on 28 November 2023.

This report proposes an original Impact Framework – comprising 16 indicators – to assess the impact of strategic litigation on corporate behaviour in a holistic and systemic way. We find that litigation is generally more impactful when consciously used in conjunction with other complementary strategies – such as civil society advocacy, media campaigns, complaints to regulatory bodies and broader engagement with stakeholders (eg investors and consumers) – that can influence corporate behaviour.

The report also identifies six strategies and variables to maximise the impact of litigation on corporate behaviour. The report concludes by offering practical recommendations for the four key stakeholders of litigation: initiators of litigation, corporations, funders and states.

For more information watch the strategic litigation impact report webinar.