Normative Discourses and Public-Private Regulatory Strategies for Construction of CSR Normativity

Can norms regulating business
impact on society may be developed through public-private regulation? When
enforcement institutions are weak, a rule’s effectiveness may depend on
‘compliance pull’ that may be enhanced by legitimacy. Looking at United Nations
and EU cases of co-regulation of CSR, this work explores conditions for effectiveness
and legitimacy for both process and output.

 

A pragmatic combination of
legal and discourse theory and theory on legitimate law-making is adopted to
analyse the construction of CSR normativity and discuss prospects. The analysis
is based on four cases: the UN Global Compact; the development of the UN ’Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework
on Business and Human Rights (‘the Ruggie Framework’); the EU Multistakeholder
Forum on CSR; and the EU's CSR Alliance. All are approached as reflexive law
and analysed as to strategies and results for norms on CSR and business impact
on human rights. Reflexive law theory’s gap as to handling power disparities
between participants is found to call for proceduralisation to equalize
participation. This may enhance legitimacy for the purpose of process and
output effectiveness and a compliance pull.

 

The thesis offers new insight through its combination of reflexive law
and discourse theory to frame the analysis, exploration of negotiation
strategies on CSR normativity, and recommendations of strategy,
proceduralisation and processes for broad stakeholder participation (including
through IT) for developing norms in the sustainability field.

 

This Post-Doc. thesis has been accepted by
Roskilde University for defense for the degree Dr.Scient.Adm.