Tort Law and Human Rights

The article explores the relationship between tort law and human rights. It explains the potential inherent in holding corporations liable in tort for human rights violations along the supply chain. Several European jurisdictions such as France and imposed duties of care on domestic corporations to minimize human rights violations caused abroad by subsidiaries or independent contractors.Germany is about to follow this model. The problem with this approach is that is distorts competition in the domestic and European market, as suppliers of goods and services are subjected to divergent standards of care and liability. The better solution would be to introduce "production liability", i.e. a uniform standard of human rights responsibility for any supplier which serves the internal market