A HIGH LEVEL DISCUSSION ON THE ROLE OF BUSINESS IN SOCIETY: OF GREAT INTEREST TO ALL CORPORATE LAWYERS WITH CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR)

An appreciation by Phillip Taylor MBE and Elizabeth Taylor of Richmond Green Chambers

What a welcome we can give to this insightful book, post the Companies Act 2006! The subject matter has been described as demonstrating that private law makes a significant contribution to the promotion of corporate social responsibility (CSR) which is emerging as an important objective for the immediate future.

The book’s author, Andreas Ruhmkorf, adds that, with certain changes this contribution could, of course, be much, much better. Ruhmkorf’s research is part of the Elgar “Corporations, Globalisation and the Law” series of corporate legal texts.

The text is based on an analysis of 4 substantive areas depending on how we classify them today: company law/corporate governance; contract law; consumer law; and the law of torts. The author’s aim is to cover a full range of issues that are important for CSR. They include in depth discussion and evaluation of directors' duties, corporate reporting and an incorporation of CSR policies into the supply chain, consumer rights and the tortious liabilities of companies.

The current discussions and legal views surrounding social responsibility has, in the view of some commentators neglected to understand in detail the important role of national private law in achieving socially responsible conduct in business. This important new study on CSR demonstrates as best it can how private law can make a significant contribution to the promotion of CSR and how it could possibly be improved.

Ruhmkorf’s treatise discerns how national private law in the home state of multinational enterprises can legally affect their socially responsible conduct worldwide. He demonstrates that private law already promotes and, with certain amendments, could better promote CSR in the regulation of global supply chains.

The book's findings are applied, for example, to the collapse of the Rana Plaza Building in Bangladesh, which offers what the author describes as “a supportive empirical insight”.

It is a most up-to-date and comprehensive survey of CSR and global supply chains to date and will benefit both legal researchers and practitioners interested in the fields of CSR, private law, international law, political economy, international labour standards and sustainable supply chains.

The book is an important addition to the corporate lawyer’s library in 2015.