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Includes respect for rule of law; commitment and action to uphold the International Bill of Human Rights and other rights instruments such as UNDRIP and UNDROP; commitment and action to uphold ILO conventions; respect for the spirit of the law; respect for international conventions and guidelines for business enterprises; respect for the rights of nature (such as rivers granted legal personhood); respect for national legal systems; respect for different ways of knowing; respect for and integration of traditional and community knowledge (including Indigenous science) in decision-making; and respect for local and traditional knowledge holders.
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Rule of law underpins all of society. It is the foundation for economic and social development, and businesses have an integral role to play in supporting and strengthening it. Anchored in research, our Respect for Rule of Law: A Getting Started Guide aims to support your company as it contemplates its impact on rule of law. It helps build an understanding of the importance of rule of law, the role of businesses, and provides clarity on the work ahead.
This report from the UN global Compact can help you understand the business case for strengthening rule of law. It outlines how to support legal frameworks and public institutions through your core business practices, strategic social investment and philanthropy, public policy engagement, and partnerships. These strategies may be relevant to a number of different departments, but especially sustainability and public affairs.
The Rule of Law Index from the World Justice Project (WJP) can help you to compare and understand how well countries adhere to universal rule of law principles. The index allows users to explore either by an overall index score or by issue/factor, including constraints on government powers, absence of corruption, fundamental rights, regulatory enforcement, criminal justice, and more. This tool will be especially useful to sustainability, risk, and investment professionals who want to identify areas where respect for rule of law is improving and declining and thereby evaluate investment opportunities, global supply chain integrity, legal and political risks, and more.
This paper from the Taskforce on Nature Markets can help you understand the emerging perspective that nature has fundamental rights and human beings have the legal authority and responsibility to enforce these rights on nature's behalf. It traces how this trend is being expressed in environmental law and the implications for nature-linked markets, including within nature credits and soft commodity markets. This paper points to a paradigm shift that will be most relevant to sustainability and legal practitioners.
This set of guidelines from the ILO, The World Bank, The Canadian International Development Agency, and KIVU Nature Inc. provides valuable insights that can help you to work effectively with Indigenous Peoples while respecting their rights. It emphasises the importance of applying traditional knowledge systems to decision-making in a way that is respectful, empowering, and complementary to western, science-based knowledge. It includes a series of case studies that illustrate how traditional knowledge can be applied in the planning and implementation of projects, as well as guidelines on how to work with Indigenous Peoples.
The IPCA Knowledge Basket has created and curated excellent resources for facilitating respectful collaboration with Indigenous Peoples. This repository can help you to understand Indigenous knowledge systems; frameworks for working with multiple knowledge systems; methods, tips, and frameworks for gathering Indigenous knowledge; and agreements and protocols for working with Indigenous knowledge systems. They have also created a toolkit for respectful collaboration with Indigenous Peoples, which features guiding principles for collaboration and practical steps and resources.
This article can help you to better consider the Indigenous and traditional ecological knowledge that sustain positive environmental actions and outcomes. Based on interviews with Indigenous experts from 43 distinct communities across all six habitable continents, the study highlights specific ways in which Indigenous worldviews and cultural practices underpin these results. It explains the shifting and growing threats that Indigenous Peoples face on their lands; how Indigenous Peoples are addressing these threats; and what support is needed to enable Indigenous Peoples to continue to steward their territories. This resource will be especially beneficial to sustainability, risk, and strategy professionals, as well as those engaging in company-community relations with Indigenous communities.
This insight report can help you to better understand the effectiveness of Indigenous stewardship in managing complex natural environments, as well as the value - both towards corporate action on nature and towards the long-term health of nature - of embedding traditional ecological knowledge and empowering Indigenous peoples as co-investment leaders in nature-based solutions. It explores current approaches to landscape conservation and restoration solutions, including the current conservation paradigm, which often excludes Indigenous people and Indigenous knowledge; the legacies of settler-colonialism, including its impact on Indigenous peoples and the enduring power imbalance; and the role of rights and responsibilities. It also introduces new models for embedding Indigenous knowledge and leadership, including various investment models. This report will be particularly beneficial to investors and sustainability professionals.
It is all too common that traditional and cultural knowledge is made secondary to Westernized worldviews, and particularly within industry. However, there is tremendous, untapped value in using unique cultural and intergenerational ways of knowing to provide a better understanding of complex issues. This short, evocative video explores how rainmakers in Nganyi, Kenya have perfected the art of interpreting plant responses and animal behaviors to predict weather, and how researchers are bringing together ancient and modern systems of thinking to build climate resilience in Africa.