Principles of Human Rights-based
Approach to Access to JusticeThis module has the following objectives:
Enable the participants to• Discuss the principles of human rights-based approach to access to justice; and• Apply the concept of human rights-based approach to access to justice to humanrights issues related to company operations.
Time: 3 hours and 45 minutes
Materials:• Big size papers, colored pens, writing papers, adhesive tapes;• Equipment - computer, projector, screen;• Video/documents on the human rights-based approach to access to justice.

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Principles of Human Rights-based Approachto Access to JusticeI. Procedurea. Opener - 30 minutes
Show a video about a situation involving access to justice. Ask the participants to comment or raise questions on the video.
Inform the participants that their comments and questions will be discussed in the otheractivities in the module.
b. Activity – 1 hour*
Ask the participants to do the photograph sequencing game. Provide the participants
with several photos depicting issues, actions being taken by people, and related events. The
photographs should be able to portray a story of people seeking a remedy on their complaints
regarding company operations.
Tell them to make a story out of the set of photographs subject to the following rules:
1. Each participant is given one photograph that she/he will not show to anyone;
2. Without seeing all the photographs, the participants discuss and agree on a story
based on each one’s idea on each photograph;
3. They put all the photographs face down on the floor/table in a sequence to tell theagreed story. A participant who thinks her/his photograph begins the story puts
her/his photograph face down on the floor/table first, others do the same until one
participant who considers her/his photograph to be ending the story puts it down as
the last one in the sequence. The photographs must not be seen by the participantsat this point.
4. Ask the participants to turn over all photographs and tell the story that comes out
from the sequence of photographs.
There can be two groups of participants with two different sets of photographs.
Draw out from the sequence of photographs ideas or principles on how the issues areresolved or could have been resolved. These ideas or principles can include the following:
1. Participation of affected community in problem solving;
2. Empowerment of people, especially as members of groups or communities, on how
to resolve their problems;
3. Fair and effective mechanism for resolving problems;
4. Accountability of the company that cause problems; and5. Appropriate remedy for the problems.
c. Input - 1 hour
Provide an input on the following:
1. Bases for determining subscription of corporate grievance mechanisms to humanrights-based approach:* This activity is based on “Exercise 4 – Zoom into Human Rights Approach to Realizing EA2J” discussed on pages 4054 of the Asian Consortium for Human Rights-based Access to Justice, A Manual on Human Rights-Based Approach toRealizing Equal Access to Justice (Quezon city, 2011).

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i. Use of human rights framework;
ii. Consideration of different degrees of vulnerability with regard to a particular problem, and groups who may be more seriously impacted by the companyoperations;iii. Identification of the relevant stakeholders as either claim/rights holders andduty bearers;**iv. Assessment of the capacity of both the claim/rights holders and the duty
bearers to address the problem and capacity development strategies for both sides;
v. Existence of participatory processes where those who are impacted on as aresult of the problem are freely and meaningfully involved.
(Note: this list is based on Programming for Justice: Access for All – A Practitioners’ Guide to a Human Rights
Based Approach to Access to Justice, United Nations Development Programme, 2005)

2. Access to remedy with stress on, among other matters, the following:i. Definition of remedy, grievance mechanism, procedures of the grievancemechanism; link to other responsibilities of the companies such as human rights due
diligence;***ii. Relation of corporate grievance mechanism with the larger, national justicesystems (formal and non-formal, judicial and non-judicial/legislative/administrativesystems); effectiveness criteria for non-judicial grievance mechanisms;
iii. Supporting measures for effective use of grievance mechanism or the earlyresolution of issues such as education programs (for workers, community members
and other stakeholders), pro-active monitoring of the situation for early detection ofissues (such as dialogues), multi-stakeholder initiative.
d. Activity
Group Work - 1 hour
Divide the participants into three groups and give each group a case to work on. Thecases should not be too detailed to allow the participants to add situations and arguments/
ideas to the stories. Annexes A, B and C can be used as cases for the group discussion.
Ask the participants to determine how the elements of the human rights-based approachto access to justice can be applied to the cases in terms of grievance mechanism. They haveto develop a story on the development or improvement of a grievance mechanism and theapplication of the human rights-based approach.
Tell the groups to act out the story they developed as a play and assign participants todifferent roles such as the following:
1. Workers, or members of the local community where a company operates;
2. Company officials;
3. Members of the local NGO/trade union that assist the workers or the members ofthe local community; and4. National or local government officials.
After the role play, ask the participants to answer the following questions:
1. What kind of grievance mechanism was developed/improved?
2. Was the issue involved resolved?
** See “Business and Human Rights: Concepts and Terms” section for definition of “rights holders” and “duty bearers.”*** See “Business and Human Rights: Concepts and Terms” section for definition of the terms.

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i. If yes, was it resolved in accordance with human rights norms?
ii. If no, what was missing in the story or what went wrong in the story?
3. What aspects of the human rights-based approach to access to justice have beenfound to be either
i. Helpful in resolving business-related “human rights impacts;” orii. Problematic in applying to concrete cases?
Write on the board/big size paper the key points raised in the answers, comments andalso questions of the participants.
II. Summary
Time: 15 minutes
Summarize the main points discussed during the session such as the following:
1. The general principles governing human rights-based approach to access to justice;
2. The key issues raised on the approach that should be considered in using it on actual
cases involving companies.

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Annex A
A big shipping and construction company established business in a freeport zone in a country in Southeast Asia to build a wide variety of bulk carriers atthe site. While the presence of the company in the freeport zone brought thousandsof jobs to the area, occasional accidents, workplace deaths and alleged labor law
violations have called into question the company’s compliance with the local laborand occupational safety laws. The workers of this shipbuilding company have been
trying to form a labor union for several years but have failed to have a labor union sofar. Their leaders, however, were either fired or transferred by the company as soon
as they undertook the initial labor union activities. The company explained that they
were fired because of involvement in robbery or theft or negligence of duty. However,
the workers claimed that they were fired or transferred by the company to suppress
the formation of a labor union.
Under the local labor law, “probationary employment” shall not exceed six months
from the date the employee started working. This means that workers who continue
working in a company beyond the six-month period are qualified for permanent employment unless there are grounds for non-qualification. According to the workers,
the company used tricks, such as registering the employees as workers of subcontractors, or dismissing and re-hiring them to prevent them from becoming regular
employees. Such tricks upset the employees’ efforts to form a labor union.
The frequency of industrial accidents forced the workers to continuously request
the company to establish a hospital for them. But the company ignored the requests
supposedly due to lack of personnel. The workers filed formal complaints against
the company with the freeport zone management authority; while the issue got theattention of the national legislature. Both the freeport zone management authority
and the national legislature investigated the complaints. Both found the company
violating industrial safety and labor laws. At the conclusion of the legislative committee investigation, the legislators required the company to build a medical center andcomply with industrial safety laws. Nevertheless, the company claimed that it had thecapability to send injured workers immediately to a hospital using speedboats.
(This case is based on Korean Transnational Corporations Watch, “Korean Companies and Human Rights: Doing Business in thePhilippines, Myanmar and Uzbekistan,” in Jefferson R. Plantilla, editor, Bridging Human Rights Principles and Business Realities inNortheast Asia (Kuala Lumpur/Osaka: HURIGHTS OSAKA and SIRD, 2014)

100Business, Human Rights and Northeast AsiaAnnex B
A company consortium acquired the development rights to offshore gas fields
in a country in Southeast Asia. The company consortium agreed to sell natural gas
from the gas field to another company through a memorandum of understanding.
Human rights issues have been raised by the residents in the affected areas and by
the international community regarding the construction of the gas pipeline from thegas field to a province in the neighboring country. Non-governmental organizations
have constantly demanded information on the status of the gas development as wellas on the protection of human rights.
Local residents have been raising their concerns about the adverse impacts ofthe project from the time it started. Residents held a demonstration to express theircomplaint about insufficient land compensation. Ten residents who led the demonstration were arrested, charged before a court for violating the peace assembly law andsentenced to three months in prison. A human rights organization raised this issue inthe UN Human Rights Council sessions and asserted that the government and thecompanies participating in this project should take responsibility for the imprisonmentof people who were merely demanding respect for their right to live. The company
consortium promised to review the issues and to prepare measures to address them.
Residents near the onshore gas terminal complain of considerable damage inflicted on them by the project. The residents have consistently insisted that the damage
to their farmlands caused by the wire fences and the sewage pipeline of the onshore
gas terminal has not been properly compensated. Accumulated soil and sand madeit hard to farm the land and to reach it during rainy season. The residents demandthat the companies involved should conduct a field investigation and then either
compensate them properly for the damage caused or purchase the useless land.
Due to inadequate explanation, the residents know neither the system for determining
the amount of compensation nor how it would be paid. They also do not know whoamong the two companies is in-charge of providing the compensation.
(This case is based on Korean Transnational Corporations Watch, “Korean Companies and Human Rights: Doing Business in thePhilippines, Myanmar and Uzbekistan,” in Jefferson R. Plantilla, editor, Bridging Human Rights Principles and Business Realities inNortheast Asia (Kuala Lumpur/Osaka: HURIGHTS OSAKA and SIRD, 2014)

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Annex CAllegations of workers in a supplier company being forced to work very longhours, living in cramped and insufﬁcient accommodation, being forced to pay for accommodation and food, and being prevented from leaving the facility appeared in theinternational press. In addition, there were allegations of child labor in the manufactureof some products, and use of disciplinary actions which involved workers being madeto stand still for long periods.
The main company took steps to investigate the allegations through extensive factory visits and worker interviews. It published a report on its website within six weeksof the initial media coverage. In the report, the main company stated that an audit
team sent to the factory was made up of staff from its human resources, operations
and legal departments, and that the evidence gathered was cross-checked against
many sources of information from employees, management and staff records. It also
pointed out that, in auditing for forced labor, security records were checked to look for
false identiﬁcation papers. The report summarized the ﬁndings related to the working
and living environment, compensation, overtime, and worker treatment.
Although the main company report stated that there was no evidence of forcedlabor or child labor, it made public the observation that the company’s own weekly limit
on hours worked, as stated in the company’s code of conduct, was being exceeded.
The main company stated that, as a result of its ﬁndings, the supplier company waschanging its policy to ensure compliance with the weekly overtime limits. In addition,
the main company noted that improvements to the sleeping facilities were required
but that the supplier company was in the process of acquiring more land to build
further facilities. The supplier company was quoted as having opened the factory to
its customer and provided access for the audits to take place. The supplier company
is a signiﬁcant company in the industry and has grown rapidly in recent years.
(Source: Text based on Combating Forced Labour - A Handbook for Employers & Business, 7 Case Studies, International Labour
Organization (Geneva, 2015), pages 5-7.)

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Materials•

Photos of people and events related to human rights issues•

United Nations, Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing theUnited Nations “Protect, Respect and Remedy” Framework. HR/PUB/11/04, 2011.

•United Nations Development Programme, Programming for Justice: Access for All – A
Practitioners’ Guide to a Human Rights Based Approach to Access to Justice, United
Nations Development Programme (Bangkok, 2005). Available at www.unrol.org/
files/Justice_Guides_ProgrammingForJustice-AccessForAll.pdf.

•Asian Consortium for Human Rights-based Access to Justice, A Manual on Human
Rights-Based Approach to Realizing Equal Access to Justice (Quezon city, 2011).

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