A/HRC/40/51 1. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights 28. The Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights were unanimously endorsed by the Human Rights Council in 2011. They rest on three pillars: the State duty to protect human rights; the corporate responsibility to respect human rights; and access to remedy. Under the second pillar, the Guiding Principles recognize that business enterprises should respect human rights, meaning that they should avoid infringing the human rights of others and should address adverse human rights impacts with which they are involved. 7 This is independent of States’ obligation to protect against human rights abuses committed by private actors. To meet their corporate responsibility to respect human rights, business enterprises are expected to undertake human rights due diligence, which refers to the processes and activities by which businesses identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their adverse human rights impacts. 29. Under the Guiding Principles, the responsibility to respect human rights refers to internationally recognized human rights – understood, at a minimum, as those expressed in the International Bill of Human Rights and the principles concerning fundamental rights set out in the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. As the commentary to the Guiding Principles makes clear, business enterprises should consider additional standards where their actions may have adverse human rights impacts on individuals belonging to specific groups requiring particular attention.8 Thus, international instruments elaborating on the rights of children, such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its Optional Protocols, should be taken into account by business when examining the sale and sexual exploitation of children in the context of sports. 30. Where a business enterprise determines it has caused or contributed to an adverse human rights impact, its responsibility to respect human rights requires active engagement in remediation, by itself or in cooperation with other actors. The third pillar of the Guiding Principles outlines the shared responsibility of States and business to ensure access to an effective remedy for those affected by business-related human rights abuse. While effective State-based judicial mechanisms are at the core of ensuring access to remedy, other nonjudicial mechanisms, including a variety of non-State-based grievance mechanisms that sports bodies may administer or cooperate with, play an essential role in addressing alleged abuses.9 31. The Guiding Principles have been used as a benchmark by several sports organizations. For instance, FIFA commissioned the Special Representative of the SecretaryGeneral on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises and drafter of the Guiding Principles, John Ruggie, to develop recommendations on what it means for FIFA to embed respect for human rights across its global operations, using the Guiding Principles as the authoritative standard.10 Additionally, the newly launched Centre for Sport and Human Rights uses the Guiding Principles as part of the basis for its work. 2. International Safeguards for Children in Sport 32. The International Safeguards for Children in Sport, launched in 2014 under the leadership of UNICEF UK, have been developed to guide sports institutions on how to protect children. They have been translated into several languages and piloted by over 60 sports institutions. 7 8 9 10 Principle 11. Commentary on principle 12. The Accountability and Remedy Project of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) provides recommendations on how to enhance the effectiveness of Statebased mechanisms in cases of business-related human rights abuse. It currently focuses on non-Statebased grievance mechanisms (including those administered by sports bodies) for a report to be submitted to the Human Rights Council at its forty-fourth session. See www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Business/Pages/OHCHRaccountabilityandremedyproject.aspx. John G. Ruggie, For the Game. For the World. FIFA and Human Rights, Corporate Responsibility Initiative Report No. 68 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard Kennedy School, 2016). 5