TMU CSR Institute zoom session: Responsible Business Conduct Supply Chain Regulation: Learning from the German Experience-- In conversation with Dr. Olaf Dilling

The Institute for the Study of Corporate Social Responsibility at Toronto Metropolitan University*(TMU) is pleased to present an online interactive zoom talk, Responsible Business Conduct Supply Chain Regulation: Learning from the German Experience-- In conversation with Dr. Olaf Dilling on Tuesday, April 16, 2024 from 3 pm to 4:30 pm, Toronto time (details below).

To register (no cost, everyone welcome) click HERE (external link)  then press the "reserve a spot" button.

To access the zoom on Tuesday, April 16 at 3 pm (Toronto time), click HERE (external link)  to patch in for the live session. This session is exclusively a zoom event: there is no in-person component.

Information will be provided during the session re: how to submit questions.

About this talk

Doing business abroad is linked to issues of human rights and environmental protection. These have long been regulated employing a variety of CSR approaches, which have seemed to develop over time more or less autonomously in a transnational public sphere. As such, these CSR supply chain regulatory approaches can be seen as the product of an evolving dialog among civil society, business and governmental and inter-governmental agencies. However, both the effectiveness of these approaches in addressing problems and their legitimacy are often questioned. Recently, governments and inter-governmental entities therefore have adopted more intensive and authoritative approaches. They try to regulate the environmental and social impacts of their companies abroad and associated supply chains by binding law. A current example is the German Supply Chain Due Diligence Act, which came into force January 1, 2023.

How does this type of regulation relate to CSR and other forms of regulation? Does it make CSR more effective and legitimate? Based on a theoretical framework for the Transnationalization of Environmental Law, which the author and others have developed over the last 20 years, these questions will be addressed with regard to the current implementation of the German law. In particular: What is the approach of the law and what does implementation of the law look like after one year of operation? Can it be claimed that the law unilaterally imposes German neo-colonial values? Or does it open possibilities for self-empowering and context-specific norms and practices of affected local communities?

About the Speaker, Dr. Olaf Dilling

Dr. Olaf Dilling is a practicing lawyer and partner in the Berlin based law firm re|Rechtsanwält. He has studied philosophy and law in Berlin and Frankfurt am Main and was trained as a legal clerk in Frankfurt, Hanau and Speyer. He did his PhD at Bremen University on Transnational Waste and Chemicals Law. He has published on topics such as CSR, Transnational Environmental Law and the role of scientific expertise. After working at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) in Leipzig and for the Environmental Council for the German Federal Government (SRU), he is now practicing as a lawyer in administrative and infrastructure law. His pubications include :

• Markus & Dilling, “Interglobalsuprasubandtransialidocious: mapping and disentangling transnational environmental governance”, in: Heyvaert and Duvic-Paoli (eds), Research Handbook on Transnational Environmental Law, Handbook, 2020, 67–87.
• Dilling & Markus, “The Transnationalisation of Environmental Law”, Journal of Environmental Law, Volume 30, Issue 2, 1 July 2018, Pages 179–206
• Dilling, From Compliance to Rulemaking: How Global Corporate Norms Emerge from Interplay with States and Stakeholders, German Law Journal, 13 (05), S. 381-418.
• Dilling, Herberg & Winter (eds), Responsible Business: Self-Governance and Law in Transnational Economic Transactions, 2008.

The talk is co-sponsored by the TMU Corporate Social Responsibility Student Society, and the TMU Law and Business Student Association.

About the Moderator, Prof Kernaghan Webb

Dr. Kernaghan Webb is an Associate Professor in the Toronto Metropolitan University Department of Law and Business, and is the Director of the TMU Institute for the Study of Corporate Social Responsibility.

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