Sherpa was born out of a fundamental observation: the gap between the political, economic, and social existence of multinational companies and their legal non-existence. Indeed, multinationals, whose names, brands, and economic importance are known worldwide, are, however, not fully treated as such by law. This situation is a major source of impunity in the globalized world.
This conclusion led to the drafting of the first edition of Sherpa’s Handbook of Proposals, in 2010. Its aim was to explain and overcome the obstacles to the regulation of multinationals by formulating proposals.
Some of these proposals have made their way into positive law. The law on the duty of vigilance adopted in 2017 is one example. Other proposals, however, have not stood the test of time. Sherpa's practice, particularly in litigation, has made it possible to identify the limits of certain proposals.
On the occasion of its 20th anniversary, Sherpa sought to review these proposals and propose a new updated version of the Handbook. Sherpa shines a spotlight on concrete human rights violations observed in the field by our partners (NGOs, journalists, whistleblowers, etc.) and has shown that the current legal landscape is not fit to fight impunity. Our experience and observations allow us to develop ambitious legislative proposals to meet the challenges of our century. Thus, our actions aim to change the law in order to contain climate change, combat resource grabbing, strengthen democratic debate, and allow for the emergence of new societal models, more respectful of human rights.
On this website, discover an overview of the Handbook through 5 key themes.
Each page of the website allows you to explore one of the major challenges in the fight against multinational impunity, with a description of the key issues, videos, and summaries of our proposals!
","t2":"Sherpa - About us","p2":"Sherpa is a non-profit association, founded in 2001.
Sherpa brings together advocates, lawyers, and experts who use the law as a tool to combat new forms of impunity linked to the globalization of economic and financial exchanges, and to defend victims of economic crimes.
As such, Sherpa has brought cases against multinational corporations for serious human rights and environmental violations in their global supply chains, as well as litigations against corporations for involvement in international corruption schemes.
The four pillars of Sherpa's work are strategic litigation, advocacy, legal research and capacity building activities, which all aim to significantly change the legal framework in France, as well as at the European level and internationally.
","bigLink":{"title":"Strengthening corporate accountability","url":"/1-strengthening-corporate-accountability"}},"thematique1":{"title":"Strengthening corporate accountability","metaTitle":"Strengthening corporate accountability – Sherpa NGO 20 years","description":"Fighting new forms of impunity linked to the globalization : civil and criminal liability.","subTitle":"Topic 1","p1":"Sherpa was born out of a fundamental observation: the gap between the political, economic and social existence of multinational companies and their legal non-existence. There is no legal definition of \"enterprise\", \"group\", or \"multinational\". Only the company is defined in the law and endowed with legal personality. This situation guarantees their impunity in a globalised world.
In particular, the veil created by the principle of autonomy of legal persons exempts them from liability and prevents the consistent attribution of liability within groups, especially when their activities cause environmental or human rights abuses abroad.
The gradual emergence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) standards has not fully overcome these difficulties and reflect the complex structuring of transnational economic activity, as well as its legal consequences.
The majority of new transparency measures and vigilance obligations are neither appropriate nor sufficient, and tend to become merely compliance measures. They focus on prevention, through the implementation of internal risk management processes, and are often coupled with mechanisms aimed at enabling parent companies to avoid liability when violations occur.
Thus, Sherpa's experience, particularly in litigation, has shown that the law still contains many obstacles, which guarantee a form of impunity for multinationals responsible for human rights violations committed abroad by entities within their corporate group or supply chain.
Establishing the liability of parent companies, particularly civil liability, still faces some limits, despite new initiatives such as the duty of vigilance of parent and instructing companies. Adopted in 2017 primarily thanks to the work of Sherpa and our partners, this law requires certain large companies to identify and prevent serious human rights and environmental risks and abuses in their value chain. But in practice the law’s adoption of the common regime of civil liability for fault makes it complex for victims to access justice.
","p2":"Furthermore, despite a growing awareness of the criminal risks posed by multinationals, there are numerous obstacles to holding parent companies criminally liable for human rights and environmental abuses committed abroad.
Finally, the activities of multinationals are largely facilitated by intermediaries, such as legal, financial, and tax advisors and social and environmental auditors. Their role in aiding criminal activities and certifying practices that violate human rights abuses must be addressed.
","propositions":{"prop1":"Create and strengthen parent and instructing companies’ obligations and civil liability regime towards groups and supply chains","prop2":"Facilitate the criminal liability of legal persons and strengthen the arsenal of penalties for human rights, environmental, and ethical violations perpetrated by economic actors","prop3":"Strengthen the obligations and liability of social and environmental auditors and the various financial, legal, and fiscal intermediaries who facilitate the concealment of economic crimes committed by multinationals"},"bigLink":{"title":"Preventing resource grabbing by multinationals","url":"/2-preventing-resource-grabbing-by-multinationals"}},"thematique2":{"title":"Preventing resource grabbing by multinationals","metaTitle":"Preventing resource grabbing by multinationals – Sherpa NGO 20 years","description":"Corruption, ill-gotten gains, tax and legal havens: Multinationals take advantage of the lack of regulation of their activities to accumulate financial and natural resources.","subTitle":"Topic 2","p1":"Multinationals have taken advantage of the lack of regulation of their transnational activities, with the consent of states, to accumulate financial and natural resources. The accumulation of these resources has been achieved to the detriment of populations and states, whose capacity to create and maintain effective public services has been progressively eroded.
This phenomenon is made possible by the existence of tax and legal havens. These havens offer economic actors, both individuals and companies, numerous services and advantages, such as banking secrecy, tax secrecy, relaxed processes for creating companies, and high legal opacity stemming from the uncooperative nature of these jurisdictions.
These havens are therefore ideal for setting up schemes that allow economic actors to cover up illegal profits, for example, from corruption, or to bypass tax laws and environmental or human rights protections.
The continued existence of these havens severely undermines the ability of states to protect tax revenues, which are the necessary counterpart to resource exploitation and are an indispensable element to the implementation of public policies for the protection of fundamental rights and the environment.
Without comprehensive transparency mechanisms for intra-group transactions and effective sanctions against the economic actors in question, the use of these jurisdictions will continue to increase global inequality.
Moreover, it is imperative to be able to effectively return funds that may have been illegally misappropriated to States and populations through these arrangements. Like other developed countries, France has hosted illicit assets, or so-called \"ill-gotten gains\".
","p2":"Although numerous legal proceedings initiated by Sherpa and its partners have led to the seizure and confiscation of \"ill-gotten gains\" by the French authorities when these were present in France, the legislature has not provided a mechanism to guarantee their restitution to the countries of origin.
","propositions":{"prop1":"Fight tax evasion by imposing ambitious and public country-by-country reporting on multinationals and by establishing public registers of beneficial owners of companies and trusts in an open format","prop2":"Ensure the restitution of stolen assets through the establishment of a transparent and independent mechanism focused on identifying victims of corruption"},"bigLink":{"title":"Facilitate access to justice against multinationals","url":"/3-facilitate-access-to-justice-against-multinationals"}},"thematique3":{"title":"Facilitate access to justice against multinationals","metaTitle":"Facilitate access to justice against multinationals – Sherpa NGO 20 years","description":"Ensure that victims have access to the justice system in order to assert their rights.","subTitle":"Topic 3","p1":"In addition to strengthening the obligations and liability of multinationals, it is necessary to ensure that victims have access to the justice system in order to assert their rights. The fundamental right of access to justice must not be undermined in any way, in law or in fact.
However, there are many legal and practical barriers that impede access to justice. These obstacles exist both upstream and downstream of judicial action.
Upstream of judicial action, the lack of transparency and access to information on multinationals is a major obstacle. Indeed, the international activity of companies and the violations they commit are largely hidden.
This is due, on the one hand, to the private nature of corporate activities and, on the other hand, to the remoteness of violations and offences within complex value chains. The use of tax and legal havens as well as the protections for corporate secrecy, tax secrecy, and banking secrecy also contribute to this opacity.
This secrecy prevents access to justice, particularly when victims are required to establish proof of a company's liability. The information relevant to establishing such proof is held by the company itself. Foreign victims are also confronted with cultural, linguistic, and financial barriers which increase the inequality between the parties involved.
The few existing legal instruments, which aim to enforce some form of transparency on companies' activities or allow ad hoc access to the information they hold, are completely insufficient and do not resolve the asymmetry of information. Besides, the courts themselves are regularly limited by the lack of international judicial cooperation as well as the lack of financial and human resources.
Further along in the judicial process, other obstacles make it more difficult to bring multinationals before the courts. Particularly, bringing cases before criminal and civil courts raises questions of jurisdiction and the applicable law, which are inherent to the international nature of such violations.
","p2":"As for civil liability, although access to French courts is possible under the conflict of jurisdiction rules of private international law, these rules do not always allow for the application of the most protective law for victims. The extraterritorial application of criminal law is seriously curtailed and limited in practice.
","propositions":{"prop1":"To facilitate evidence collection, establish a genuine system of access to information of general public interest held by multinationals, which can be sanctioned by courts, and reinforce the capacities of the courts through specialisation and increasing their resources","prop2":"Remove obstacles to bringing cases to court and the application of the most protective law in disputes involving multinationals by amending, in particular, Articles 113-5 et seq. of the Criminal Code and adapting the rules of conflict of law in private international law"},"bigLink":{"title":"Fighting corporate capture","url":"/4-fighting-corporate-capture"}},"thematique4":{"title":"Fighting corporate capture","metaTitle":"Fighting corporate capture – Sherpa NGO 20 years","description":"Lobbying, revolving doors, marketing, etc. : fighting multinationals’ influence strategies.","subTitle":"Topic 4","p1":"Multinationals have developed a strong capacity to influence public debate and decision-making. This influence shapes the political agenda and defines the final content of the law as well as government decision-making. In turn, this tends to enshrine the interests of private economic actors to the detriment of the general interest. These actors manage to exert their influence in different ways, each of which calls for different responses.
Economics actors can use direct influence techniques, such as lobbying or revolving doors. This influence illustrates the increasingly porous overlap between the political and economic spheres, which can generate conflicts between public and private interests.
The corporate capture also reveals itself through the existence of more diffuse and indirect practices, such as the influencing public opinion through communication in the broad sense, whether with advertising, marketing, or corporate communication.
In the almost total absence of effective tools to regulate and sanction these communication practices, their impact is particularly worrying, notably given the monopolization of the media and the development of targeted online advertising.
Another manifestation of the influence of multinationals lies in the privatisation of the norms of globalisation achieved with the consent of States. Companies tend to create their own rules to regulate the internationalisation of their activities, while keeping State regulation out of the picture.
Investment treaties and arbitration tribunals thus enable companies to manage their international disputes according to the rules they choose. In this context, State law tends to become merely a product in the market of legal services at the disposal of economic interests.
The creation of “soft law”, i.e. non-binding law, is another manifestation of the phenomenon of the privatisation of norms. Soft law allows multinationals to define their responsibilities, either by “adhering” to principles drawn up by States within a multilateral body framework or by producing soft law themselves, either individually (codes of conduct, ethical charters) or within multi-stakeholder bodies, if not totally private. The ineffectiveness of these standards, which today serve corporate communication and public relations functions rather than ensuring victims' access to justice, has been widely denounced.
","propositions":{"prop1":"Regulate the practices of direct influence on public decision making such as lobbying and revolving doors, especially by broadening the definition of certain breaches of integrity","prop2":"Define and provide a legal framework for the commercial and political communication of multinationals, in particular by criminalising image laundering","prop3":"Challenge the self-regulation of multinationals through \"soft law\" and establish the supremacy of international public order over international economic order, in particular by adopting an international Treaty on Business and Human Rights"},"bigLink":{"title":"Protecting the civic space","url":"/5-protecting-the-civic-space"}},"thematique5":{"metaTitle":"Protecting the civic space – Sherpa NGO 20 years","title":"Protecting the civic space","description":"SLAPPs, whistleblowers, etc. : protection the civic space from private actors.","subTitle":"Topic 5","p1":"As freedom of association and expression are sine qua non conditions for the realisation of the rule of law and the protection of fundamental freedoms, the protection of civic space must be ensured in the face of increasing attacks, particularly from private actors.
Associations, trade unions, indigenous representatives, whistleblowers and journalists can act as “rights defenders”, whose existence and actions are not only consistent with the realisation of the rule of law and other fundamental freedoms, but also with the protection of the environment. From the local to the international level, the activities of these civil society actors provide citizens with information and allow them to engage in the public debate.
However, all of these groups, whether journalists or associations, have their activities hindered and their very existence sometimes challenged by multinationals and public authorities. Every year, hundreds of rights defenders, particularly those working to protect the environment, are victims of murder and violence. This shrinking of the civic space is happening around the world, as well as in Europe. France is no exception.
While France has adopted a general statute to protect whistleblowers, the protection regime remains very incomplete. Furthermore, SLAPPs (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) which aim to stifle the exercise of freedom of expression through judicial intimidation, are frequently used by companies or institutions against rights defenders when they denounce abuses. The aim of these disproportionate and unbalanced procedures is not judicial victory, but censorship. Despite numerous warnings from civil society, this problem has still not been addressed by the legislature.
","p2":"Another illustration of the mistrust faced by associations is the trend in legislation and case law to limit their ability to take legal action, for example when they report environmental damage by companies or integrity breaches involving the private or public sector.
It is essential to implement a response that is equal to the challenges posed by the increasing gagging and legal insecurity of rights defenders, and thus protect civic space from attacks by private actors.
","propositions":{"prop1":"Broadening the status and protection of whistleblowers","prop2":"Fighting SLAPPs by amending procedural rules and strengthening sanctions against judicial practices that impede the exercise of freedom of expression","prop3":"Amend the articles of the Code of Criminal Procedure governing the standing of associations to facilitate litigation as a whole"}},"tribunal":{"metaTitle":"Is the fight against economic crimes imperialist? – Sherpa NGO 20 years","description":"For its 20th anniversary, Sherpa organized a People's Tribunal! An opportunity to look back on our past actions while taking time for debate and reflection.","title":"Our 20th anniversary —For its 20th anniversary, Sherpa organized a People's Tribunal!
The numerous witnesses for the prosecution and the defence debated tenaciously and introduced their evidence to answer the following question: is the fight against economic crimes imperialist?
Are associations like Sherpa legitimate in taking legal action against multinationals for international corruption? What right do these associations have to act in France to defend the environment or foreign workers? Are associations like Sherpa guilty of interference? Of spoliation? Of paternalism?
This fun event was an opportunity to look back on our past actions while taking time for debate and reflection, in order to prepare for the next steps in our fight.
","t11":"The speakers","p11":"The Tribunal was moderated by:
Pour faire partie du jury et participer au débat – votez lors de la délibération qui aura lieu à la fin du tribunal qui sera diffusé en live le 3 décembre 2021 à partir de 19h.
Voir notre module de vote sous la vidéo.
","linkTitle1":"Learn more about what we do","link1":"https://www.asso-sherpa.org/","linkTitle2":"Home","link2":"/"}}},"__N_SSG":true}