Renowned corporate accountability scholar Professor Hassan Ahmad played a key role at a roundtable hosted by the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights at Oxford University, one of the world’s leading institutions for legal scholarship. From January 22-24, 2025, Professor Ahmad joined a group of business and human rights experts to discuss draft chapters for the upcoming Cambridge Handbook on Business and Human Rights Litigation, which he is co-editing alongside Professors Ekaterina Aristova (University of Oxford) and Rachel Chambers (University of Connecticut).
The high-level discussions examined the complexities of business and human rights litigation across jurisdictions, tackling issues such as:
- Defining business and human rights litigation in an evolving legal landscape
- Contrasting legal approaches between the Global North and Global South
- Assessing private versus public law in holding corporations accountable
Drawing on his expertise in transnational law and corporate responsibility, Professor Ahmad helped guide a comparative analysis of landmark cases from jurisdictions including the U.S., U.K., Canada, and the EU, contrasting them with litigation challenges in, for instance, Bangladesh, Brazil, Tanzania, and other Global South nations. Key barriers – such as private international law doctrines, restrictive statutes of limitations, and enforcement difficulties – were explored alongside emerging legal tools like domestic tort law, customary international law, and alternative compensation mechanisms.
With Professor Ahmad’s leadership, the discussions at Oxford are helping to shape what is expected to become a definitive resource in the field. When published in 2026, the Cambridge Handbook on Business and Human Rights Litigation will provide critical insights into the expanding global reach of corporate accountability law.