Accountability for Corporate Complicity in Human Rights Violations: Argentina’s Transitional Justice Innovation?

Abstract

Democracy or Corporations” were the words that appeared on posters and in graffiti on the March 26, 2014 commemoration of the 1976 coup in Argentina. Those words capture the efforts that the country has begun in holding businesses accountable for their role in the military regime's repressive apparatus. It might not be surprising that Argentina, as the world leader in transitional justice innovations, might add corporate accountability to its set of accomplishments. The puzzle underlying this chapter, however, is whether other countries will follow Argentina's lead or if the factors shaping the corporate accountability processes in Argentina are unique and nontransferable to other contexts. We thus explore Argentina's efforts in a comparative framework and also attempt to build a theoretical link connecting accountability for business complicity with the broader transitional justice field. To fulfill these objectives we raise and address the following questions: Why and when should corporate accountability become a new focus within transitional justice? Where and how are these transitional justice innovations occurring? We conclude with some reflections on the question of what factors contribute to success in achieving transitional justice goals through accountability for corporate complicity. Our responses to these questions draw on our cross-national research on accountability for corporate complicity, with a particular focus on Argentina in a comparative context. Transitional Justice and Corporate Complicity: Why and When Traditionally, transitional justice (hereafter TJ) has focused on the behavior of states and their direct associates in perpetrating human rights violations. The definition of TJ and its practice, however, have not excluded non-state actors as targets for accountability. TJ could thus be extended to include corporate accountability for complicity in past dictatorships and civil conflict, as we argue in this chapter. TJ has been defined as a response to “systematic or widespread violations of human rights … [in] recognition for the victims and to promote possibilities for peace, reconciliation, and democracy.” Nothing in the definition and purpose of TJ precludes the inclusion of businesses as long as they have participated in the systematic or widespread use of repression and if the aim of corporate accountability advances TJ goals. In practice, moreover, non-state actors have been included in TJ mechanisms. Truth commissions and trials have focused on state forces and their civilian allies in death squads or paramilitary groups, as in Peru and El Salvador.