Re-righting the international tax rules: operationalising human rights in the struggle to tax multinational companies

Abstract

Who finances government, and how, is foundational to realising human rights for all, without discrimination. This is especially pertinent during the COVID-19 pandemic, which is only exacerbating health and economic disparities. This article reviews what a national human rights-aligned tax policy would look like, and then dissects how the international tax rules currently impede individual States, and particularly low- and middle- income countries, to bring their national tax policies in line with human rights. The authors then discuss how international human rights law, including the UN Guiding Principles on Human Rights Impact Assessments of Economic Reforms, can provide a stronger normative foundation to curb harmful tax competition and help resolve disputes over the right to tax multinational companies. Given the paucity of practical tools to embed human rights norms into the process and substance of reforming international tax policies, the authors then develop a set of assessment questions to help operationalise human rights norms into current efforts to re-write the international tax rules.