Business and human rights: a historical map of national developments through 2021
By 2021, national business-and-human-rights developments included a French statutory vigilance duty, a Dutch child-labour bill with a separate commencement question, Germany’s adopted supply-chain law, Canada’s procedural ruling in Nevsun and Luxembourg’s policy plan.
- Record through
- 2021
- Published
- 29 October 2026
- Sources checked
- 29 October 2026
This newly written historical account concerns the dated record above. It is not a recovered article or document from the former publisher. Later developments are identified separately.
Different routes to corporate accountability
By 2021, business-and-human-rights developments across several countries used markedly different legal mechanisms. France’s 2017 Law 2017-399 established vigilance-plan duties for covered large groups, including risk mapping, assessment, prevention and monitoring. The law also distinguishes a possible injunction after formal notice from ordinary civil liability; its provisions on civil fines were censured. The French statute is a legislative duty, not merely a policy plan.
The Dutch Senate adopted a child-labour due-diligence initiative on 14 May 2019. The proposed scheme required businesses to declare due diligence against child labour and included supervision and sanctions. Adoption by the Senate did not itself establish that the scheme had commenced. The Senate’s record identifies the parliamentary step, while commencement remains a separate legal question.
Adoption, procedure and policy
Germany’s Bundestag adopted the government’s supply-chain due-diligence bill on 11 June 2021. The historical schedule described phased application, first to businesses with 3,000 employees in Germany from 2023 and then to those with 1,000 from 2024. The adoption record concerns a statutory scheme with risk-related duties, preventive and remedial steps, complaints and documentation. The Bundestag report records adoption, not a statement of all later law.
In Canada, the Supreme Court’s 2020 decision in Nevsun Resources Ltd. v Araya dismissed the company’s appeal from refusal to strike Eritrean workers’ claims. The Court held that the act of state doctrine was not part of Canadian common law and that the customary international law claims were not plainly bound to fail. The procedural ruling did not determine liability at trial. The Supreme Court decision concerned whether claims could proceed, not whether the allegations were proved.
Why the legal distinctions matter
Luxembourg’s first national action plan, adopted on 22 June 2018, was a government implementation programme for the UN Guiding Principles, with coordination, stakeholder engagement and business guidance. It was not a general statutory due-diligence duty. The plan belongs in the same historical map as the laws and cases, but its legal form differs from them.
Our analysis: Treating these developments as one wave of “due diligence law” would obscure who had to act, what institutions could enforce, and what stage each measure had reached. France imposed a defined statutory planning duty on covered groups; the Dutch parliamentary adoption raised a separate commencement issue; Germany adopted a law with scheduled coverage; and Nevsun addressed whether claims could survive a procedural challenge. Luxembourg’s plan set public policy direction. These distinctions determine whether a document creates duties, opens a path for litigation, or signals government priorities.