Professor Olivier de Schutter
Catholic University of Louvain & College of Europe

This paper examines under which conditions States may -– or should -- exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction in order to improve the accountability of transnational corporations domiciled under their jurisdiction for human rights abuses they commit overseas. The hypothesis is that, where the host State on the territory of which the transnational corporation has invested is unwilling or unable to react to such abuses, in particular by providing remedies to victims, the home State may have an important role to play in order to ensure that corporate abuses are not left unpunished. This report addresses whether, in such cases, the home State has an obligation to exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction, and whether, even in the absence of such an obligation, it may do so, and if so, under which conditions and according to which tools.