2.1 Introduction

Evolution of concepts, principles and documents in the construction of sustainability

The social responsibility of organizations from all sectors arises from an international context in which themes such as human rights, labor rights, environment and sustainable development gain momentum in the discussion among United Nations member states resulting in guidelines that lead to the development of the CSR concept within the business world.

Such initiatives have been translated into standards, agreements, recommendations, unilateral and multilateral codes that help understand and place responsibility as an emerging theme for organizations. Generally speaking, they are documents of the United Nations and its agencies, such as ILO and UNDP, which provide the minimum parameters for business operations.

Among the main international documents inspiring the CSR we can highlight the following:
• United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
• ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and its Follow-up;
• ILO Tripartite Declaration Concerning Multinational Enterprises;
• Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises;
• United Nations Rio Declaration / Agenda 21 on environment, sustainable development and poverty eradication.

Widely accepted worldwide, these treaties, guidelines and instruments directly affect the business activities, their obligations, and hold companies responsible for promotion and fulfillment of rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the most impor­tant of them and its preamble includes the companies as legitimate actors for the full achievement of human rights based on the 18th Century French Revolution ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity.

Labor is also a United Nations concern and it is addressed by the ILO through the Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and its fundamental Conventions, which provide principles for labor relations such as:
• Freedom of association and protection of the right to collective bargaining’ (ILO Conventions 87, 98, complemented by ILO Convention 135);
• Abolition of forced and compulsory labor (ILO Conventions 29 and 105);
• Abolition of child labor (ILO Conventions 138 and 182);
• Abolition of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation (ILO Conventions 100 and 111), and Conventions 87 and 98 (complemented by ILO Convention 135).

Sustainable development, widely discussed nowadays within the scope of social responsibility, has become a United Nations universal concern since the Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, also known as Rio - 92. Since then, enhanced discussion and a higher number of Conventions on environment has added to other existent agreements such as:
• OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises (1976);
• Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer (1985);
• Earth Summit, Rio de Janeiro (1992);
• Convention on Biological Diversity (1992);
• Aarhus Convention (1998), through which human rights and environmental rights were for the first time related to each other.
• Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent (PIC) Procedure (1998);
• Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (2000);
• Kyoto Protocol;
• Stockholm POPs (Persistent Organic Pollutants) Convention (2001);
• Stern Report (2006);
• IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) Report.

In 2007, the UN Assembly will vote on the Norms on the Responsibility of Transnational Corporations and other companies concerning human rights. This initiative aims to update the UN guidelines for companies taking into account documents such as:
• United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
• United Nations Charter;
• Tripartite Declaration of Principles Concerning Multinational Enterprises and Social Policy;
• ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work;
• OECD Guidelines and Global Compact.

The objective of the new UN guidelines is to empower Governments so that they can demand that organizations respect human rights, sovereignty and local economic development. In addition to addressing CSR in respect to human rights, labor rights, consumer rights and the environment, the guidelines also include the participants’ comments and create a database of the documents used in their development.

Organizations are expected to take their social responsibility, complying with, respecting and promoting the treaties and standards mentioned above, integrating them in all aspects of their operations.