Private Sector Accountability in Combating the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children A contribution of ECPAT Int'l to the World Congress III against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents

Since the First and Second World Congresses against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC), new methods for holding the private sector accountable for violations of children’s rights in the context of sexual exploitation have emerged. Internal and external corporate social responsibility (CSR) tools have increased in popularity, in turn placing greater pressure upon intergovernmental organisations, international agencies and world states to acknowledge the abuses and develop regimes towards ensuring prevention, protection and punitive consequences for multinational corporations (MNCs) that harm children.
Although there are many best practice examples in the literature, global standards and norms (often referred to as international “soft” law) have been criticised as being ineffective due to their voluntary and self-policing nature. A new trend has been noted: attempting to hold the private sector accountable by treating alleged violations of international “hard” law (including the Convention on the Rights of the Child – CRC and its Optional Protocols) as actionable, in the same way that human rights violations committed by a state are actionable in some domestic courts of law. Legal mechanisms that offer a vehicle for domestic application of international “hard” law, such as the United States’ Alien Torts Claim Act, may offer the possibility of successfully ensuring human rights accountability of multinational corporations, albeit in a narrow set of circumstances and with many obstacles to overcome, most notably jurisdictional issues.

The report also looks at the Tourism Industry, the media, New Technologies (internet) and the Financial services industry in particular to assess their responsiveness to the problem.