Category: NEWS UPDATES

MSI Integrity has been invited and will attend an exclusive conference at Wilton Park in London, UK, from April 28-30 on a topic that is at the heart of MSI Integrity’s mission: “Increasing the effectiveness of multi-stakeholder initiatives through active collaboration”. Wilton Park is a globally recognized forum for strategic discussion that organizes over 50 events each year focusing on international security, prosperity, and justice. Events at Wilton Park bring together leading representatives from the worlds of politics, diplomacy, academia, business, civil society, the military, and the media.

Amelia Evans, co-founder of MSI Integrity, was invited to attend the conference to contribute her knowledge and experience from investigating the impact and value of MSIs, and developing an MSI Evaluation Tool to assess the structural design and governance processes of MSIs from a human rights perspective. Amelia also presented as an expert panelist at the 2^nd Annual UN Forum on Business and Human Rights in Geneva in December 2013, on the topic of MSI effectiveness for implementing the UN Guiding Principles. That presentation was briefly outlined in a Business and Human Rights Resource Center (BHRRC) blog post in December, reporting on events at the Forum.

More details on the Wilton Park conference can be found at the conference website.

MSI Integrity is pleased to announce that our Board has adopted the core recommendations from our 2013 global consultation and review process. The Board has released a statement explaining all of the actions that MSI Integrity will take to meaningfully implement the Advisory Group’s core recommendations, which is available on our website. 

The feedback throughout the process strongly affirmed the value and need for MSI Integrity to evaluate MSIs, facilitate research into the human rights impact of MSIs and to share learning regarding MSI effectiveness. An Advisory Group, made up of experts with backgrounds in business, human rights, government, and academia, reviewed the comments and presented MSI Integrity’s Board with the Advisory Group Recommendations and Considerations Report (“Report”) in October 2013. The report reiterated the support for MSI Integrity’s work and proposed evaluation framework and provided constructive recommendations based on the comments from the consultation process.

We would like to thank everyone who participated in the consultations for their input, and the Advisory Group for their strong support of MSI Integrity and helpful recommendations on how to further develop our work and organization.

To read the full Board announcement, please visit the webpage that summarizes the developments.

MSI Integrity is pleased to announce that the Advisory Group officially presented the Board with its final report on October 16, 2013. The report contains considerations and recommendations for the Board, based on an extensive review of the feedback and comments received during the 2013 Global Consultation and Review Process. The report can be reviewed on our website.

Over 100 people participated in the worldwide consultation meetings or submitted individual comments.These participants represented views from: corporate social responsibility consultants, business, trade and labor unions, civil society organizations, non-governmental organizations, governments, national human rights institutions, international human rights organizations, MSIs, and academic researchers in fields such as law, business, and human rights.

Special thanks are owed to the host institutions for coordinating regional consultation meetings around the globe. MSI Integrity would like to thank: the Netherlands Embassy (Washington, DC), the Center for Business and Human Rights at NYU Stern Business School (New York, NY), the World Bank (Washington, DC), the Center for Applied Legal Studies at Witwatersrand University (Johannesburg, South Africa), La Trobe University School of Business (Melbourne, Australia), the Law, Governance and Development Initiative at the Australian National University College of Law (Canberra, Australia), the Australian Human Rights Centre at the University of New South Wales Law School (Sydney, Australia), Jindal Global Law School (Sonipat, India), Jorge Tadeo University (Bogotá, Colombia), and the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Den Haag, Netherlands).

The Board of MSI Integrity is carefully considering the Advisory Group report this month, and will publish an extensive response in the coming weeks.

MSI Integrity thanks the many individuals and organizations who have submitted comments during our 2013 Global Consultation, from May 1, 2013 until August 31, 2013. The comment period is now closed.

At this time, all submitted comments and global consultation meeting notes have been directed to the Advisory Group for review and incorporation into their final report and recommendations to the Board of MSI Integrity.

The Board of MSI Integrity will subsequently revise the MSI Evaluation Tool and Assessment Process, taking into account the public comments and Advisory Group recommendations.

We anticipate future consultations and reviews of our standards. If you did not get an opportunity to comment, please contact us directly as we would still like to hear your views and will keep you informed of when the next comment period will be held.

Thank you for your submissions!

The Institute for Multi-Stakeholder Initiative Integrity (MSI Integrity) was officially launched at Harvard Law School on April 17, 2013. MSI Integrity aims to ensure that multi-stakeholder initiatives protect and promote human rights.

The launch of MSI Integrity coincided with the announcement of a public consultation and review of the indicators and standards used to evaluate MSIs. The consultation will be open from May 1 until August 31, 2013. Overseen by an expert advisory group, the review encourages MSI and public participation. For further details, click here.

The first open consultation was held in Washington DC on May 7.  For those interested in other events, please email: info@msi-integrity.org. More events will be announced here soon.