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Article

1 Aug 2013

Author:
Aurora Voiculescu, Uni. of Westminster, on Times Higher Education

Just Business: Multinational Corporations and Human Rights, by John Gerard Ruggie

From his privileged position “in the eye of the storm”, Ruggie announces two aims for his book. First, to tell the story of how he got from the 2005 UN mandate to the 2011 Guiding Principles. His second stated aim is to tell the story in such a way “that broader lessons can be learned from it”, with business and human rights being, according to him, “a microcosm of a larger crisis in global governance”...Just Business rewards one with all the details of the birthing process of the Guiding Principles. At the same time, this volume offers much more. One can identify the essential elements of an insightful storytelling endeavour: the character, the conflict, the (episodic) resolution, as well as the structuring of events in ways that go beyond mere chronology...Just Business recounts, however, a few of the essential episodes of a bigger story that is yet to unfold. This is a story to which Ruggie has contributed substantially, and this is why his book is indeed a must-read, if only for the reader to be able to offer a different account.