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Lawsuits

Lawsuits are formal legal actions brought before courts to get a legally binding decision. They can be filed by the affected individuals and, in some cases, communities, NGOs or groups (collective actions).

Whether you can file a lawsuit and what remedy you can obtain depends on the laws of the country and the specific legal system.

Lawsuits are often used as a last resort, especially when other pathways have not led to a solution or when a binding decision is needed.

Domestic lawsuits: As a general rule, lawsuits have to be filed in the country where the harm or risk has occurred and against the company directly responsible for it, not its parent company or the company it supplies goods to.

Transnational lawsuits: In some cases, if the harm is connected to a foreign company, it may be possible to sue a company in the country where it is headquartered or operates for human rights harms caused by its subsidiaries or suppliers in another country.

Whether you are considering a local or a transnational lawsuit, there are some common considerations to take into account.

Find out how companies are connected to specific risks or harms

Business-related harms to people, communities and the environment are not always purely local; often a company operating locally might be owned by, supplying or financed by an actor based elsewhere, or there are other connections to foreign companies and global supply chains. Understanding that connection is often the first step toward identifying remedy or complaint options that may be relevant to your situation.

The most accessible options for seeking remedy are usually local (courts, public authorities, company complaints systems or other complaint bodies in the country where the harm happened). The options available, and how well they work, depend on the country.

When the harm is connected to a foreign company or global supply chain, there may be ways to seek remedy or make a complaint abroad.

Find out how companies are connected to specific risks or harms here.

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Local/domestic lawsuits

These are lawsuits against companies filed in the country where the human rights or environmental harm has occurred. The lawsuit can seek remedies such as orders to stop or prevent a harmful activity, reparation of the harm and/or financial compensation.

The lawsuits can target local companies, foreign companies that operate directly in that country and local subsidiaries of transnational companies.

They can also target public agencies or bodies that have authorised a business activity that is connected to a harm or have not acted when a harm has occurred.

If local legal action is an option you are considering in your situation or on behalf of people affected by corporate abuse, you should contact a lawyer or legal organisation to get preliminary advice.
Explore our legal assistance directory

Advantages:

  • The general rule followed by most countries’ legal systems is that a human rights harm should be judged by the courts of the country where the harm occurred. As a result, local courts are generally much more likely to accept a case than foreign courts.
  • Additionally, from a practical perspective, it is usually easier to bring a lawsuit in local courts due to language barriers, differences in legal procedures, difficulties in presenting evidence, and the overall complexity of bringing a case abroad.

Limitations:

  • The possibility of filing a lawsuit and obtaining remedy in the country where the harm occurred depends on that country’s laws. This means that the business conduct that directly caused a harm must violate the law of that country, and the country’s courts must have the authority to judge the company. These rules, including any applicable time limits until when to file a case, vary from country to country. Additionally, obtaining a remedy in practice also depends on whether the country’s judicial system is accessible, independent and able to enforce its decisions effectively.
  • A common limitation is that it is generally not possible, in the country where the harm has occurred, to file a lawsuit directly against a foreign parent or buyer company.
  • In practice, this can make it harder to obtain a remedy, particularly financial compensation, as local suppliers or subsidiaries often have limited financial resources.
How lawsuits compare against other types of remedy and complaints options

Domestic lawsuit examples

Explore more examples

Transnational lawsuits against parent or buyer companies

These are lawsuits in which a parent company or buyer company is sued for human rights or environmental harms that occurred in another country, and which are connected to its subsidiaries or suppliers. These lawsuits are brought in the country where the parent or buyer company is headquartered, rather than where the harm occurred, and sometimes are referred to as “supply chain litigation”.

These lawsuits are only possible and viable in certain countries and under very specific legal conditions, and can be complex, lengthy, and expensive.

If transnational legal action against a parent or a buyer company is an option you are considering in your situation or on behalf of people affected by corporate abuse, you should contact a lawyer or legal organisation to get preliminary advice.

Explore our legal assistance directory

Advantages:

  • When possible, they allow affected people to bring claims directly against the parent companies that are benefitting the most from the business activity causing the harm and/or actually making the decisions that have led to the harm, thereby jointly causing/contributing to it. In some situations, this type of lawsuit may be the only option for obtaining remedy, particularly where local laws or courts are ineffective or inaccessible.
  • In addition, these companies typically have far greater financial resources than their subsidiaries or suppliers. This means that, at least in principle, they have more resources to compensate victims for the harm suffered.

Limitations:

  • Transnational lawsuits against parent or buyer companies face significant legal and practical challenges. They usually require substantial financial resources and expert support from specialised lawyers or organisations.
  • From a legal perspective, these lawsuits are only possible in certain countries, under certain recent and forthcoming laws, and in limited situations. Traditionally, companies have not been considered legally responsible for harm caused by their suppliers or subsidiaries, and claims must be brought where the harm has occurred. Only in some countries have courts agreed to hear these cases and recognised that, in some circumstances, a parent company or a buyer company can be held responsible. Even when a case is allowed to go ahead, companies often choose to resolve the cases through settlements, which may provide compensation without admitting wrongdoing.
  • In practical terms, bringing a case in another country is complex. For example, courts may need to apply the law of the country where the harm occurred, and it may be difficult to gather evidence or hear witnesses across borders. These challenges often make the process lengthy and costly, which can be a major barrier for victims.

By country

Transnational lawsuits against parent or buyer companies by country:

Flag France, EU

Photo: Andrew Fackler/Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0

France

Flag France, EU

France

France

France’s Duty of Vigilance Law requires certain very large companies headquartered in France (generally, groups with at least 5,000 employees in France or 10,000 worldwide) to carry out human rights due diligence onf their supply and value chain and publish an annual vigilance plan. The law also provides for civil liability. This means that individuals harmed by a company’s activities can bring a lawsuit before French courts if the company has not complied with its obligations to prevent, mitigate or remedy harm.

A number of lawsuits seeking compensation have already been filed under this law and are currently ongoing:

In addition, anyone can send a company a formal notice asking it to meet its obligations under the law. If the company does not act, the person or group can ask request a court to order the company to comply. The court can also impose financial penalties if the company still does not comply. NGOs have used this mechanism to send formal notices and bring cases, some of which have already ended in court decisions or settlements. See, for example:

See the latest updates on formal notices and lawsuits under the law here.

Flag Netherlands

Peter Smits/Pixabay

The Netherlands

Flag Netherlands

The Netherlands

The Netherlands

Dutch courts may accept to hear cases against Dutch parent companies for harm caused by their foreign subsidiaries if there is a real possibility that the parent company may be held responsible for the harm. This depends on the law that is applicable to the case.

Sometimes, Dutch courts also allow claims against the subsidiary to be heard in the same proceedings. But the courts do not always accept this.

Some groups of victims have succeeded in having their claims seeking compensation for harm heard by Dutch courts, but these proceedings are complex and lengthy. Additionally, some cases have been accepted and later dismissed on the merits (meaning the court decides the claim fails, and the victims lose the case).

Examples:

Additionally, NGOs are starting to use Dutch consumer law to seek accountability for human rights abuses in companies’ supply chains, arguing that the claims that companies make to consumers about their products are misleading, but this type of litigation is only emerging:

European Parliament flags.jpg

Endzeiter, Pixabay license

Other EU countries

European Parliament flags.jpg

Other EU countries

Under the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), victims will most likely be able to claim damages from a company in courts (civil liability) if harm has occurred due to non-compliance with CSDDD obligations. Exact modalities will depend on EU member states’ implementation of the directive into national law, which is currently underway with a July 2028 deadline. There will be a law based on the CSDDD in all 27 EU member states, applicable from July 2029, one year after the transposition deadline.

There have been examples of transnational lawsuits against EU-based companies in Member States other than France and the Netherlands. One example is the KIK lawsuit (re textile factory fire in Pakistan), filed in Germany. The German courts accepted jurisdiction, but the case did not proceed to the merits because the court considered that the compensation claims had expired. The case also played a role in the debates leading up to the German Supply Chain Act. However, the final adopted law did not introduce a new civil liability cause of action or alter the rules governing applicable law.

United Kingdom flag

terimakasih0 / Pixabay

United Kingdom

United Kingdom flag

United Kingdom

In England, courts have developed a principle sometimes called parent company liability. This means an English parent company can sometimes be held responsible for human rights harms caused by its subsidiaries abroad, depending on how much control or oversight the parent company has over what happens (Vedanta Resources lawsuit). More recently, courts have also allowed similar claims where the harm is connected to suppliers of English companies (Dyson lawsuit). Sometimes English courts have also held a parent company responsible by applying the law of the country where the harm occurred (BHP lawsuit).

However, for English courts to hear these cases, victims need to convince the court that England is a more appropriate place for the claim to be heard than the country where the harm occurred. This can be challenging, because the courts usually consider the place where the harm occurred as the more appropriate place to bring a case. But English courts have accepted cases where there is evidence that victims would not be able to obtain justice in the country where the harm occurred, for example, because it would be unrealistic to bring the case there.

Several groups of victims have succeeded in having their claims seeking compensation for harm heard by English courts, but these proceedings are complex and lengthy. Even when cases are accepted, companies have often agreed to a (financial) settlement without admitting wrongdoing. Some cases have also been accepted and later dismissed on the merits (meaning the court decides the claim fails, and the victims lose the case). Examples include:

Explore other transnational lawsuits against UK parent or buyer companies here.

national-flag-of-canada

Pxfuel

Canada

national-flag-of-canada

Canada

In Canada, courts have exceptionally agreed to hear claims for compensation against Canadian parent companies, brought by victims of very serious human rights abuses committed in the operations of their foreign subsidiaries. Examples include:

However, the possibility to bring these types of claims, even for very serious abuses, is not a settled matter, as courts still often consider more appropriate to try the case where the abuse occurred. For example, a group of Indigenous Kuria is fighting to keep its case in Canada against Barrick Gold over alleged extensive abuses connected to a mine in Tanzania, after the case was initially rejected.

United States flag

“USA Flag, 6/2014 US Flag,” by Mike Mozart, CC BY 2.0

United States

United States flag

United States

It has generally been difficult to hold a US company legally responsible for human rights abuses connected to its overseas subsidiaries or suppliers in US courts. Courts often find that they should not hear these cases because the harm happened abroad. Even when US courts do hear the case, they often find that the US company’s connection to the harm is not direct enough to make it legally responsible.

Examples include:

However, if the harm relates to forced labour or human trafficking, there is a specific law, the US Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) that expressly allows victims to seek compensation in US courts from US companies or companies present in the US for abuses in their overseas supply chains. The availability of this route depends on the specific facts of the case and legal advice is recommended. Still, these cases are hard to bring and hard to win. Companies often use many legal arguments to challenge them, which can make the cases very long and the outcome uncertain. Examples include:

Additionally, individuals and organisations have tried to use certain US states’ consumer protection laws to bring lawsuits in federal court against US companies over human rights harms in their overseas supply chains, arguing that the claims that companies make to consumers about their products are misleading. Many of these lawsuits have been rejected by courts but some are ongoing:

NGOs have also brought cases in the District of Columbia local courts under the district's consumer protection law, which allows public interest organisations to bring cases on behalf of consumers:

Other countries

In other countries, there are a few examples of transnational lawsuits against parent or buyer companies that have been accepted by courts, as well as others that have not yet been declared admissible.

Examples of transnational lawsuits against parent or buyer companies in other countries

Transnational “polluter pays” climate lawsuits:

Individuals and communities around the world who have been harmed by the consequences of climate change are increasingly suing fossil fuel and other high-emitting companies, seeking compensation from them. Most of these lawsuits have been filed in the country where the harm hasoccurred. For example, a Belgian farmer has sued TotalEnergies before a Belgian court and South Korean farmers have sued Korean energy companies before Korean courts.

However, some individuals and communities, often supported by civil society organisations, are also suing high-emitting companies in the countries where those companies are headquartered, seeking compensation for harms that occurred elsewhere. These cases can be legally difficult because claimants must connect their specific losses, such as flooding, crop damage or sea-level rise, to climate change and to a particular company’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. This is a relatively new and rapidly evolving area of litigation. Even so, there have already been landmark rulings on admissibility, and new cases continue to be filed.

Examples of transnational “polluter pays” climate lawsuits:

Transnational criminal litigation:

As a general rule, crimes are investigated by the prosecutors and courts of the country where they happened. However, some crimes are considered so serious that prosecutors and courts in other countries may also be able to investigate them, even if they took place abroad.

This can apply to international crimes such as genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. It can also apply to other offences that are often linked to serious human rights abuses, including terrorism financing and foreign corruption. Where companies are connected to these crimes, the company, its executives or both may face criminal investigation or prosecution, depending on the law of the country concerned.

Victims of these crimes, often supported by civil society organisations, have filed criminal complaints against companies or executives in the countries where those companies are based, or in other countries with a connection to the crimes. These cases can be especially important where prosecutors or courts in the country where the harm occurred have not taken action.

The role that victims and private individuals can play in criminal cases varies from country to country. In some places, victims can actively participate in the proceedings; in others, the case is mainly controlled by prosecutors. The possibility of obtaining compensation through a criminal case also depends on the country.

For these reasons, criminal cases do not always provide victims with a direct or immediate remedy. They can also be lengthy, complex and difficult to pursue. Even so, victims may see them as important because they can help acknowledge the harm suffered, establish public accountability, and bring attention to serious abuses. A criminal conviction may also strengthen later civil claims for compensation.

Examples of prosecutors’ investigations, judicial proceedings or criminal complaints brought by victims and NGOs against companies and/or their executives:

Explore more examples of transnational lawsuits

Learn more about specific laws under which you can file lawsuits