Realizing Human Rights for Water in Industry
Read the Final Report - "The Water and Human Rights, Unlocked: A Guide for Water-Intensive Industries"
This initiative represents a cross-sectoral collaboration between the global mining company BHP and an interdisciplinary team of academics and practitioners at the University of Notre Dame and the Pulte Institute for Global Development. It has produced a groundbreaking rights-based approach to water stewardship that empowers actors in water-intensive industries to promote and protect the human right to water and interrelated human rights. The Realizing Rights for Water (RRW) Framework uniquely combines hydrological, political, and legal considerations into a series of questions that allow industry actors to assess how a proposed set of industrial processes could impact human rights within the areas of operation. These questions aim to capture the right to water's multi-dimensionality and intersectionality with other critical economic, social, and cultural rights. Ultimately, the RRW Framework allows state and non-state industrial actors to proactively mitigate risk and prevent abuse when conducting water-intensive operations.
The framework has been privately discussed with experts at peer institutions and received acclaim at World Water Week for its dynamic responsiveness to the challenges of designing human rights implementation in operational contexts. It takes into account the evolving and interdependent nature of the human right to water and its connection to other rights, including the recently recognized human right to a healthy, safe, sustainable, and clean environment. As a result, the team was invited to present at the UN Social Forum, which contributed to the OHCHR’s input for the UN 2023 Water Conference.
The framework builds from established paradigms of water scarcity, hydrological cycles, and water governance, as well as emerging trends in jurisprudence globally. The multi-disciplinary team validated the framework's flexibility and comprehensiveness by applying it to a series of case studies differing in hydrological, political, and industrial contexts. In addition, in 2022, the multi-disciplinary research team had the opportunity to present the RRW Framework at World Water Week, as well as at the United Nations during the 2022 Social Forum, which focused on Water for Sustainable Development. The Framework was highly regarded at both conferences and has led to additional presentation and funding opportunities.
In its third phase, the “A Rights-Based Approach for Water Governance in a 21st Century World” project has achieved significant milestones. These include the creation of a streamlined, user-friendly framework, stakeholder engagement, comprehensive case study research, and the development of a website. These accomplishments highlight the project’s commitment to advancing human rights and environmental stewardship.
Researchers identified 15 historic case studies of water-intensive industry operations affecting local populations in countries from Colombia and Mongolia to the United States. The framework was applied to these cases, taking into account various political and environmental contexts. This analysis has created a knowledge base for practitioners to assess the human rights impacts of their operations and has the potential to serve as a broader educational tool. Academics may use the database as training material, and industry actors will benefit from understanding the framework’s scope and outcomes.
María Chacón, sustainability program manager at the Pulte Institute, notes, “Our initiative transforms in-depth research into actionable solutions, bridging the gap between analysis and real-world impact. We firmly believe that thorough human rights risk assessments can protect communities and enhance corporate accountability.
“By implementing the RRW framework, we aim to lead environment-intensive industries in understanding and upholding human rights, no matter the legal, social, or environmental context.”
The research team is being led by Marc Muller, Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Earth Sciences, Diane Desierto, Professor of Law and Global Affairs, and Ellis Adjei Adams, Assistant Professor of Geography and Environmental Policy. The project is managed by María Chacón of the Pulte Institute, and benefits greatly from the guidance of Ray Offenheiser, Senior Advisor to the Dean and Director of the McKenna Center for Human Development and Global Business, Tom Purekal, Director of the Innovation and Practice Division at the Pulte Institute, and Georges Enderle, the John T. Ryan Jr. Professor Emeritus of International Business Ethics.