Dispute mechanism

Last updated June 16, 2024

A dispute mechanism is a structured process^[1] that addresses disputes or grievances that arise between two or more parties engaged in business, legal, or societal relationships. Dispute mechanisms are used in dispute resolution, and may incorporate conciliation, conflict resolution, mediation, and negotiation.

Otherwise known as grievance mechanisms, dispute mechanisms are typical non-judicial^[2] in nature, meaning that they are not resolved within the court of law. According to research produced by the non-judicial grievance mechanism task force of John Ruggie, Special Representative of Business and Human Rights to the United Nations, those who design and oversee non-judicial mechanisms should acknowledge core human rights processes defined by "all core UN human rights treaties.”^[3]

Dispute mechanisms comprise a way for socially responsible businesses to meet requirements of corporate responsibility-related agreements or pacts, reduce risk while capacity-building or developing internationally, and assist larger processes that create positive social change.

Dispute mechanisms are an increasingly effective tool for establishing communication channels between businesses and communities. When successful, they offer a trusted way for local peoples or communities to voice and resolve concerns related to development projects, while providing companies with transparent, effective ways to address community concerns. According to a publication by the Compliance Advisor/Ombudsman of the World Bank Group, "locally-based grievance resolution mechanism(s) provide a promising avenue by offering a reliable structure and set of approaches where local people and the company can find effective solutions together."^[4] Generally, it is agreed that a well-functioning grievance mechanism should:

Provides a predictable, transparent, and credible process to all parties, resulting in outcomes that are seen as fair, effective, and lasting
Builds trust as an integral component of broader community relations activities
Enables more systematic identification of emerging issues and trends, facilitating corrective action and preemptive engagement.

Characteristics

According to the Business and Human Rights SRSG, such mechanisms must at a minimum be:

Legitimate: a mechanism must have clear, transparent and sufficiently independent governance structures to ensure that no party to a particular grievance process can interfere with the fair conduct of that process;
Accessible: a mechanism must be publicized to those who may wish to access it and provide adequate assistance for aggrieved parties who may face barriers to access, including language, literacy, awareness, finance, distance, or fear of reprisal;
Predictable: a mechanism must provide a clear and known procedure with a time frame for each stage and clarity on the types of process and outcome it can (and cannot) offer, as well as a means of monitoring the implementation of any outcome;
Equitable: a mechanism must ensure that aggrieved parties have reasonable access to sources of information, advice and expertise necessary to engage in a grievance process on fair and equitable terms;
Rights-compatible: a mechanism must ensure that its outcomes and remedies accord with internationally recognized human rights standards;
Transparent: a mechanism must provide sufficient transparency of process and outcome to meet the public interest concerns at stake and should presume transparency wherever possible; non-State mechanisms in particular should be transparent about the receipt of complaints and the key elements of their outcomes.^[2]

Types

Industry
Company
Legislative
Government
Non-Governmental
Independent State-based
International Organization
Multi-Stakeholder

Uses

Well-designed grievance mechanisms have multiple and sometimes divergent points of application, but are typically used by monitoring, auditing, project oversight, supply chain management, and stakeholder engagement. Grievance mechanisms can deal with most kinds of grievances (bar those raising criminal liability), including – but by no means limited to – those that reflect substantive human/labour rights concerns. As such, rights-compatible mechanisms must work to integrate human rights norms and standards into their processes and are based on principles of non-discrimination, equity, accountability, empowerment and participation.

Related Research Articles

Dispute resolution or dispute settlement is the process of resolving disputes between parties. The term dispute resolution is conflict resolution through legal means.

Mediation is a negotiation facilitated by a third-party neutral. It is a structured, interactive process where an impartial third party, the mediator, assists disputing parties in resolving conflict through the use of specialized communication and negotiation techniques. All participants in mediation are encouraged to actively participate in the process. Mediation is a "party-centered" process in that it is focused primarily upon the needs, rights, and interests of the parties. The mediator uses a wide variety of techniques to guide the process in a constructive direction and to help the parties find their optimal solution. A mediator is facilitative in that they manage the interaction between parties and facilitates open communication. Mediation is also evaluative in that the mediator analyzes issues and relevant norms ("reality-testing"), while refraining from providing prescriptive advice to the parties. Due to its voluntary nature, a person cannot be compelled to use mediation to resolve their dispute. However, a suggestion from the Court may be difficult to resist.

The European Ombudsman is an inter-institutional body of the European Union that holds the institutions, bodies and agencies of the EU to account, and promotes good administration. The Ombudsman helps people, businesses and organisations facing problems with the EU administration by investigating complaints, as well as by proactively looking into broader systemic issues. The current Ombudsman is Emily O'Reilly.

Online dispute resolution (ODR) is a form of dispute resolution which uses technology to facilitate the resolution of disputes between parties. It primarily involves negotiation, mediation or arbitration, or a combination of all three. In this respect it is often seen as being the online equivalent of alternative dispute resolution (ADR). However, ODR can also augment these traditional means of resolving disputes by applying innovative techniques and online technologies to the process.

A national human rights institution (NHRI) is an independent state-based institution with the responsibility to broadly protect and promote human rights in a given country. The growth of such bodies has been encouraged by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), which has provided advisory and support services, and facilitated access for NHRIs to the United Nations (UN) treaty bodies and other committees. There are over one hundred such institutions, about two-thirds assessed by peer review as compliant with the United Nations standards set out in the Paris Principles. Compliance with the Principles is the basis for accreditation at the UN, which, uniquely for NHRIs, is not conducted directly by a UN body but by a sub-committee of the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI) called the Sub-Committee on Accreditation. The secretariat to the review process is provided by the National Institutions and Regional Mechanisms Section of the OHCHR.

A legal remedy, also referred to as judicial relief or a judicial remedy, is the means with which a court of law, usually in the exercise of civil law jurisdiction, enforces a right, imposes a penalty, or makes another court order to impose its will in order to compensate for the harm of a wrongful act inflicted upon an individual.

Justiciability concerns the limits upon legal issues over which a court can exercise its judicial authority. It includes, but is not limited to, the legal concept of standing, which is used to determine if the party bringing the suit is a party appropriate to establishing whether an actual adversarial issue exists. Essentially, justiciability seeks to address whether a court possesses the ability to provide adequate resolution of the dispute; where a court believes that it cannot offer such a final determination, the matter is not justiciable.

The Financial Ombudsman Service is an ombudsman in the United Kingdom. It was established in 2000, and given statutory powers in 2001 by the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, to help settle disputes between consumers and UK-based businesses providing financial services, such as banks, building societies, insurance companies, investment firms, financial advisers and finance companies.

The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action (VDPA) is a human rights declaration adopted by consensus at the World Conference on Human Rights on 25 June 1993 in Vienna, Austria. The position of United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights was recommended by this Declaration and subsequently created by General Assembly Resolution 48/141.

An organizational ombudsman is a designated neutral or impartial dispute resolution practitioner whose major function is to provide independent, impartial, confidential and informal assistance to managers and employees, clients and/or other stakeholders of a corporation, university, non-governmental organization, governmental agency or other entity. As an independent and neutral employee, the organizational ombudsman ideally should have no other role or duties. This is in order to maintain independence and neutrality, and to prevent real or perceived conflicts of interest.

The Constitution of Kosovo is the supreme law of the Republic of Kosovo, a territory of unresolved political status. Article four of the constitution establishes the rules and separate powers of the three branches of the government. The unicameral Assembly of the Republic exercises the legislative power, the executive branch led by the President and the Prime Minister which are responsible for implementing laws and the judicial system headed by the Supreme Court.

The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) was formed on 14 August 2003 by United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 1500 at the request of the Iraqi government to support national development efforts.

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR), or external dispute resolution (EDR), typically denotes a wide range of dispute resolution processes and techniques that parties can use to settle disputes with the help of a third party. They are used for disagreeing parties who cannot come to an agreement short of litigation. However, ADR is also increasingly being adopted as a tool to help settle disputes within the court system.

The Universal Periodic Review (UPR) is a mechanism of the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council (HRC) that emerged from the 2005 UN reform process. Commonly referred to as the UPR, it was established by General Assembly resolution 60/251 of 3 April 2006, the UPR periodically examines the human rights performance of all 193 UN Member States. It is intended to complement, not duplicate, the work of other human rights mechanisms, including the UN human rights treaty bodies. This is the first international human rights mechanism to address all countries and all human rights. The Working Group on the UPR, which is composed of the HRC's 47 Member States and chaired by the HRC President, conducts country reviews.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Whistleblower protection in the United States</span>

A whistleblower is a person who exposes any kind of information or activity that is deemed illegal, unethical, or not correct within an organization that is either private or public. The Whistleblower Protection Act was made into federal law in the United States in 1989.

The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) is an instrument consisting of 31 principles implementing the United Nations' (UN) "Protect, Respect and Remedy" framework on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises. Developed by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG) John Ruggie, these Guiding Principles provided the first global standard for preventing and addressing the risk of adverse impacts on human rights linked to business activity, and continue to provide the internationally accepted framework for enhancing standards and practice regarding business and human rights. On June 16, 2011, the United Nations Human Rights Council unanimously endorsed the Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights, making the framework the first corporate human rights responsibility initiative to be endorsed by the UN.

Development is a human right that belongs to everyone, individually and collectively. Everyone is “entitled to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized,” states the groundbreaking UN Declaration on the Right to Development, proclaimed in 1986.

Internet intermediary refers to a company that facilitates the use of the Internet. Such companies include internet service providers (ISPs), search engines and social media platforms.

The Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict (OSRSG-SVC) is an office of the United Nations Secretariat tasked with serving the United Nations' spokesperson and political advocate on conflict-related sexual violence, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict (SRSG-SVC). The Special Representative holds the rank of Under-Secretary-General of the UN and chairs the UN Action Against Sexual Violence in Conflict. The mandate of the SRSG-SVC was established by Security Council Resolution 1888, introduced by Hillary Clinton, and the first Special Representative, Margot Wallström, took office in 2010. The current Special Representative is Pramila Patten of Mauritius, who was appointed by UN Secretary General António Guterres in 2017. The work of the SRSG-SVC is supported by the UN Team of Experts on the Rule of Law/Sexual Violence in Conflict, co-led by the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPO), Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the UN Development Programme (UNDP), also established under Security Council Resolution 1888.

The Toronto Declaration: Protecting the Rights to Equality and Non-Discrimination in Machine Learning Systems is a declaration that advocates responsible practices for machine learning practitioners and governing bodies. It is a joint statement issued by groups including Amnesty International and Access Now, with other notable signatories including Human Rights Watch and The Wikimedia Foundation. It was published at RightsCon on May 16, 2018.

References

↑ "ACCESS Facility database of non-judicial grievance mechanisms" . Retrieved 2013-12-13.
1 2 "0812861" (PDF). Retrieved 2010-05-17.
↑ These principles, based on more specific guidance developed for companies, apply across non-judicial mechanisms of different kinds. See http://www.business-humanrights.org/Links/Repository/308254/ link_page_view.
↑ "A Guide to Designing and Implementing Grievance Mechanisms for Development Projects". Commdev.org. Archived from the original on 2009-08-17. Retrieved 2010-05-17.

External links

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] "ACCESS Facility database of non-judicial grievance mechanisms" . Retrieved 2013-12-13.

[unglobalcompact1-2] 1 2 "0812861" (PDF). Retrieved 2010-05-17.

[3] These principles, based on more specific guidance developed for companies, apply across non-judicial mechanisms of different kinds. See http://www.business-humanrights.org/Links/Repository/308254/ link_page_view.

[4] "A Guide to Designing and Implementing Grievance Mechanisms for Development Projects". Commdev.org. Archived from the original on 2009-08-17. Retrieved 2010-05-17.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]