Abstract
The European Union’s Forced Labour Regulation of 2024 has been lauded as an important step to mandate companies’ protection of global workers. The Regulation sets out an ambition to eradicate the use of forced labour and promote decent labour standards in global value chains. Yet does this Regulation, shaped as a product ban, promote justice for workers?
In their paper, they analyse the Regulation’s terminology of ‘forced labour’ in light of the concept of forced labour developed in Skeie (2026), which sees forced labour as one example of severe labour exploitation, and emphasises the importance of integrating vulnerability, to mitigate global inequalities as an essential element of achieving a safe and just world (Sjåfjell and Cornell 2024).
The Regulation does not exist in a vacuum, and to better understand its potential for promoting justice for workers, they analyse the Regulation in the broader context of Corporate Sustainability Law (Sjåfjell 2025). Employing the regulatory ecology approach (Sjåfjell 2025, Cornell & Sjåfjell 2024), they position the Regulation in the context of international human rights and labour, international norm sets, notably the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises on Responsible Business Conduct, and the geopolitical tensions in globalised markets for products and services.
They undertake an in-depth analysis of the interactions and tensions between the Regulation and the EU’s broader corporate sustainability initiatives and instruments, including the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, the corporate sustainability reporting rules and financial disclosure rules, including the (limited) integration of international laws and norm sets in these EU instruments. Notably, they discuss the significance of due diligence for the fulfilment of the Forced Labour Regulation’s goals.
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This seminar is open to all interested!