Corporate Liability for Human Rights Violations on Foreign Soil: A Historical and Prospective Analysis of the Alien Tort Claims Controversy

Authors

Gabriella D. Pinilla

First Page

687

Document Type

Comment

Abstract

Breakthrough decisions in Federal Circuit Court have allowed foreign plaintiffs to successfully bring claims against U.S. corporations for egregious human rights violations perpetrated by foreign governments in furtherance of corporate initiatives abroad. This comment analyzes the Alien Tort Claims Act controversy, from the Act's obscure roots through its modem evolution, paying particular attention to developmental cases and critical legal arguments. Though the ATCA has its origins in the Judiciary Act of 1789, a relatively minimal body of recent case law has developed revealing the Act's use as a weapon in the enforcement of international human rights norms. This string of case law includes striking decisions construing the statute and international law to allow for accountability of corporations engaged in business with irresponsible foreign governments. With corporations now vulnerable to considerable liability for their actions abroad, the politicization over the ATCA's viability may influence important decisions in the federal court system, or bring about potentially dismantling legislation that would substantially limit the Act's applicable scope. This comment will present the Act's history, watershed and developmental cases, and feature the arguments against and in defense of its current use and application. Part I will give an overview of the Act's interpretive and decisional history prior to Doe v. Unocal. This section will cover cases interpreting the "law of nations" almost too narrowly to employ the Act at all, through landmark constructions, which gave rise to the ATCA's far reaching modern scope. Part II will discuss the significance of the Ninth Circuit's decision in Unocal and that case's effect on current and future ATCA determinations. Part III concludes the paper with a review of the heating debate between human rights advocates and scholars who support the ATCA, and corporate lobby, trade analysts, and conservative legal theorists who claim that modem application of the Act is an exercise in judicial imperialism, the unbridled use of which will lead to a costly chilling of transnational investment and development.

Recommended Citation

Gabriella D. Pinilla, Corporate Liability for Human Rights Violations on Foreign Soil: A Historical and Prospective Analysis of the Alien Tort Claims Controversy, 16 St. Thomas L. Rev. 687 (2004).
Available at: https://scholarship.stu.edu/stlr/vol16/iss4/6