After the End of the Beginning: Namibian Oil and the Realisation of Rights through Business

Abstract European corporations have recently discovered vast quantities of oil and gas in Namibia, presenting significant opportunities and risks. Business and human rights (BHR) principles should be applied to the projects, but this paper is motivated by a concern that extant BHR norms are partial and inadequate, particularly in light of global economic and environmental crises. Starting from a critique of liberal human rights, this paper develops a human rights realisation-oriented vision of BHR designed to capture the root causes of harm and to enforce developmental objectives upon corporations. We study the African philosophical concept of ‘ Ubuntu ’, the 1970s UN Code of Conduct on Transnational Corporations, and a 2023 report on business and the right to development to develop specific principles underlying this more comprehensive version of BHR. In conclusion we argue that a more confrontational and egalitarian vision of BHR is needed to address today’s grand challenges.