THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 2019 at 3:30-5:30 P.M. Hotung 1000, Georgetown University Law Center 600 New Jersey Avenue N.W., Washington, D.C.
Refreshments Provided, No Attendance Fee But Please Register by Emailing Allison Donahoe at: ad1448@georegtown.edu
The relationship between business, human rights, and sustainability has gained momentum in recent years with the private sector, governments, civil society, and international organizations, owing largely to the passage of the U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGP) in 2011, the 2012 U.N. Rio + 20 Sustainable Development Conference, the UN Sustainable Development Goals. These developments were followed by a series of multi stakeholder (governments, private sector, investors and civil society networks and organizations) and specific industry driven initiatives. These initiatives led to an emerging international soft law system of business, human rights and sustainability that is based in the internationally acknowledged body of hard law principles. Regardless of being sector specific or multi stakeholder in nature, the regulation/de-regulation, policy, practice (and even litigation) is multifaceted, dynamic, interactive, complex and challenges lawyers to think outside the box to solve these problems.
For instance, in a Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) transaction, corporate lawyers are most likely to encounter questions dealing with social, environmental, human rights and environmental concerns. Lawyers working on national, regional and hemispheric security and defense will also likely encounter these challenges and will have to advice their governments and organizations on how to develop strategic cross-sector collaborations to counter and address these challenges with a security-defense framework and approach. Those advocating on behalf of environmental and human rights organizations will find their work directly intersects with company law, securities law, investment law and company law to name a few sub areas of practice. Conflicts arising out of environmental and natural resources management, require now more than ever legal responses and the integration of a set of skills and strategies in a lawyer’s toolbox to better address context specific challenges and their client’s needs.
Adjunct Professor Mooney will highlight some of the key trends, current challenges and practical opportunities emerging from this evolving field of practice, many of which she will be covering as part of her upcoming GULC Summer Course on the subject. Her background and professional background can be found on the next page.
Sponsored by the GULC Center on Transnational Business and the Law Cosponsored by the D.C. Chapter of the Inter-American Bar Association (IABA D.C.) In coordination with FLAG, LALSA, GILS and …..
Prof. Lelia Mooney
Professor Mooney is a widely-respected expert on rule of law, governance, business, human rights and sustainability, gender and social inclusion, conflict management and transformation and multi-stakeholder engagement. Her twenty years’ career includes working with a wide range of stakeholders across the Americas and in Africa, Asia and Europe leading initiatives with academic institutions, governments, civil society organizations and networks, the private sector and international organizations.
She currently serves on the Board of the American Bar Association’s Center for Human Rights and its Working Group on Business and Human Rights. She previously served as the Chair of the United Nations and International Organizations Committee, Rule of Law Officer, Diversity Officer, Membership and Secretary of the Board and Council of the American Bar Association Section of International Law.
She has been the Director of the Inter-American Democracy Network, a Senior Technical Expert on the Worldwide Women’s Legal Rights Initiative with Partners of the Americas, a Director at Partners for Democratic Change and most recently, a Senior Program Officer and Director of the International Network to Promote the Rule of Law at the United States Institute of Peace.
She is the author of several publications in English and Spanish, including “Promoting the Rule of Law: A Practitioner’s Guide to Key Issues and Developments,” and “The Business, Human Rights and Sustainability Sourcebook,” both published by the American Bar Association.
She has spoken at numerous conferences and panels in the United States and abroad. She has taught seminars at the Inter-American Defense College in Washington, D.C., the University of Defense of Argentina and several other academic initiatives. She served on the International Steering Committee Board of the Voluntary Principles for Business and Human Rights and the United Nations Global Compact Business for the Rule of Law Initiative.
Bilingual in English and Spanish, she also speaks French and Portuguese. She is a trained attorney from the Universidad Nacional del Nordeste (UNNE) in her native province of Corrientes, Argentina, and holds an LL.M. in Law in Development Studies in the United Kingdom and an LL.M. from the Georgetown University Law Center.
IABA DC 