JUS5528 – Corporate Sustainability Law
Course description
Schedule, syllabus and examination date
Course content
This elective introduces the new interdisciplinary concept of Corporate Sustainability Law, which identifies and analyses the multi-layered regulatory framework that intends to promote corporate sustainability.
Corporate sustainability concerns the contribution of business to sustainability, which is necessary if we are going to be able achieve overarching sustainability goals in this decade of action towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
The elective positions the discussion of business in the unsustainable reality of our time, and analyses how business can create value in a sustainable way. Creating sustainable value is, amongst other things, contributing to the protection of human rights, ensuring decent work, and fair taxation. Sustainable value creation is also about contributing to mitigating climate change, reversing biodiversity loss, and phasing out novel entities such as microplastics. We will discuss sectors such as the energy sector, the food industry, and the fashion industry, as concrete examples of the unsustainability of business as usual.
Whatever the sector, company law and corporate governance is the core of the regulatory infrastructure of the dominant form for organising business: the company. There is an inherent tension in law’s focus on the legal form of the individual company as a creature of national law and the cross-border organization of business through global value chains. Knowledge in this field requires an extensive understanding of the interconnections, gaps and attempts at achieving coherence, across international, European and national levels of laws and policies.
Corporate Sustainability Law will encompass international developments, including the UN Guiding Principles of Business and Human Rights and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. In the EU, there is an increasing and unprecedented interest in discussing the regulation of business, with roots in the paradigm shift of the Commission’s definition of Corporate Social Responsibility in 2011. With the launch of the Commission’s Sustainable Corporate Governance Initiative in 2020, the adoption of the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive in 2022 and the soon adopted Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (in trilogue negotiations in the autumn of 2023), company law and corporate governance have become the topic of a heated political debate. The international trend of lawsuits against business for unsustainable activities are also a crucial element of this regulatory framework.
The course will draw on extensive comparative company law and corporate governance research as a basis for analysing and discussing these developments in the EU and the national developments, including the Norwegian Transparency Act (‘?penhetsloven’).
The course provides a thorough understanding of the theoretical underpinnings of the dominant and of newer, more progressive approaches to the company. The core themes of the elective will be corporate purpose, governance of the business (including of global value chains), and the evolving duties of the board.
Learning outcome
You will learn the importance of globalised business in this crucial decade of action towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and how corporate purpose, the governance of business and core duties of the corporate board are regulated today and how they could be regulated in the future.
Admission
You may register for this course if you have admission to a Master’s programme at UiO or the faculty's exchange programme. You can also register for this course if you do not have admission to any programme at UiO, but meet the formal prerequistites.
All students are required meet the formal prerequistites.
Have you met the formal prerequisites at another institution than the University of Oslo, and the results are not formally registered at UiO, you must apply for admission to courses at Master’s level . Students with admission to Master’s degree programmes at other faculties than The Faculty of Law must also apply for admission.
When your admission is in order you must register for courses in StudentWeb
Prerequisites
Formal prerequisite knowledge
Students must fill one of these requirements:
- Passed 1st - 3rd year of the 5-years degree Master of Laws (Master i rettsvitenskap at UiO) (or exams that qualify for exemption for these) or
- Hold a 5-years Master’s degree in Laws (Master i rettsvitenskap at UiO) or equivalent.
Exemptions from the formal prerequisites will be given to students with admission to the faculty's own exchange or master’s degree programmes. This rule does not apply to students with admission to other master’s degree programmes at the University of Oslo, unless otherwise agreed.
Recommended previous knowledge
Three years of law studies.
Overlapping courses
10 credits overlap with JUR1528 – Corporate Sustainability Law
Teaching
Students are given the opportunity to give a short group presentation in the course room, with the topic selected from a list of possible themes.
Examination
Compulsory activity:
All students must submit a blog-style essay of maximum 1000 words (pass/fail), which may be on or related to the topics presented in the course room, to be submitted and assessed after the lectures. The essay may be submitted by individual students or a group of students (maximum five).
All students will have the opportunity to have their blog-style essay selected for further guidance towards a blog post on Blogging for Sustainability.
Examination:
48 hour written home exam. The word limit is 3000 words on master’s level and 2000 words on bachelor’s level.
Footnotes are to be included in the word count of the main text. The following is not to be included in the word count: front page (title etc.), summary, table of contents and references (bibliography). (If relevant for the paper).
Please note that assignments/papers with text exceeding the word limit will not be sent to grading.
Examination support material
This is an open book exam. Candidates may therefore make use of all available sources during the examination period.
Your exam paper must be an independent work. Exam candidates are not permitted to communicate with other persons about the exam question(s) or distribute draft answers or exam answers.
General rules on exam support materials
Use of sources and rules for citing
Familiarize yourself with the use of sources and citations in legal writing. In an exam situation, using other people’s material without declaring it in a clear manner may be considered cheating or an attempt at cheating. You must cite any sources you draw on.
If you break the rules, you may be suspected of cheating or attempted cheating.
Language of examination
The examination text is given in English, and you submit your response in English.
Grading scale
Grades are awarded on a scale from A to F, where A is the best grade and F is a fail. Read more about the grading system.
Explanations and appeals
Resit an examination
- Illness at exams / postponed exams
- Resitting an examination.
- There are special rules for resitting a passed examination in the master's programme in Law.
Withdrawal from an examination
It is possible to take this exam up to 3 times. If you withdraw from the exam after the deadline or during the exam, this will be counted as an examination attempt.
There are special rules for resitting a passed examination in the master's programme in Law.
Special examination arrangements
Application form, deadline and requirements for special examination arrangements.
Evaluation
The course is subject to continuous evaluation. At regular intervals we also ask students to participate in a more comprehensive evaluation.
Other
The language for this course is English. Students enrolled in the Masterprogrammet i rettsvitenskap must pass one English subject as part of their degree, this course will meet these obligations.
This subject is taught at Master 's level. The subject is also taught at Bachelor's level (15 ECTS credits), see JUR1528 – Corporate Sustainability Law.
Please see the chapter above, regarding overlap. For instances of overlap, credits will be deducted on the subject at Bachelors's level.