Studies On Environmental Responsibilities Of Transnational Corporations

With worldwide accelerated flowing of capital and production factors,the transnational corporations are increasingly playing a major role in world economic activities.The transnational corporations have cast in-depth influences on social, economy, politics and cultures. At the same time, the negative effect of transnational corporations on the global environment is also becoming increasingly serious. The rise of theory of corporate social responsibility and the seriousness of environmental problems caused by the transnational corporations urgently require the transnational corporations to bear the corresponding responsibility of environmental protection. However, due to the nature of a transnational corporation, it's difficult to find a good global accountability mechanism. The environmental responsibility of a transnational corporation includes not only environmental liability, but also environmental moral responsibility. The only way of combining autonomy and heteronomy of the transnational corporation on environmental issues is to form a comprehensive environmental liability system. Based on this argument, this thesis is divided into the following parts:Part I is Overview of Environmental Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations. Firstly, the concepts of the "transnational corporation" and "environmental responsibility" are clarified. On this basis, the author holds that environmental responsibility of transnational corporation is the responsibility with the content of environmental benefits undertaken by the parent company and the economic entities in various countries in their cross-border business process, which includes both the legal responsibility and the moral responsibility. Then, the author analyzes the characteristics of the environmental responsibility of transnational corporations, pointing out that based on the particularity of transnational corporations, the environmental responsibility of a transnational corporation is also particular. In the end, the author sorts out the emergence and development of environmental responsibility of transnational corporations.Part II is Related Theories of Environmental Liability of Transnational Corporations. The author tries to find a basis for environmental responsibility of a transnational corporation from the different theoretical points of view: the theory of corporate social responsibility lays the foundation of environmental responsibility of transnational corporations. It's the inherent requirements of the environmental responsibility; the theory of sustainable development is the era orientation of the environmental responsibility of transnational corporation; the theory of eco-contract suggests that transnational corporation as the major eco-contractual performer should respect the national environmental rights and the ones of the citizens of the host states; the theory of fair liability emphasizes differentiated responsibilities and the fairness in the real sense, and so transnational corporations should shoulder more environmental responsibilities based on their strong positions.Part III is International Regulation on Environmental Accountability of Transnational Corporations. At present, there are three main approaches to regulate the environmental responsibility of transnational corporations: first, by the conclusion of inter-governmental international organizations, rules, typically such as Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, Global Compact, Code of Conduct on Transnational Corporations,etc.,for transnational corporations to define the environmental obligations, and provides the corresponding information disclosure, environmental management systems and other systems; second, guidelines and supervision of non-governmental international organizations. Non-governmental international organizations have cast more and more significant influence on transnational corporations and have played an active role for promoting transnational corporations to assume environmental responsibility.Part IV is Existing Problems of Environmental Liability for Multinational Corporations. As the transnational operation and the integrated influence of transnational corporations increasingly grow, there are some problems of the environmental responsibility both in theory and in institutional regulation. The problems exist in three aspects: the first is the relevant basic theory. Due to the independent legal personality of the company, the parent company can to a certain extent avoid environmental liabilities; the second is the absence of domestic legislation and the limitations of the interterritorial effect; the third is whether the cooperations among states or international organizations, cooperation in the regulation of the environmental responsibility of the transnational corporation are still full of obstacles and needs to be improved.Part V is Improvement of the Environmental Liability Regime in China. The author firstly analyzes the status of regulation in environmental responsibility of transnational corporation in China. At present, the two aspects of environmental management of transnational corporations are market access and business activities, but there is so little regulation in the disclosure of environmental information and environmental liability insurance. In combination with China's actual situation, the author makes a few suggestions and hopes that the suggestions can provide a reference to effectively regulate environmental responsibility of transnational corporations: Firstly, to strengthen communication and cooperation with other countries; secondly, to bring the role of monitoring and advocacy of non-governmental organizations and civil society into full play; thirdly, to improve and refine the relevance requirements of Company Law, to improve the disclosure system of environmental information and insurance system of environmental liability.