As evidenced by her regular blog posts on the subject, corporate social responsibility is a primary area of interest for new U of A Faculty of Law Assistant Professor Gail Henderson. This summer, Professor Henderson was interviewed by Alberta Venture magazine on the topic of "CSR"(corporate social responsibility) for a story on outsourcing in the Canadian fashion retail industry.
"The likelihood of a Canadian retailer being held liable in court from damages that result from outsourcing is still extremely low," says Gail Henderson, an assistant professor specializing in CSR in the University of Alberta s Faculty of Law. Still, that could change. The Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh, signed by companies like Loblaw and H&M after the Dhaka collapse, is legally binding. The story was prompted in part by the collapse of a factory in Bangladesh that produced clothing for the Canadian label Joe Fresh, among other prominent clothing brands.
Professor Henderson also incorporates discussion of CSR in her Corporations class, and this summer supervised an independent research paper by 3L Andrea Vig on outsourcing in Bangladesh, corporations' responses to the factory collapse and the idea of "corporate conscience".
Read the full interview in Alberta Venture.
Links to Professor Gail Henderson's blog posts on the tragedies in Bangladesh, related to the Alberta Venture story: