OECD instruments on corporate governance, integrity and responsibility

Abstract

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), as the international organisation that groups the most. developed market economies, plays a leading role in setting international standards for corporate conduct. The OECD has worked on these issues since the 1970s and, in 1976, one finds the first international document on corporate responsibility: the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. A parallel work on the drafting of a Code of Conduct on Transnational Corporations was started by the UNCTAD Centre on Transnational Corporations (UNCTC), but was never completed, due to the differences between industrialised and developing countries. At that time, the confrontational ambience in the United Nations prevented a compromise on such a divisive issue, while the more homogenous membership of the OECD - in fact the source of most of the world's direct investment flows and home to most multinational enterprises - facilitated consensus.