Compliance and the fundamental duty to prevent racism in business activity

Abstract

This article addresses the practice of racism within the context of business/economic activity aimed at employees and consumers. The research problem centers on the question of whether companies have a fundamental duty to act to neutralize acts of racism in their production chain, and whether compliance serves as a tool capable of realizing this objective. Employing a hermeneutic-dialectic method, the study investigates the phenomenon of racism in business activity through the lens of political philosophy and the legal category of fundamental duties. It explains the connection between the legal category of fundamental duty and the theory of the horizontal effectiveness of fundamental rights. Finally, it links the philosophical category of racism and the theory of fundamental duties and horizontal effectiveness of human rights to the potential of compliance to prevent racist acts. The study concludes that companies have a fundamental duty to prevent the practice of racism through a compliance program compatible with its dimension.