Big Data on BHR: Innovative Approaches to Analysing the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre Database

Author: Nicole Janz, James Allen-Robertson, Rajeshwari Majumdar and Shareen Hertel

Publication: Cambridge University Press

Date Published: 30 September 2020

Citation: JANZ, N., ALLEN-ROBERTSON, J., MAJUMDAR, R., & HERTEL, S. (2020). Big Data on BHR: Innovative Approaches to Analysing the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre Database. Business and Human Rights Journal, 1-7. doi:10.1017/bhj.2020.18

Overview:

Data limitations in the field of business and human rights (BHR) are a significant challenge to developing transparent and replicable scholarship. Difficulties stem from the proprietary nature of much BHR data; incomparability of information across firms, sectors or regions; and coding challenges of existing information. Together, issues like these constrain the nature of cumulative research. Absent standard protocols for sharing and validating large-scale data, for example, make it difficult for scholars to progress in generating new conceptual or policy breakthroughs in the field of BHR.