"Violations of human rights and environmental destruction are still a reality in parts of the internationalised value chains. The "Supply Chain Due Diligence Act" (LkSG) is an expression of a paradigm shift that the international trade union movement and actors such as the UN Human Rights Council have long worked towards with the "Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights". The law makes companies more accountable for respecting global, labour-related human rights in supply chains. The law also aims to ensure that environmental risks are avoided more effectively than before. The Act is thus in line with initiatives for transparency and corporate due diligence in states such as France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and California. The Act, which was passed by the German Bundestag in June 2021 after long negotiations, came into force on 1 January 2023. From a systematic point of view, it belongs less to labour law and more to commercial law. However, due to its objectives, it represents an „important component of a transnational labour law", as Rüdiger Krause rightly puts it (RdA 2022, 303). Not only with its reference to freedom of association does the LkSG contain levers for the transnational protection of interest representation. Reingard Zimmer, Professor at the Berlin School of Economics and Law, provides a profound overview of the provisions of the Act that are particularly relevant for business practice in this report. She elaborates which legal instruments workers' representatives and trade unions in Germany and abroad are given with the LkSG to increase corporate diligence for the observance of human rights and environmental protection in supply chains. In particular, the linkage with the Works Constitution Act is being examined. This text was first published in German under the title “Das Lieferkettensorgfaltspflichtengesetz”. While there is still a dispute in Brussels about a uniform European regulation after the European Commission presented a draft directive on the due diligence obligations of companies with regard to sustainability in February 2022, it is clear: companies that profit from the cross-border division of labour will be held more accountable. Even if the effectiveness of the law has yet to be proven in practice, this report shows that co-determination bodies and trade unions are important actors in achieving the goals of the law..."

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