Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Disputes

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Disputes, a book representing one of the first comprehensive analyses of ESG within the field of dispute resolution, serves as an essential resource for understanding the legal, procedural, and normative developments at the intersection of sustainability and adjudication, given that disputes touching on ESG concerns frequently cut across multiple areas of law and engage a diverse range of parties and causes of action. ESG has gained significant prominence in shaping the policy frameworks and procedural dynamics of contemporary dispute resolution. Across numerous sectors and jurisdictions, businesses are facing sustained pressure from institutional investors, regulators, and civil society to incorporate ESG-related obligations into contractual arrangements and ensure that these obligations are legally enforceable, particularly in cross-border contexts.

Encircling issues as diverse as environmental impact, climate change, human rights, corruption, financial crime, and corporate reporting violations, the contributors address the complex pattern of the ESG paradigm under five major headings related to legal practice:
- arbitration and arbitral procedure, including investor-State arbitrations;
- climate change and sustainability litigation; 
- disputes arising in the course of major construction projects;
- due diligence in identifying key ESG-related risks in the context of mergers and acquisitions; and
- grounds on which ESG responsibilities can be enforced and companies can be held accountable for ESG-related infractions.

The relevance of ‘soft law’ instruments – such as the Equator Principles, the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs), the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI), the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, and the IFC Performance Standards – has become increasingly prominent, as each plays a distinct role in shaping normative expectations and influencing legal and policy debates around responsible business conduct and sustainability.

In the current global legal climate, it is clear that companies must navigate growing compliance obligations and complex multijurisdictional regulatory frameworks concerning ESG issues. Environmental considerations have been particularly prominent and, with the commitments flowing from COP29, one may expect them to continue being so. Consequently, this authoritative overview of the ESG landscape not only furnishes an in-depth understanding of the legal basis that can generate disputes – thus fostering certainty for the market around ESG-related expectations of company conduct and reporting requirements – but also serves as a key to successfully prosecuting or defending ESG concerns in investment law, energy law, private equity, climate change, sustainable development, corporate social responsibility, and construction law.