In the light of growing legislation on company disclosure of ecological and social information such as the US Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd Frank Act) from 2010, the UK Modern Slavery Act 2015 and the recent EU Directive 2014/95/EU on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by certain large undertakings and groups (CSR Directive) and its German implementation act (CSR-RUG), this article seeks to assess the contribution of company disclosure laws to improving human rights performance of companies and reducing poverty. Put more generally, can disclosure law actually trigger a change in behaviour? It begins by recalling why we need sustainability or corporate social responsibility (CSR) laws, then discusses key issues of the CSR Directive and the German implementation act, looks into some practice and will draw some conclusions. Its main thesis is that the first step of companies on their way to acting socially responsibly is to know and show their environmental and human rights impacts. Thus, company disclosure laws of non-financial information can be a valuable first step towards more sustainability if designed in the right way.

中文翻译：

---

可持续发展报告：从人权角度对欧盟CSR指令及其在德国实施的评估

鉴于越来越多的关于公司披露生态和社会信息的立法，例如2010年的《美国多德-弗兰克华尔街改革和消费者保护法》（《多德·弗兰克法》），2015年的《英国现代奴役法》和最近的2014/95号欧盟指令/ EU，关于某些大型企业和集团披露非财务和多样性信息（CSR指令）及其德国实施法（CSR-RUG），本文旨在评估公司披露法对改善公司人权绩效的贡献并减少贫困。概括地说，披露法是否真的可以引发行为的改变？首先回顾我们为什么需要可持续发展法或企业社会责任（CSR）法律，然后讨论CSR指令和德国实施法案的关键问题，研究一些实践，并将得出一些结论。其主要论​​点是，公司采取社会责任行动的第一步是了解并展示其对环境和人权的影响。因此，如果设计正确，则非财务信息的公司披露法律可能是迈向更具可持续性的宝贵第一步。