Seeking Justice. Access to Remedy for Corporate Human Rights Abuse, by Tricia D. Olsen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023)

Business and human rights (BHR) scholars and practitioners have long lamented the scarcity of research investigating the nature, quality, and contours of Access to Remedy, the third pillar of the United Nations Guiding Principles.While the work of this journal is starting to reverse the situation, there is still a dearth of scholarship on remedy based on quantitative empirical research.Against this backdrop, this review will emphasize how Tricia Olsen's book is a much-needed and long-awaited contribution, not only because of its methodological uniqueness but also because of the theoretical advances she delivers.Olsen aims to understand the variation in access to remedy mechanisms for corporate human rights abuse and the role that contestation may play in shaping this access.In the process, she empirically tests and discusses some previously unquestioned premises of the BHR fielde.g. the 'governance gap' narrative, and the complementarity between judicial and non-judicial remedies among others.The book is structured in seven chapters.Following the introduction, chapter 2 presents the fundamental premises underlying Olsen's theoretical model, the so-called 'Varieties of Remedy Approach'.Chapter 3 outlines the scope and breadth of the Corporations and Human Rights Database underpinning her research.Chapters 4 and 5 investigate access to judicial and nonjudicial remedy mechanisms, respectively.Chapter 6 looks at whether and how contestation for corporate human rights abuse helps strengthen democratic institutions.Finally, chapter 7 concludes.Olsen asks herself: Why do some victims of corporate human rights abuses have access to remedies while others do not?To what extent the characteristics of who is involved and the context in which access to remedy is (not) taking place can explain such variation?And, more broadly, does the contestation that often accompanies the claims for remedies for business and human rights abuses contribute to advancing democratic practices?From a methodological perspective, the way in which she addresses these questions is a unique and innovative contribution to the BHR field.Firstly, Olsen built the Corporations and Human Rights Database (CHRD), a unique large-scale collection of data about corporate human rights abuse and access to remedy in Latin America.The CHRD compiled more than 1,000 allegations of corporate human rights abuse with over 130,000 data points spanning a 15-year period (2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012)(2013)(2014).This contrasts with the typical small N analysis prevailing in the BHR literature relying on single firms, specific countries, and comparative analysis among firms or industries.Secondly, she engages in a quantitative empirical exercise where she tests her carefully constructed hypotheses, using mostly logistic regressions, accompanied by sound robustness checks.Altogether, in methodological terms, Olsen's work is unparalleled in the BHR domain.Olsen utilizes this powerful methodological engine to develop and empirically test her 'Varieties of Remedy Approach' theoretical model.This approach allows her to refine the prevailing 'governance gap' narrative.Such 'myopic narrative', as Olsen describes it, may

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