BNP Paribas (BNP) is among the largest banks in Europe; it also boasts one of the largest carbon footprints in the world.
BNP is a leading investor in fossil fuel development and other polluting industries. Between 2016 and 2021, the French bank financed $55 billion in fossil fuel activities, including 200 new projects by major oil and gas players like Chevron, Shell, ExxonMobil, and BP. These projects alone are projected to emit 8.6 gigatons of CO2, seemingly contradicting BNP’s own commitments to “move towards carbon neutrality by 2050.”
A French law may provide an avenue to ensure that BNP makes good on its promises. In 2023, three NGOs filed a lawsuit against the bank under the Duty of Vigilance Law, which obligates large French companies to prevent human rights violations and environmental harms from their operations. They allege that BNP violated the law by continuing to fund fossil fuel expansion despite its contribution to global climate change. Although the case is still ongoing, its outcome could provide greater insight into the Duty of Vigilance law’s potential to promote corporate accountability in France.
This blog post first explains what the Duty of Vigilance law is and how it works. It then examines some of the recent cases, considers the law’s broader implications and limitations, and concludes by looking towards what the future may hold for corporate accountability in France and in the European Union.
The Duty of Vigilance Law
In 2017, France enacted the Duty of Vigilance Law. The law requires large France-based companies and their subsidiaries to establish, implement, and publicly disclose a “vigilance plan.” Vigilance plans must identify and prevent human rights violations, health and safety risks, and environmental harms arising from a company’s operations. A company is subject to the Duty of Vigilance law if it has more than 5,000 employees in France or 10,000 employees globally. A company’s vigilance plan must include risk mapping––specifically, it must account for risks to human rights and the environment emerging from the company’s supply chain, including from its subsidiaries and subcontractors. It must also establish procedures to regularly assess the effectiveness of the plan, set strategies to mitigate risks, and create a reporting mechanism for workers and other stakeholders to raise their concerns.
If a company does not comply with its vigilance plan or its vigilance plan falls short of any of the requirements, any party who has a “legitimate interest” can send notice to the company. Should a company fail to adequately respond to the notice, a case can be brought to court. If the court then decides that a company is violating the Duty of Vigilance law, it can impose financial penalties and require the company to amend its vigilance plan.
When it was passed, France’s Duty of Vigilance law was unprecedented in a number of ways. The law’s application to corporate suppliers, subsidiaries, and subcontractors represented a novel effort to enforce its obligations across multinational corporate structures. And by creating a route for interested parties to bring cases, the law removed a significant legal barrier for individuals and communities seeking accountability.
Recent Decisions under the Duty of Vigilance
Recent developments have emphasized the Duty of Vigilance law’s potential to expand avenues to corporate accountability.
In 2021, the French legislature granted the Paris Court of Justice the exclusive authority to handle Duty of Vigilance cases. Then, in 2024, the Paris Court of Appeal created a dedicated chamber for appeals under the law. Prior to this, cases were delayed by jurisdictional and procedural issues as courts struggled to apply the law’s unprecedented framework. Following the creation of specific courts for these cases and appeals, those courts have heard and decided key decisions that clarify the scope of the Duty of Vigilance law.
One such decision was in the Sud PTT v. La Poste case, filed in 2021. Sud PTT is the French postal trade union; La Poste is a French postal service. Sud PTT brought the case over psychosocial harms to workers, workplace harassment, and a La Poste subsidiary’s subcontractor’s reliance on undocumented workers. In 2023, the Paris Court of Justice decided in favor of the plaintiffs, clarifying that companies must account for subcontractors, subsidiaries, and for psychological harms workers may face, requiring La Poste to amend its vigilance plan. However, the court clarified that it did not have the authority to tell a company how to amend its vigilance plan and, notably, it chose not to impose a financial penalty on La Poste. The Paris Court of Appeal affirmed the decision in 2025.
Another important case, Notre Affaire à Tous et al. v. TotalEnergies, focused on whether the French energy and petroleum company, TotalEnergies, had to include risks associated with climate change from greenhouse gas emissions in its vigilance plan. In June 2026, the Paris Court of Justice held that it does. Part of the court’s decision found that TotalEnergies must account for its Scope 3 emissions—indirect greenhouse gas emissions resulting from a company’s activities but originating from other sources. A company’s Scope 3 emissions may, for example, stem from the extraction of materials it purchases or the use of products it sells. Scope 3 emissions account for 70–90% of a company’s total emissions. The court chose to impose financial penalties on TotalEnergies to pay for the plaintiff’s legal fees.
In a third case, Sherpa et al. v. Yves Rocher, the legal non-profit organization Sherpa brought a case on behalf of workers formerly employed by the Yves Rocher Group’s Turkish subsidiary. In 2018 and 2019, the subsidiary fired many of its workers who had joined a union. Yves Rocher had reached a settlement with some of the workers after nearly 300 days of strike in 2019. In the lawsuit, Sherpa and the affected workers claimed that Yves Rocher had breached the Duty of Vigilance law because its vigilance plan did not protect the rights of workers in its subsidiaries. In March 2026, the Paris Court of Justice decided in favor of the workers. However, it did not award most of the workers financial compensation due to the 2019 settlement, even though few had received any compensation.
These three cases illustrate how the Duty of Vigilance law has charted promising pathways to corporate accountability since its enactment. The decisions further clarify the law’s reach: companies are now responsible for all aspects of their operations, including Scope 3 emissions, psychosocial harms to workers, and the actions of their subsidiaries and subcontractors both at home and abroad.
The Road Ahead
However, the judicial interpretation of the law has significant limits. One of the primary challenges to the Duty of Vigilance law has been the court’s reluctance to impose financial penalties on companies found to be in violation. In the La Poste and the TotalEnergies cases, the court chose not to impose financial penalties on the companies that violated the law. In the Yves Rocher case, the court awarded its first-ever damages—only 11% of the damages sought by the workers involved in bringing the case. There are additional significant challenges to the Duty of Vigilance law’s enforcement: there is no public list of companies covered by the law, or any dedicated enforcement body. As a result, NGOs are almost entirely responsible for investigating and pursuing compliance under the Duty of Vigilance.
Despite these challenges, there are still many pending cases that have been brought under the Duty of Vigilance law. Among them are two cases brought against the bank BNP Paribas. As detailed above, o ne of the cases is the first climate lawsuit against a commercial bank, seeking to hold BNP Paribas accountable for its loans to oil and gas companies. The other case challenges the bank’s loans and bond issuances to the Israeli government and weapons suppliers, alleging that such activities violate the Duty of Vigilance’s requirements to identify and prevent human rights violations. These cases and several others have the potential to set promising new precedents regarding the scope and application of the law.
The Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive
Looking forward, France will soon be required to transpose the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) into its national laws. The CSDDD is a set of regulations aiming to ensure sustainable corporate activity for European companies and their foreign subsidiaries. Originally, the CSDDD was more ambitious than France’s Duty of Vigilance law, but following lobbying from the French government and multi-national corporations––as well as from other EU member governments––the EU has significantly walked back the regulations.
With the CSDDD set to require compliance starting in 2029, it is crucial that the Duty of Vigilance law remains a powerful tool for corporate accountability. By requiring vigilance at every level of a company’s operations, the law is uniquely adapted to the modern reality of global supply chains and transnational partnerships. It should continue to offer viable pathways to accountability for individuals and communities who would otherwise be without remedy.
Remy Simon was an intern at CAL and is currently an MPP student at the University of Chicago. Alana Mitias was a legal intern at CAL and is currently a 2L at Harvard Law School.
Image of France’s High Court, Cour de Cassation, by Daniel Vorndran, 2014. CC BY-SA License 3.0
