Lee McConnell is a lecturer at Northumbria University, UK.

The human rights abuses are often committed by powerful non-State actors including multinational enterprises and non-State armed groups. This book examines this phenomena in resource-rich, weak governance States where these groups are involved in resource extracting industries. The book explores the failure of the dominant State-centric accountability regime to regulate these groups and instead establishes an alternative theoretical framework based on Hans Kelsen's Pure Theory of Law which would allow for a legal system in which non-State actors are regulated directly.

1. Introduction 2. The State as the Basis of Legal Validity 3.The Practical Failings of State-centric Accountability Regimes 4. The Theoretical Scope for Direct Non-State Actor Regulation 5. Abandoning the State: Towards an Alternative Theoretical Framing 6. Conclusion