Search

Since the contemporary, mainstream human rights movement rose to prominence in the late-1970s, both knowing about and doing human rights has been marked by a very particular mode of activism, information politics, which mobilises 'brute' facts with the aim of shaming governments into reform. However, this article suggests that the global rise of the far-right has intertwined with reactionary forms of digital culture, engendering both the retreat of shame as an operative concept in global affairs and nourished a growing 'post-truth' suspicion of facts. The article theorises this problem as a conjunctural shift that represents both a political and epistemological crisis for human rights. Following the lead of debates within Science and Technology Studies (STS) and media studies, I contend that the present conjuncture requires us to consider what comes after information politics by re-imagining its epistemological basis. The article brings together Donna Haraway's theoretical work on 'Situated Knowledges', with Maurizio Lazzarato's political epistemology to develop a more perspectival, combative approach to human rights knowledge-making. I argue this epistemic framework is able not only to navigate key problems posed by the digital-authoritarian present but also to address many issues with information politics identified by earlier critics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on rights politics in most of the world and on knowledge production 'after rights'. It assembles a few key elements of anti-imperial epistemic justice which it argues is a necessary lens for producing knowledges on rights politics in most of the world 'after rights'. Its key argument is that knowledge production on rights politics 'after rights' is one that is invested in challenging existing coloniality, structural injustice, exploitation, oppression and methodological nationalism. It is also one that is invested in producing conceptual descriptions of rights politics in most of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The slogan 'defend the right to protest' has proved popular in recent years, connecting a wide variety of organisations, activists and institutional actors. But beneath this apparent agreement of left and centre-left groups, we find quite a significant difference of views over the meaning of the 'right to protest', and what activities it might protect. This article sets out to critically engage with the way that an institutional human rights discourse frames protest. It insists that a primacy is accorded to communication, to the exclusion of material forms of power. At the same time, the article shows that 'violence' becomes a meta-signifier for the jurisprudence on the right to protest, often rubber stamping the way that state violence is externalised onto protestors. The article uses these issues to understand how we might traverse rights, moving from a point where they hold an immense grip on the political imagination, to a point where that grip begins to loosen. In short, the article uses the right to protest to begin to think about what Santner calls 'the far side of rights'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonhuman interests are today routinely articulated in a register of 'rights'. 'Rights of nature' and 'animal rights' have expanded the vernacular of liberal rights beyond the human subject, thereby arguably entering the realm of 'post-human rights'. For such rights to be enforced, however, they must be recognised within a legal order and mediated by human subjects speaking on behalf of nonhuman 'right-holders'. This article focuses on the modes of representation and subjectification of nonhumans – whether natural entities, animals, or ecosystems – that underpin this reconfiguration. While granting rights to nonhumans de-centres the human figure at the heart of liberal legal orders, it remains focused on the category of the subject. Taking on the questions of the symposium on 'After Rights? Politics, Ethics, Aesthetics', I argue that granting rights to nonhumans might well enable a move beyond or 'after human rights', but not 'after human rights'. To think the possibility of an 'after rights', I turn to practices of sociality as articulated in works of critical Black studies that refuse the category of the subject as such. What emerges are modes of living in escape from violent subjections to racialised, colonial, and liberal inscriptions of worlding through 'rights', whether humans or nonhumans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global drug policy is currently dominated by great enthusiasm about human rights, including the idea that rights can generate less punitive approaches to drugs. But if human rights were an effective framework for the prevention of punitive approaches towards drugs, why haven't they prevented them previously? One possibility is that rights are less reliable for those society considers 'less than human'. In Western liberal contexts that valorise voluntarity, rationality, authenticity, and order, people who use drugs figure as compulsive, irrational, duplicitous and chaotic. Rights can reproduce these logics of abjection, including through the repetition of ideas about drugs and proper ways of being. A body of critical drug scholarship seeks to intervene in these constructions. This work mobilises 'habit' as an otherwise to 'addiction' and argues that habit is the foundation of realities. Habits, and thus realities, can be changed. This paper draws on these approaches to explore whether insights from critical drug scholarship can help to generate something after rights, made possible by new habits and modes of connection. To make this argument, we consider habits as a site of both repetition and rupture. We ask whether habits can help us rethink or disrupt rights, and the 'human' therein. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decolonial and post-colonial critiques have shown how rights naturalise a normatively white, Western bourgeois, and appropriative subject, while negating other forms of being and subjectivity. Given the disquiet around rights and their subject, reimagining the subject of rights calls on us to think 'after rights?'. Thinking 'after rights?', and insisting on the question mark, I argue, entails seeking the 'undared shape' (Aimé Césaire) of rights untethered from the figure of sovereign Man. Sylvia Wynter's historical-philosophical critique of Man, and search for the human 'after Man', are central for understanding the colonial-modern order and the role of rights within this. Extending Wynter's orientations, I first analyse how rights are implicated in modernity-coloniality's material and symbolic violences. Second, I examine Wynter's amplification of sociopoetic struggles – those wide-ranging modes of sociality and cultural, survival practices – by Man's enslaved and colonised Others. Such struggles aimed to displace Man as locus of colonial-modern structures, forging new meanings and modes of world-making untethered from this hegemonic figure. Importantly for rights and world politics scholarship, sociopoetic struggles work with abolitionist-reparative intent towards modernity-coloniality and its master subject. Finally, I consider what renarrating the human outside Man's horizon – as abnormative, insovereign and anti-individualist praxis – means for human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central government has the primary responsibility for the protection of human rights. However, several factors such as decentralisation raise questions about the role of local authorities in this area. Our paper examines this issue through an interdisciplinary approach, combining international law and political sociology. Our focus lies on the case of France, the 'homeland' of human rights: do French local elected authorities always take human rights seriously? Our research design combines qualitative and quantitative methods. After providing a background of the international legal context, this paper will present the findings on human rights local perceptions and practices of elected representatives. Human rights' perceptions of these subnational political actors strongly depend on their educational qualifications and personal commitments. The same applies to the hierarchy that they draw between fundamental freedoms, social rights, and environmental rights. By contrast, local practices in favour of human rights vary most importantly according to the local authorities' status and demographic weight, rather than their political hue. When human and financial resources are scarce, the goodwill showcased by local elected representatives is not sufficient to foster the proper implementation of human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The high-level Reykjavík Declaration (2023) recognises the importance of local authorities (the lowest tier of administration within a state) for the functioning of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) system. This article seeks to provide a better understanding of the human rights role of local authorities and the potential of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) as a promoter of this role. It examines how local authorities appear in the judgments of the ECtHR and assesses the extent to which they provide clear pictures of local authorities and their role in human rights issues. The analysis draws on a close reading of a sample of cases encompassing a diverse set of states and human rights issues. It shows how the ECtHR's reasoning indicates what is required of a local authority for a specific set of circumstances, but also the general attributes of local authorities that are conducive to the provision of human rights. For judgments of the ECtHR to promote local authorities as human rights actors, local authorities and their interlocutors need to be able to identify the judgments and the elements of reasoning therein that are of most relevance for their circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Member States of the ECHR are complex entities made up of many levels. The subsidiarity principle is grounded in this social reality. However, the ECHR, just like general international law, treats its States as unitary entities: local authorities are procedurally and institutionally inexistent in the ECHR system, although they play important roles as protectors and violators of human rights. I show that the codification of the subsidiarity principle in the ECHR preamble was not intended to strengthen the role of local and regional authorities. Protocol No. 15 was only concerned with reinforcing 'the' States role vis-à-vis the Court. I explain this with the state's role as the bearer of political sovereignty and the fact that sovereignty is a pre-condition for a functioning political democracy and, therefore, a democratically legitimate human rights system. Finally, the paper enquires into whether the subsidiarity principle of the ECHR might be read as an interpretative principle, which contributes to determining the scope and content of the human rights that the Strasbourg Court must guarantee, and whether this might benefit local and regional associations. I answer in the negative. Such a reading would be contrary to Protocol No. 15, as it would further empower the Court. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to situate Traveller evictions within discussions on local authorities and their role in realising human rights. It focuses on the scenario where local authorities choose to merely tolerate rather than regularise Travellers' housing situation, leading to forced evictions without culturally appropriate alternative accommodation. Through a case study in a Belgian city, three aspects will be examined. First, the local authority's position will be evaluated against the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. Second, the article will analyse the involved actors' human rights engagement. Based on these findings, a third aspect will be to briefly explore three strategies to improve local authorities' human rights performance in this context: to further develop their position within human rights law and strengthen their engagement with the supranational level; to hold local authorities accountable in terms of human rights law at the domestic level; and to integrate a human rights framework into local authorities' daily decision-making processes. It will be argued that these strategies show different strengths and weaknesses, highlighting the importance of cooperation between multiple levels and actors. Taken together, they hold the potential to reinforce each other and promote processes and outcomes truly benefitting human rights implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dominant arrangement for governance in many States which are party to international human rights treaties is decentralisation. This puts implementation of human rights in the hands of institutions which are geographically closer to intended beneficiaries. Decentralisation to different levels of government introduces complexity, risk and opportunity to the governance of human rights. In response, UN Treaty Monitoring Bodies focus on State responsibility for implementation of human rights. The Committee on the Rights of the Child has emphasised the State as the coordinating body responsible for children's rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). In this paper, Wales is used as an example of a jurisdiction where decentralisation is a feature of children's rights, which has enabled a progressive approach to implementation. It explains the principled Children's Rights Approach which provides public authorities in Wales with a coherent framework to give effect to international children's rights policy planning and service delivery. As the contours of decentralisation in Wales are typical of arrangements in many States parties to the CRC, insights from Wales will be transferable to other jurisdictions. This experience is also relevant to other areas of human rights implementation in the context of decentralisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Applying a critical rhetorical approach to law, this article revisits the proportionality discourse of the European Court of Human Rights and the socio-political tendencies it reveals in the case of Garib v the Netherlands (2017). The work focuses on the rhetorical management of the conflict between socio-economic public policies and the social rights indirectly protected under the European Convention on Human Rights and its Protocols. The rhetorical construction of proportionality discourse identified is driven by the re-elaboration of themes constitutive of the normative rationality of post-austerity neoliberalism, in particular the individual responsibilisation and sacrifice for the negative consequences of neoliberal socioeconomic policies. The discourse is also supported by elements announcing an authoritarian turn in the deployment of such policies through the connection between economic goals and public order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite its close relationship to employment rights, the concept of the public interest in labour law lacks extensive discussion. Even fewer scholars have studied employment discrimination in China from this perspective, despite China signing many international Conventions and Recommendations related to employment rights. This article analyses the social-based attributes in China's employment anti-discrimination laws, arguing that the laws should prioritise the protection of public interests. It then distils the connotation of the social public interest carried by the laws from the perspectives of legal values, the independence of legal interest, and legislative purposes. Subsequently, this article examines the implementation of the laws at judicial and administrative levels, identifying limitations in individual-oriented approaches and deficiencies in safeguarding the public interest. These limitations and deficiencies primarily manifest in the fact that labour agencies generally do not accept employment discrimination complaints or subtly exclude hiring processes from the scope of administrative enforcement, while courts are accustomed to a private law rationale of compensating for actual losses. Accordingly, this article suggests establishing and maintaining a fair labour market competition order by imposing punitive damages to deter potential discrimination, activating administrative enforcement to rectify past discrimination, and guiding employers to proactively assume social responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research presents a critical theoretical and practical re-examination of the link between human rights' issues and politics at national and international levels. The study of human rights is an inherently multidisciplinary enterprise. The paper provides an insight into the relations between diplomacy and human rights and discusses how the latter are exploited for political and commercial aims. This study focuses on the case and constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), and the problem of hostage taking. An internationally-oriented study and based on theoretical arguments and an empirical research approach-notably by using several real cases of ordinary individuals of foreign and dual nationalities who became hostages and the subject of political games and financial conflicts between Iran and the Western countries-the paper highlights the issue of hostage taking of individuals by a state as a political policy and prisoner swaps involving financial and commercial deals. The paper provides evidence of the substantial suffering of the hostages and their families. The paper makes an academic contribution to the literature-the unlawful act of hostage taking involving a state has rarely been discussed -and addresses the legal vacuum in international law and human rights conventions regarding the topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Homelessness has shattered democracies worldwide. This study uses a doctrinal approach, employing content analysis, especially relational content analysis, to examine the underlying factors and difficulties associated with homelessness among women. The study notably focuses on the issue of police violence directed at this marginalised population and sheds light on the vulnerable position of homeless women, highlighting the crucial responsibility of governments under Parens Patriae to protect their lives and freedoms. The study argues that homelessness is fundamentally inconsistent with the principles of human dignity. The findings highlight the constitutional violations committed against homeless women in India, contravening the principles enshrined in Articles 14, 19, and 21, as well as the directives specified in Articles 39(1), 42, and 47. The findings indicate that the social welfare efforts implemented by the state are in line with the objectives of SDGs. This highlights the importance of adopting more focused approaches to address the issue of homelessness among women. Moreover, the study examines the legal framework of the United Kingdom, taking into account the influence of India's colonial history, and investigates the current practices of democratic nations and the role of the protagonist played by the Indian Judiciary in addressing homelessness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past three decades, national human rights institutions (NHRIs) have becoming an increasingly common feature of transitional and post-conflict justice processes. As institutions designed to promote and protect human rights, they have been afforded a range of responsibilities, including investigating conflict-related human rights violations, assisting with the establishment and functioning of ad hoc mechanisms like truth and reconciliation commissions, and contributing to accountability. Drawing on evidence from the case of Nepal, however, this article demonstrates that engaging in transitional justice processes places NHRIs at considerable risk. It argues, in particular, that the political nature of transitional justice and compromises it inevitably entails can serve to jeopardise the legitimacy, credibility, and effectiveness of NHRIs. The article thus concludes that far greater consideration of the impact that transitional justice has on NHRIs and development of measures to protect their integrity in highly fraught political contexts is required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International human rights institutions and scholars are debating whether established human rights suffice to address challenges raised by neurotechnologies which measure or alter brain activity; UNESCO intends developing a novel standard-setting instrument for neurotechnologies. This paper analyses how core human rights pertain to neurotechnologies and might be interpreted in this context. Contrary to claims about gaps in the law, several rights, especially the underexplored rights to mental integrity and freedom of thought, as well as some features of human dignity provide resources to protect persons against reading their minds or tampering with their brains against their will. Proposals for the construction of these rights are submitted. They specify and actualise the multi-layered protection of the person that core human rights provide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2021, the UN Human Rights Committee (HRC) held Spain responsible for violations of Articles 14(1), 14(5) and 15 (1) of the ICCPR in the Garzón v Spain case. The purposes of this article are three-fold. Firstly, it provides an analysis of the 'Francoism' case and the 'Gürtel' case, the two trials held by the Spanish Supreme Court (SSC) against Judge Garzón, which the HRC declared were 'arbitrary and did not comply with the principles of judicial independence and impartiality', and an assessment of their political and legal aftermaths. Secondly, it assesses the dim prospects for Spain complying with the HRC's views on the Garzón case by providing an updated and comprehensive statistical account of Spain's extremely low record of compliance with previous HRC's decisions. Thirdly, it provides an analysis of the new opportunities for judicial enforceability in cases of non-compliance by Spain with the views of the HRC in the wake of the SSC's landmark judgement on the González Carreño v. Spain case and subsequent case law. The conclusion considers the enhanced potential role of domestic courts in fostering the enforceability of decisions by quasi-adjudicatory human rights bodies both in Spain and in the light of the Spanish experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate litigation against states is increasingly based on international human rights law. As a result, more climate cases are filed at international human rights courts and treaty bodies. Strict standing requirements pose significant hurdles, however, for individuals and communities to access such courts and treaty bodies, especially for those most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. This article argues that an intersectional perspective aids in overcoming procedural hurdles and can help international and regional human rights courts and treaty bodies to provide access to justice in climate cases, thus enforcing international human rights standards. Intersectionality unveils how climate change exacerbates pre-existing injustices and how society's most vulnerable are structurally hit the hardest by climate change. It thus offers courts a more complete view of the impact of the climate crisis on human rights. Moreover, it illuminates how certain individuals are particularly affected by the climate crisis, aiding them in meeting standing requirements such as victim status and individual concern requirements. Examining recent cases brought on by generational groups, the article illustrates how intersectionality uncovers how the intersection of age and climate make certain generations particularly susceptible to climate change-induced human rights violations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the role of the European Parliament as an international moral tribune for the promotion of human rights through a qualitative case-study design. It focuses on the emblematic Ayotzinapa case, which involved the enforced disappearance of 43 young rural students and the killing of other six civilians in Mexico in September 2014. The paper innovatively analyses the parliamentary diplomacy activity of four Members and their respective political groups: Franziska 'Ska' Keller (Greens/EFA, Germany), Josep-Maria Terricabras i Nogueras (Greens/EFA, Spain), Estefanía Torres Martínez (GUE/NGL, Spain) and Teresa Jiménez-Becerril Barrio (EPP, Spain), during the 8th parliamentary term (2014–2019). It addresses: How does the European Parliament, acting as an international moral tribune, exercise its role in promoting human rights in practice? Importantly, how do individual members and their political groups contribute to fulfilling this role? The research findings reveal that the phenomenon of parliamentary diplomacy on human rights is highly complex, challenging the mainstream notion that the European Parliament is a monolithic player acting as a moral tribune in international relations. Results also provide important insight for understanding the (micro-)processes of parliamentary diplomacy and their relevance for human rights advocacy within the European Union's external relations and its Member States'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the recent cases of the European Court of Human Rights (the ECtHR, the Court) in which the Court offered legal protection to vulnerable groups. For this purpose, the paper will first discuss the vulnerability paradigm before the ECtHR and draw the list of groups recognised by the Court as vulnerable. It will then turn to the case law to trace the recent trends and developments in the Court's focus when protecting vulnerable groups. In particular, the research covers the Court judgements rendered in the last four years (from 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2022). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally, there are certain tendencies in a significant number of regimes today that indicate a shift away from liberal democracy, the rule of law, equality, and justice. This threatens international human rights, advancing towards totalitarianism. The technologies available to totalitarian regimes today for control, intimidation, indoctrination, and mass manipulation are far more advanced than their earlier counterparts. It is typically led by a charismatic dictator and a single political party that uses powerful narratives of blame, hate speech, instilling fear, and scapegoating to seise or maintain power at any cost. That being so, amid contemporary global shifts to totalitarianism, human rights abuses persist worldwide despite the ratification of so many international treaties. This piece engages in critically analysing the situation faced by the targeted group of citizens who live under the rules of resurgent totalitarian states. The study further examines the reasons why certain countries and communities get along well with their counterparts while others appear to be breeding grounds, what role governments, politicians, and leaders play in the development and support of group divisions and ideologies of social difference, and how these ideologies lead to the creation of a destructive culture and infrastructure on the path to large-scale bloodshed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was drafted, in part, as a response to the horrific antisemitism leading to the extermination of millions of Jews in World War II. Yet, today, organisations that utilise human rights instruments to criticise Israel's laws, policies and practices are themselves being cast as antisemitic. How has the contemporary human rights regime come to be charged with antisemitism? The ostensible answer is that the meaning of antisemitism has expanded to include anti-Zionism and harsh criticism of Israel. While scholars have debated the validity of this expansion, this paper interrogates three types of abstractions: those deployed by traditional antisemites, those emanating from human rights, and those mobilised by the new antisemitism doctrine. An analysis of these abstractions helps clarify the new hostility between antisemitism and human rights. Whereas Zionism aims to protect Jews by asserting a right to Jewish difference within the context of a nation-state, human rights aim to protect Jews by promoting an egalitarian distribution of rights among the population. The crux of the matter is that the solution human rights offer to antisemitism also threatens the Zionist project, since it challenges the racialized mode of governance that this political ideology has implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even though inter-state forced displacement is heavily concentrated in the Third World and predominantly constituted of massive migration flows linked to objective and structural socio-economic factors, the protection provided by International Refugee Law remains based on a liberal Euro- and state-centric definition of refugees, culminating in a de facto exclusion of the great majority of the world's refugees. This article advocates the need to conceptually challenge the 1951 Convention refugee definition, proposing the Cartagena Declaration as a Third World human rights alternative to it. The delegitimization of the socio-economic refugee sustains and is sustained by the Western liberal and state-centric logic under which International Refugee Law functions. The recognition of socio-economic rights per se as a basis for refugee status under the Cartagena Declaration constitutes a rupture with that dysfunctional logic. Consequently, the Cartagena 'Spirit' provides, in theory, a comprehensive and up-to-date human rights refugee protection regime capable of encompassing all types of refugees. To materialise the discussion, the article critically analyses the Brazilian application of the Cartagena refugee definition to Venezuelan socio-economic refugees. It concludes that the Brazilian approach does not fully materialise the Cartagena 'Spirit' radical potential, putting into question the 'Spirit' practical feasibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1948, Article 27(1) UDHR declared the right 'to share in scientific advancement and its benefits'. Since 1966, the right has also been guaranteed by Article 15(1)(b) ICESCR as the right to 'enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications'. This equivocation on the right's name reveals a disagreement about the object of that right, i.e. (actively) participating in the scientific practice or (passively) 'enjoying its fruits' only. While the importance of participation in science has recently been emphasised, no justifications thereof have yet been provided. Drawing on considerations in human rights theory, the present article proposes an interpretation of Article 15(1)(b) ICESCR qua 'right to participate in scientific practice and enjoy its benefits'. It starts with an account of the genesis of the right. Second, it argues that science is best approached as a 'participatory good', both from the perspective of the philosophy of science and of other rights guaranteed by the ICESCR. Third, the article spells out the participatory dimensions of the human right to participate in science including its 'collective' dimensions. Finally, the article explores three institutional implications of the proposed participatory interpretation of the right, both domestically and internationally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The human right to science is set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The two texts, which were adopted consecutively, are similar but not identical. Conflicts in formulating the right to science in international human rights law were rooted in the ideological quarrels of the Cold War. The travaux préparatoires indicate debate about whether the right was essentially about the freedoms of scientists or about the purposes of science, including concern about abuse. Article 15(3) of the Covenant confirms recognition of 'the freedom indispensable for scientific research ... ' The Soviet Union promoted the view that scientific research must pursue progressive aims but was unsuccessful in its attempts to entrench this in the texts. UNESCO's contribution to the Declaration was insignificant but it had considerable influence on the Covenant text. In 1950 and 1951, UNESCO issued important and influential expert statements challenging 'scientific' arguments of racial supremacists, confirming in practice its own understanding of the direction that science should take. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses how the right to science can benefit from the obligations and mechanisms related to anticipation of other, social and cultural rights. It considers how these obligations can be extended to the right to science and how they can benefit the right to science by ricochet. Hence, this article shows, on the one hand, the potential that the obligations of prevention, precaution and due diligence, when applied to, social and cultural rights, have to be extended into the context of the right to science. This analysis of obligations is followed by identifying mechanisms capable of addressing the anticipatory dimension required for implementing this right. It is therefore explored, on the other hand, how mechanisms such as indicators and HRIAs, considered useful in the framework of, social and cultural rights, can play a role in the implementation of the anticipatory aspects linked to the right to science. This analysis is based mainly on the interpretative function of quasi-judicial and jurisdictional human rights bodies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores whether the integration of human rights approaches, in particular, the human right to science in Article 15(1)(b) of the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, offers a basis for improving upon current approaches in international environmental law by widening democratic input and oversight in decisions involving environmental science and its applications. It examines a case study regarding the international regulation of marine geoengineering under an amendment to the 1996 Protocol to the 1972 Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter. The analysis focuses on how the harms and benefits of marine geoengineering research are conceived of in the amendment, and the norms and processes adopted to address them. These same issues are then examined under the human right to science, focusing on the recent interpretation of the right by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in its General Comment No. 25. It seeks to show in a particular case how international environmental law and international human rights law each bring to bear different objectives, norms, and processes in how they treat issues of environmental science and technology, and explores the benefits of more integrated approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interface between Indigenous and Western knowledge systems highlights the existence of diverse sciences, each with their own history, contexts and processes for validation, with relevance to the human rights to sciences (HRS). The lens of intersectional universality shows how Indigenous peoples differ in ways that affect the HRS, through: (1) holding unique connections to territories, distinct cultures, worldviews and knowledge systems; (2) experiencing dispossession of their lands, territories and resources leading to great disadvantage in socio-economic status; (3) bearing a disproportionately high impact from colonial scientific practices that breach human rights; and (4) utilising Indigenous governance systems based on customary institutions for decision-making. Human rights law requires that these institutions are consistent with principles of non-discrimination – the universal aspect. From this recognition of difference and sameness, we argue that diligent anticipation of risk needs to be based on recognition and support from states for the institutions that govern Indigenous sciences, redress by relevant scientific organisations for the negative impacts of colonial scientific practices, and capacity-building to overcome inequitable distribution of resources and power. Anticipatory co-governance with Indigenous peoples can empower Indigenous agency, Indigenous perspectives on human rights and provide a fertile ground for future thinking to diligently anticipate risks and benefits of science and scientific progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper assesses the interplay between international human rights law and international biomedical law as two specialised regimes within international law. The focus lies specifically on the anticipatory duties arising under the human right to benefit from science and its applications on the one side and under international biomedical law on the other. International biomedical law instruments adopt a human rights-based approach to the regulation of biology and medicine, so one of the questions is whether the anticipatory duties in biomedical law are indeed a specific application of the corresponding duties in international human rights law, modified, expanded and elaborated further to better address the distinctive subject matter, namely, the interface between the individual and science and technology in a medical context? Or whether the anticipatory duties in international biomedical law draw from international environmental law and/or general international law? The main question that this paper aims to address concerns the precise scope and content of the anticipatory duties under international biomedical law and their relationship to human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How can scientists assist society and contribute to international policymaking – and just as crucially, how can society engage with and shape science? What will it take to make modern science diplomacy for the Anthropocene successful so that the benefits of science are furthered and its risks and harms, as far as possible, prevented? In this article, we explore the relevance and usefulness of three areas of study to these questions: science diplomacy, the human right to science, and anticipation in the context of scientific and technological developments. We argue that a hitherto underappreciated aspect of science diplomacy – diplomacy (with)in science – has significant potential to complement anticipatory approaches such as the Geneva Science and Diplomacy Anticipator's (GESDA's) by furthering the same goals: ameliorating the negative impacts of scientific and technological developments and facilitating their benefits. We relate the concept of diplomacy (with)in science to the normative framework of the right to science under international human rights law and develop and motivate it further by illustrating two potential areas for its application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

States have under the right to science an obligation to prevent or mitigate harm of scientific progress and its applications. This obligation is derived from the right to be protected against the harmful effects of scientific progress and its applications, a dimension of the right to science. However, preventing the harmful effects of scientific progress and its applications can sometimes conflict with other human rights or with scientific freedom, which is also part of the right to science. In such cases, limitations on one right might be required to protect another, whereby the different interests need to be properly balanced. While the duty to prevent harm is well established in international human rights law, it is yet obscure if the anticipation of potential harms to come is possible under the existing framework of international law. While not a legal concept, entry points for anticipation are already covered under the current international law and can be drawn together by a cross-fertilisation of the obligation to prevent, the precautionary principle and due diligence. The precautionary principle and due diligence can provide guidance on when and under what circumstances situations for anticipation are triggered and conducted. Both concepts involve a necessity and proportionality test, which is also inherent to limitations under international human rights law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Arab world faces serious challenges in the protection of human rights. Merely criticising government policies towards human rights has long meant risking one's freedom, if not life. Yet despite the myriad threats, there is a long and powerful history of efforts to address human rights from multiple perspectives that has largely been ignored outside the region (and even by many human rights scholars and practitioners within it), in good measure because most of it occurs in Arabic, which most international human rights scholars do not read. This paper critically reviews Arab human rights publications written in Arabic as a first attempt towards elucidating the diversity and depth of human rights literature in the Arab world for the broader field of human rights studies. Bringing this knowledge to the international human rights community is crucial to helping develop a human rights discourse in and for the Arab world that can positively impact research, advocacy and governance despite the broad environment of authoritarian retrenchment across the region. In so doing, our research offers new knowledge for developing human rights studies in trajectories that can have more direct impact on human rights struggles on the ground globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the article 'Towards new human rights in the age of neuroscience and neurotechnology', published in 2017, Ienca and Andorno review the current stage of neuroscience and neurotechnology development, proposing four new human rights that shall protect the individual from the dangers arising from said development. The authors accept the idea of infiltration into our interior castle -- the mind -- requiring only the proper level of protection against the described probable misuse of techniques, especially their use against the individual's will. Although their proposal seems a needed addition to the human rights system, it raises doubts as to the very definition of human it was designed to protect. Is the whole concept of the technical infiltration of the brain to alter the mind processes reconcilable with human freedom, especially with freedom of thought, conscience, and religion? In the article, the authors deliberate the inadequacy of two visions of human: the one that was the foundation of the human rights system and another emerging from Ienca and Andorno's article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Universal Periodic Review has given UN development agencies an opportunity to further reframe their work as rights-promotion. The UPR consists of regular reviews of state reports on their human rights situations. It is a peer-review process, encouraging states to improve their rights records and making specific suggestions on how to do so. Still, by itself the UPR has no powers to push for compliance other than report-driven mechanisms. However, development agencies such as UNDP, UNICEF, and the rest of the UN Sustainable Development Group are being encouraged to participate in all facets of the UPR process. They can help states prepare reports, help the UPR review those reports, and, crucially, incorporate suggestions from the UPR into national development plans of cooperation. They do this by linking UPR recommendations with the Rights-based Approach to Development. This opens up new ways to promote human rights through a more cooperative model: it moves beyond 'naming and shaming' to a more active process of rights implementation by development agencies, working cooperatively with states. The process is new, and only sporadically followed; however, if fully implemented, it can provide a model for a new phase of rights promotion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the correlations between the human rights situation and religious identity among minorities. It uses an integrated longitudinal dataset of the World Values Survey waves from 1990 to 2014 and three human rights measures to test how (a) constitutional guarantees of religious freedom and equality, (b) governmental human rights practices, and (c) societal discrimination and prejudice against minority religions correlate with the average strength of religious identities in 42 countries. Multilevel analyses show that Muslim respondents had the highest and Buddhists the lowest identity scores. The highest identity scores were further found in countries with medium governmental repression compared to such with very low or very high repression, and those with very high levels of societal discrimination. Those findings are discussed against the background of the existent literature on minority identities and religious movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2021, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief presented his 'Report on Freedom of Thought' to the United Nations General Assembly. This was the first substantive consideration of the right to freedom of thought at the United Nations level since the right was recognised in 1948. This paper provides interdisciplinary reflections on this report to support ongoing discussions on the appropriate content and scope of this fundamental human right. We begin by addressing reasons for the historical neglect of this right, namely the right being viewed as more symbolic than practical and relevant interests being perceived as already protected by other rights. Next, given there is no consensus on what the right protects, or how it protects, we consider its potential attributes. We then consider potential violations of this right, turning to its application to mental health. Finally, we consider the Special Rapporteur's recommendations, discussing how some may be realised through human rights-centered regulation in the form of the European Union's new Digital Services Act. In this context, we also briefly consider relevant aspects of the EU Commission's proposal for an AI Act. We conclude by outlining pressing challenges facing the development of this right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crisis lawmaking in the dawn of the COVID-19 pandemic spurred treaty bodies collectively to caution states that they should regularly gather and assess data both during and following the pandemic in order to ascertain the extent to which individuals were disadvantaged during the pandemic. A methodology for gathering and assessing such data has been well developed in the form of human rights impact assessment (HRIA). There are many examples of HRIA practice, particularly in the area of children's rights impact assessment (CRIA). Some practice is good. Some is better. Some is best. This article is concerned with how government could use HRIA to: optimise the state's ability to demonstrate compliance with international human rights obligations; contextualise the ways in which state policies shape peoples' lived experiences of human rights by identifying opportunities to adjust proposed law and policy changes prior to implementation; and develop a repository of information demonstrating tensions between law and the lived experiences of rights for the full spectrum of rights-holders. Relying predominantly on Scottish examples of Covid-19 pandemic-era HRIA and CRIA, the analysis offers insights on how HRIA could be used more effectively in crisis lawmaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emergency legislation introduced internationally since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic saw the closure of all levels of educational settings and a shift to remote teaching. Drawing lessons from an independent child rights impact assessment (CRIA) in Scotland, United Kingdom, this paper reviews the impact of COVID-19 measures on children and young people's rights to, and experiences of, education during the current crisis. Findings highlight that while measures sought to preserve the best interests of children and their basic rights to safety, a distinct lack of consultation on the impacts of the measures undermined the interdependency and indivisibility of children's human rights. Three human rights principles – participation and inclusion, non-discrimination, and mutual accountability of family and the State – were identified as being particularly significant in this assessment. Looking forward, findings point to the need for extending the range of perspectives involved in child rights impact assessments in times of crisis – where human rights are at even greater risk of being breached – and the significance of a children's rights-based perspective for re-imagining education altogether. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal's role in protecting fundamental rights under China's One Country Two Systems practice. It starts by giving an account of the constitutional and legal framework for Hong Kong's judicial protection of human rights. It examines the Court's efforts in obtaining constitutional jurisdiction, employing generous interpretation approach to rights guarantees, reforming standards such as proportionality and reasonableness for scrutinising rights restrictions, and broadening reference inputs by comparative approach and amicus curiae for interpretation of rights provisions. It indicates that through these ways the CFA has developed freedom-friendly common law constitutionalism and formed judicial preferences in favour of personal liberty. It advocates that the so-called conservative performance of the CFA on rights issues in national security cases may be its efforts to secure judicial independence and the common law system in a changing political climate. The article posits that due to the CFA's strong foundation in judicial protection of human rights, and its recent efforts to incorporate national security law into common law, it is well-positioned to play a crucial role in preserving the way of life for Hong Kong residents as China's Hong Kong policy enters a new era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) and European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) have developed divergent approaches to interpreting their temporal case admissibility criteria, despite those criteria being nearly identical on paper. This puzzling variation has important implications for the extent to which Americans and Europeans can pursue international legal recourse for human rights abuses committed during past civil conflicts and dictatorial regimes. The IACtHR has clearly established that states can be held responsible for ongoing human rights violations that originated prior to state accession to the Court. However, when victims of similar rights violations have submitted cases to the ECtHR, the Court has frequently declared their cases inadmissible. This article demonstrates that the divergent geopolitical origins of the ECtHR and IACtHR have driven the ECtHR's narrower interpretation of its temporal jurisdiction relative to the IACtHR. Tracing this process sheds light on the conditions under which international courts can hold governments accountable for past human rights abuses in post-conflict societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social protection has arisen with remarkable speed on the global agenda. As part of this development many international organisations have adopted social protection policies to guide their policy-making. One of the most recent organisation to do so is the IMF, which in 2019 adopted a Strategy for Social Spending. Reception has been mixed. Whereas for some this indicates a long overdue sign of taking social responsibility seriously, for others this constitutes merely another attempt at whitewashing its neoliberal economic agenda. This article seeks to identify the notion of social spending as invoked by the IMF, and to contextualise it with reference to the mandate of the Fund. The article claims that the increasing engagement with social protection inevitably brings the IMF into a discourse on the concept and form of that protection. As social protection is strongly embedded in a rights-based approach, the article therefore asks to what extent IMF social protection engagement can be thought of as promotion of human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International organisations have increasingly developed interest in the human rights dimensions of their development work. Some organisations have relatively more advanced engagement in rights issues, while others have considered human rights to be irrelevant to their mandate. Inter-organisational collaboration in common areas of work presents a peculiar site of human rights mainstreaming. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations and the World Bank have collaborated in investment in agriculture and related sectors for over half a century, in thousands of projects in hundreds of countries. Separately, the two organisations lie more or less on opposite ends of the spectrum of human rights integration in development work. They both have environmental and social policies, but with significantly differing attention to rights. Their collaborative engagement presents an interesting example of how human rights mainstreaming can be better articulated and implemented. A cursory look at the collaboration shows that the source of project funding, incentive and administrative structures and the knowledge and perceptions of technical staff add to the absence of clear rules on whose policies apply in what context, resulting in inconsistent practices that underserve the benefits of a human rights-based approach to investment in agriculture and related sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last two decades, UNICEF has led efforts to measure Child Poverty globally as well as in various regions and countries. These efforts have been explicitly grounded on a human rights perspective and guided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child. In this paper, some of the issues raised by these endeavours are analysed. The paper explicitly uses, and expands, Sally Engle Merry's framework of vernacularisation to assess these efforts. Thus, it is organised in three sections. First, a review of criticisms to the broader project of 'human rights measurement' is offered. This includes aspects of vernacularisation, paradoxes of measurement, and the tension between universal standards and particular specificities. Secondly, a brief description of Child Poverty measurement is provided, with a focus on developments and debates of the last 20 years. This is the case study on which Merry's framework is applied. This is done in the third section. Based on this analysis, practical recommendations for future research on Child Poverty measurement based on human rights are discussed in the concluding section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The normative output of international organisations is rarely legally binding as such. Yet, agendas and operational policies of international organisations have implications for both states and individuals. The current special issue explores the variety through which international organisations engage with human rights. The contributions of the special issue all approach this question from the perspective of the mandate and work of individual organisations. While on the one hand the engagement of organisations with human rights is defined by the institutional law of the organisation, it is also determined by administrative processes, normative frames and professional culture. In exploring the variety by which human rights become part of the work of organisations, the contributions raise questions ranging from conceptual endorsement of a rights-based approach, to performing organisation-specific functions and practical implementation, to staff emancipation. All of these aspects, the special issue shows, can be crucial for understanding the human rights endorsement (or lack of it) of international organisations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), a newly created international institution, provides an opportunity to study the extent and efficacy of rights protection against the backdrop of human rights criticism directed at other multilateral development banks (MDBs). The analytical framework is formed by the so-called anticipatory institution-building positing that international organisations adopt safeguards without external pressure due to having learnt from the mistakes of peer organisations. The article explores the context in which China created the AIIB and the ensuing expectations regarding its environmental and social safeguards. Specific institutional traits gear the Bank towards being 'lean, clean and green' while simultaneously formally paying due regard to environmental and social risks in development lending. The investigation of the Bank's Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) reveals that it largely resembles the operational safeguards of other MDBs while still being a 'work in progress'. It is argued that rights protection remains trapped between institutional infancy problems and principled indifference. Efficiency prevails over protection, the applicability of the ESF is fragmented, central rights receive inadequate protection, and accountability mechanisms remain untested. While the ESF review will remedy some of the shortcomings, infrastructure lending cannot completely do away with adverse environmental and social impacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses Australia as a case study to analyse restrictions on international movement during the COVID-19 pandemic. Restrictions on inbound and outbound travel have been a key tool deployed by governments across the globe to suppress the COVID-19 pandemic. We use 'COVID zero' Australia as a case study to assess an extreme response to restricting international movement. We look at the recent complaint launched before the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva. The action was raised with the support of a group of Australian citizens stranded abroad with the assistance of the expert in Australian constitutional law who is the second author of this paper. We argue that the measures implemented by Australian governments to effectively eliminate COVID-19 domestically have provided insufficient consideration of, and alternatives to, the current system's failure to facilitate essential international travel. For this reason, Australia's framework for restricting international movement lacks proportionality and necessity from the perspective of human rights and freedoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The right to health has primarily been developed and understood as an individualistic right and framed in terms of healthcare services. Public health and disease prevention have become increasingly important, particularly with the increasing occurrence of novel pandemics. The ability of the traditional framing of the right to health is less helpful in contexts where one seeks to apply a human rights-based approach to public health interventions. Though it has been posited that this may be remedied through the introduction of a collective right to public health, the South African experience illustrates the potential of the existing right to health to support public health efforts. Drawing on the African concept of 'ubuntu', one can adopt a communitarian approach to the right to health to enforce and protect the right, even where identifying discrete rights-holders and beneficiaries is challenging. This paper further argues that this communitarian approach to the right to health can ameliorate some difficulties experienced with judicialisation of health in other jurisdictions. The South African experience of judicial enforcement of the right to healthcare is used to illustrate the potential value of utilising a communitarian approach to the development of the right to health to include public health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public emergencies like global pandemics subject human rights to extraordinary vulnerability. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) permits States to restrict rights by enacting permissible limitations on them at any time and by derogating from their protection in emergencies. This article argues that States should rely on the ICCPR's permissible limitations provisions rather than lodge formal derogations in times of crisis, unlike what many States have done during the COVID-19 pandemic. It draws upon New Zealand's highly successful public health response to support this proposition. The article argues that the accountability machinery for compliance with States' rights obligations is stronger when permissible limitations are enacted. Where States do rely on the right to derogate, the article suggests some improvements to existing international accountability mechanisms. These include enhancing the analysis to be contained in notices of derogation and advance capacity-building to enable States to better decide if derogation is necessary in the first place. Ultimately, the article argues that keeping States within the international human rights system is ideal. This can be achieved through reliance on the flexibility built into the ICCPR via its permissible limitations provisions rather than its right of derogation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the challenges exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic from a European perspective, especially its consequences in light of the European Convention on Human Rights' (ECHR) guarantees of the right to health. It is the first attempt to comprehensively examine these challenges for the State Parties of the ECHR. The right to health has traditionally been included in the second generation of human rights; therefore, presumably, it does not in itself give rise to any specific rights for an individual. However, the European Court on Human Rights (ECtHR) has recently been linking the right to health with specific provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights, in particular with Articles 2, 3, and 8. We analyse the Court's relevant rulings and their possible consequences for the assessment of the actions taken by the States Parties in order to fight COVID-19, with special emphasis on possible State responsibility for violating the Convention. This can happen when the State's actions result in different levels of health care access available to different groups of patients (patients with COVID-19 and patients with other conditions). The analysis reveals the weakness of the approach taken by ECtHR in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Summary: 1. Introduction; 2. Health care and the fight against covid-19 in light of the ECHR; 2.1. Article 2 of the ECHR; 2.2. Article 3 of the ECHR; 2.3. Article 8 of the ECHR 3. The convention and the 'herd immunity' strategy; 4. The fight against covid-19; dancing on a minefield; 5. Concluding remarks [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]