- Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. This notion ignores the all important economic, social and cultural rights. Let us take examples from health and nutrition you can use to demonstrate to others why the notion above is a fallacy.
- In the case of health, equality refers to equal health for all –something the human rights-based approach (HRBA) does certainly not strive for. On the other hand, equity –something the HRBA actively pursues– is about tackling the preventable (avoidable and unfair) factors that lead to inequality. The HRBA contends that equity is indispensable in the pursuit of long-term prosperity for society as a whole.
- In our context, we look at inequalities that denote differences in which disadvantaged/discriminated social groups (e.g., poor persons, minorities) systematically experience worse health or greater health risks than more advantaged social groups. Pursuing health equity means pursuing the elimination of such health disparities/inequalities –including those that are the responsibility of the agents active in the production of health and those that flow from the social determinants of health. (Adapted from Paula Braveman and Thomas Pogge)
- [But beware that we tend to overlook or ignore clear, but more hidden inequality traps in those social determinants. For instance, it has been estimated that, should current trends continue, households earning half the national average income can, in many countries, expect to take up to five generations to reach the average].
- In the case of nutrition, the realization of the right to adequate food and nutrition (RTF) within each country is (as much as health) influenced by international policies and events that provide the environment in which national efforts either succeed or fail. Issues such as international assistance and cooperation, external debt, emergency food aid and international trade rules and policies are instrumental to the realization of the RTF in each country. Key to this realization is changing the non-HR-based-objective-of-Food-Security to a full-focus-on-the-Right-to-Adequate-Food-and-Nutrition. Although an attempt was made in 2004 to change this objective, FAO’s ‘Voluntary Guidelines to Support the Progressive Realization of the RTF’ (FAO, 2005) can certainly not be recognized as a masterpiece-of-political-will. This, despite the Herculean efforts of civil society organizations from the world-over to make the language of the Guidelines more binding.
- So now, the main challenge civil society is left with is to make effective use of existing HR instruments (primarily at national and sub-national level), using them as codes of behavior to be monitored and to be set right if not being followed.
- But a split and disarrayed civil society has too often proved unable to influence both processes and outcomes in such HR work. We have insisted in this Reader on the need of NGOs to revision and remission themselves to fully adopt the HRBA.
- Ultimately, the key role we expect civil society to play is to progressively achieve political change –especially in the areas of economic, social and cultural rights—because, where governments lack political will, other drivers of change, i.e., civil society organizations, need to step in.
To begin with, countries should start by designating a HR-focal-point that may well be an already remissioned civil society organization.
Claudio Schuftan in Ho Chi Minh City