scholarly journals THE OPTIONAL PROTOCOL TO THE INTERNATIONAL COVENANT ON ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS: A NEW INSTRUMENT TO ADDRESS HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 295-302
Author(s):  
Christian Courtis
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Optional Protocol ◽  
New Instrument ◽  
Potential Use

The article discusses the adoption of the new Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as a means to obtain redress for violations against economic, social and cultural rights in the international sphere – including its potential use for the consideration of the violation of extraterritorial obligations.Keywords: Human rights. Social rights. Violations. Optinal protocol.

Completing the UN Complaint Mechanisms for Human Rights Violations Step by Step: Towards a Complaints Procedure Complementing the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

2003 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 423-462 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wouter Vandenhole
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Working Group ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Political Opposition ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Optional Protocol ◽  
Independent Expert ◽  
Human Rights Treaties

With the entry into force of the Optional Protocol to CEDAW in 2000, four of the six main UN human rights treaties are now complemented with an individual complaints procedure. The proposal to establish an individual complaints mechanism for economic, social and cultural rights (ESCR) meets with considerable political opposition. Progress has been jeopardised by an ongoing discussion on the nature of ESCR, which are still very often considered as second-class human rights. It is submitted here that the two main issues of debate – justiciability and the nature of the obligations of States – have been sufficiently clarified in recent years in order to allow for individual complaints. Ongoing reluctance to establish an individual complaints procedure for ESCR can therefore no longer convincingly be based on legal motives. A new impetus to the debate on the establishment of an individual complaints procedure for ESCR was given in 2001, with the appointment of an independent expert, and in 2003, with the establishment of an open-ended working group. The suggested amendments to the draft for an Optional Protocol as prepared by the ESCR-Committee in 1996, may assist the working group in bringing the draft Optional Protocol in line with changed circumstances since 1996, with particular reference to the OP-CEDAW.

The Protection of Human Rights by the Organization of American States

1968 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 889-908 ◽  
Author(s):  
José A. Cabranes
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
San Francisco ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Bill Of Rights ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Optional Protocol ◽  
American States ◽  
Protection Of Human Rights ◽  
Civil And Political Rights

On December 16, 1966, the General Assembly approved three agreements designed to establish a global system of enforceable treaty obligations with respect to fundamental human rights. These agreements are the second part of the “international bill of rights” proposed at the San Francisco Conference. Eighteen years separated the adoption of these agreements—the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights—and the approval in 1948 of the first part of the projected United Nations program for the protection of human rights, the non-binding Universal declaration of Human Rights.

The Power to Judge, the Power to Act: the Argentine Supreme Court as a Policymaker

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mario Campora
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Social Security ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Public Policies ◽  
Global South ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Constitutional Courts ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Implementation Stage

AbstractEven though the role of courts to enforce economic, social and cultural rights through structural remedies is well established, the implementation stage of rulings following successful litigation seems to be an area of research still in the making. In the Global South, certain constitutional courts have taken on such litigation as a way to advance economic and social rights. The Judiciary Power thus became a key actor in the framing and execution of public policies. This paper examines how the Argentine Supreme Court has intervened after 2001 in public policies regarding the enforcement of social security, environmental and human rights.

The Covenants

2019 ◽  
pp. 396-412
Author(s):  
Bertrand G. Ramcharan
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Preventive Measures ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Human Rights Protection ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Rights Protection ◽  
Universal Language ◽  
National Human ◽  
Treaty Body

The adoption of the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and Economic and Social Rights in 1966 heralded a new international order grounded in human dignity and freedom. They have contributed to the emergence of a common universal language of human rights and offered a protection shield to millions of people worldwide. However, ideals of the UN Charter, of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and of the Covenants are widely flouted. In calling for a modernized approach to human rights protection, this chapter calls for moving beyond a formal, diplomatic ritualism. The concrete application of the Covenants requires that states adhere to their reporting obligations under the treaties, that the treaty body mechanisms pay more attention in the future to urgent, preventive measures to the poorest and most vulnerable sections of population and that national human rights mechanisms be created in each state with the capacity to effectively promote and protect human rights. In doing so, greater attention must be placed on economic, social, and cultural rights.

9 The Great Enterprise Today (2006)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pace John P
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Working Group ◽  
International Convention ◽  
Cultural Rights ◽  
Optional Protocol ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
Right To Development ◽  
United Nations Declaration ◽  
The Right ◽  
New Phase

This chapter studies the arrival of the Human Rights Council. The idea of a Human Rights Council was raised in 1976, as the Great Enterprise entered a new phase. The documentation in 1976 on this issue is comprehensive, consisting of no less than five informative reports. In addition, the Commission on Human Rights had before it the analysis of the observations received from some Member States. They included an analysis of the deliberations at the Assembly that had taken place in November of 1975, which covered a range of topics, including ‘the possibility of transforming the Trusteeship Council into a Human Rights Council’. In 2005, the Secretary-General announced his plans to propose the establishment of a Human Rights Council to the Commission. A few months later, the World Summit decided on the establishment of a Human Rights Council. The Human Rights Council inaugurated its work with the adoption of two international human rights instruments, which had reached completion in the Commission on Human Rights: the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It also extended the mandate of the Working Group formed under the Commission to elaborate an optional protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and of the Commission’s Working Group on the Right to Development.

Part III Organs Monitoring Treaty Compliance, 13 The Committee against Torture and the Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Byrnes Andrew
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Optional Protocol ◽  
Treaty Compliance ◽  
Convention Against Torture ◽  
Degrading Treatment

This chapter focuses on the Committee against Torture and the Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture. The role of the Committee is to monitor the implementation by States parties of their obligations under the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the Torture Convention). The goal of the Torture Convention is to eradicate torture, often seen as one of the gravest human rights violations, through a mix of prevention and repression. The Convention was supplemented in 2002 by the adoption of an Optional Protocol to the Convention, which established an additional supervisory body—the Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture, which commenced its work in 2007. The chapter then considers the work of the Committee over the last thirty years and provides an overview of the evolution and functions of the Subcommittee.

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