Human Rights, origins, concept 3

As we have established in earlier editions of articles on human rights, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights (UDHR), which came into force on December 10, 1948, heralded the practical protection of human rights under the United Nations (UN) system.

Initially, the idea was to have a single covenant that would incorporate all the rights, but there appeared significant differences between the Western states, led by the United States and the socialist states, with Russia as the leader.

These stark differences over the nature of the rights to be protected in the International Bill of Rights and suitable modes for protection culminated in the adoption of two separate treaties in 1966.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR).

Civil and political rights, in the main, protect citizens and individuals from the overarching acts of governments, organisations or other persons or entities. 

Another strand of civil and political rights are those that facilitate the free participation of individuals in the political system like the right to vote, the right to hold public office, etc.

Notable examples of civil rights are the right to life, the right to self-determination, the prohibition of slavery and torture, the right to liberty and security of the person, the right to privacy, the right to fair trial provisions etc. 

Meaning

I will, in due course, explore the meaning and practical implications of the two main sets of rights (civil and political as opposed to economic and social), but for now, we deem it fit to provide their main differences.

By and large, economic and social rights have an economic dimension and the individual state/government has to spend money to realise these rights.

Examples of economic and social rights are the right to health, the right to education, the right to an adequate standard of living, the right to work etc.

It was this monetary and capital-intensive aspect of economic rights that originally led to their separation from civil and political rights, culminating in the eventual adoption of two separate covenants ICCPR and ICESCR.

The socialist states led by Russia advocated the compulsory respect and protection of these economic and social rights as they saw them to be at the root of human dignity.

They argued that it was incumbent on the state to ensure that citizens benefit from having an adequate standard of living, must be able to find work and entitled to, at the same time, health and education, etc.

 The net effect of this was that citizens of countries can legally enforce these rights if the government fails to provide them.

The Western countries which, by and large, operated capitalist forms of economic systems, insisted that making economic and social rights mandatory would cripple most governments given the limited resources available.

The compromise in resolving this stalemate was that civil and political rights would be incorporated in a separate covenant (ICCPR) and would be applied immediately and would be made compulsory, whilst economic and social rights would be implemented on a progressive and incremental basis, as and when resources became available.

Debate

The debate is ongoing and there is a gradual body of opinion, fast gaining ground in the rights industry, to make economic and social rights immediate and enforceable.

This laudable push, if it materialises, would mean citizens could take their governments to court to enforce their economic and social rights.

To avoid lawsuits and the payment of compensation, governments would have to guarantee citizens work, decent education and health, reasonable standards of living etc. 

In Ghana, the 1992 Constitution did not explicitly guarantee social and economic rights in a way that citizens can legally enforce them in the courts.

What the Constitution did and the practice has been replicated in many emerging modern constitutions, is to have a chapter in the Constitution entitled Directive Principles of State Policy which provides for the gradual and progressive achievement of economic and social rights like the right to work, education and health.

We have, therefore, established the two branches of human rights as they are understood at the moment and the reasons why differing political systems have opted for different solutions to their implementation.

The next article will look at how these rights impact citizens in their daily lives and how human rights can be used to ensure a better future, given the effect that climate change will have on the environment, health and employment world—wide. 

The writer is a lawyer.

E-mail: georgebshaw1@gmail.com