Rights, Development and Critical Modernity

Canadian Journal of Development Studies / Revue canadienne d'études du développement, 2017

n the field of development, the rights-based approach has been advocated as a radical and necessary change as much as it has been criticised for legitimising the status quo. Its more recent diffusion into other spheres offers the opportunity to analyse, from a historical perspective, the political function of human rights – as a tool for emancipation or depoliticisation. Emphasising the highly political nature of these issues, the contributions in this special issue underscore the indeterminate nature of these processes and the importance of public debate for renewing development practice and realising the emancipatory potential of human rights. RÉSUMÉ Dans le domaine du développement, l’approche par les droits a été défendue comme un changement radical et nécessaire et critiquée comme légitimation du statu quo. Sa diffusion plus récente dans d’autres sphères offre l’occasion d’analyser, dans une perspective historique, la fonction politique des droits humains – comme outil d’émancipation ou de dépolitisation. Insistant sur la nature éminemment politique de ces enjeux, les contributions de ce numéro spécial soulignent ainsi la nature indéterminée des processus et l’importance du débat public pour le renouvellement des pratiques de développement et la réalisation du potentiel émancipateur des droits humains. KEYWORDS: Rights-based approach, human rights, development policies and practices, citizenship, power relations

Societies Without Borders, 2009

With the commodifi cation of rights as private privileges under neoliberal capitalism, movements in the Global South have begun to reinterpret the human rights canon. Cosmopolitan notions of human rights have spread from the Global South only to face parochial resistance from postmodern intellectuals and neoliberal power structures in the Global North. In advancing a vision of "cosmopolitanism from below" as an antidote to neoliberalism, these alliances have articulated their demands in terms of economic and social rights. In the process, they have ruptured the connection-crucial to US hegemony from the late 1940s through the early 1970s-between human rights and development. Supporting these new interpretations of human rights discourse, we argue for an explicit decoupling of human rights from previously existing development projects predicated on "catching up" through programmed industrialization. We contend that proposals for a new global system in the 21st century could be centered not on micronationalist localisms, but rather on a genuinely inclusive universalism. Th e concept of human rights in our times is rooted in world-historical struggles that must include the universal right to food, health, and prosperity, and social ownership of resources on the one hand and freedom from exploitation, inequality, geographical location, gender and sexual domination, racial control, structural violence, and environmental degradation on the other hand. In this sense, the concept of societies without borders is inextricably linked with a notion of human rights that in its breadth, depth, inclusivity, and universality goes far beyond the limited class-based notion of rights rooted in the advent of bourgeois civil society and inherited by the development project. Keywords development, human rights, US hegemony, UN, globalization Th e UN, Development, and Human Rights A specter is hunting the Global North-the specter of cosmopolitanism. With the commodifi cation of rights as private privileges under neoliberalism,

Since 1990s, there has been an increasing realization in the field of development that the traditional need-based approach to development is not enough to meet the need of this field. This field, both in theory and practice, requires a paradigm shift from the so-called need-based approach to the rights-based approach. The rights-based approach to development is meant as catalyst to enable individuals (right-holders) to demand and exercise rights and also the state and non-state actors (duty-bearers) to deliver those rights (Cornwall & Nyamu-Musembi, 2004). This capacity development notion of the approach empowers individuals to demand justice as a right rather than a charity (Sen, 2005). However, right-based approaches are practically facing challenges to be pro-poor. Recently, this issue has been addressed by many development scholars. This essay argues that rights-based approaches are not automatically pro-poor, rather they require consciously and systematically paying attention to the marginalized groups, processes and outcomes, and the integration of human rights principles into development initiatives. For these issues, the essay first highlights the welcomed turn to the rights-based approach. Then it discusses how rights-based approaches are not automatically pro-poor while offering suggestions to make it pro-poor. Finally, it presents a case study from Latin America to strengthen the argument that rights-based approaches are not pro-poor by-default.

Ids Bulletin-institute of Development Studies, 2005

IDS Bulletin, 2005

2005

This paper was written for the 2005 conference, Winners and Losers from Rights-based Approaches to Development, and draws from the authors' field experience of working with a range of NGOs that incorporate rights into their development activities 2. In particular it uses case study material from ActionAid International (AAI), an NGO that has been undertaking a shift in its strategies and operations over the last 5 years in order to integrate a rights-based perspective into its work. The paper explores both the benefits and challenges that this approach can bring when focused on strengthening the voice and power of marginalised sectors of society.

In the last few years, there has been growing talk amongst development actors and agencies about a "rights-based approach" to development. Yet what exactly this consists of remains unclear. For some, its grounding in human rights legislation makes such an approach distinctive, lending it the promise of repoliticising areas of development work that have become domesticated as they have been "mainstreamed" by powerful institutions like the World Bank. Others complain that like other fashions it has become the latest designer item to be seen to be wearing and has been used to dress up the same old development.

Third World Quarterly, 2004

IDS Bulletin, 2005