Other interpretations
The UN Common Understanding on a Human Rights Based Approach to Development Cooperation sought to standardise what is meant by a human rights approach among UN agencies. However, there are differences in interpretation at a broader level, with some NGOs having a differing emphasis in their approach.
A study undertaken by the Institute of Development Studies, Sussex University, UK (IDS), identifies that there is a distinction between agencies who take a more ‘legalistic approach’, using human rights as standards against which development interventions are measured, and those for whom the realisation of human rights is the foundation of the development enterprise itself and therefore offers a “more broad-based normative framework which requires the definition of intermediate developmental goals.”
|
|
| Ways in which human rights are deployed in rights-based approaches to development
1. As a set of normative principles to guide the way in which development is done, as in the UK Department of International Development (DFID) Target Strategy Paper, ActionAid, and CARE’s statements of solidarity with the marginalised as a guiding principle of their work.
2. As a set of instruments with which to develop assessments, checklists and indicators against which interventions might be judged, as in Sida’s guidance for country strategy processes and UNICEF’s five-step assessment.
3. As a component to be integrated into programming – as, for example, in UNICEF’s integration of rights into its Community Capacity Development approach or CARE’s integration of rights into its Household Livelihood Security approach.
4. As the underlying justification for interventions aimed at strengthening institutions, whether to develop the advocacy skills of organisations representing marginalised people, as in the case of ActionAid, or to create or strengthen accountable governance institutions as in the case of Sida and UNDP[1]
Source: ‘What is the “rights-based approach” all about? Perspectives from international development agencies,’ IDS Working Paper 234, November 2004 |
|
