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Strategies for Achieving the
International Development Targets
HUMAN RIGHTS FOR POOR PEOPLE
February
2000
Section 6. Measuring progress against the objectives
6.1 The International Development Targets are drawn from internationally agreed conventions and resolutions and provide an indicator of the extent to which particular social and economic rights have been realised.
6.2 At the national level further work may be required on methodologies for formulating benchmarks and indicators relevant to countries’ and local communities’ needs. The translation of international standards into national and local level benchmarks and indicators, through democratic processes, provides a means of measuring progress towards strategic objectives. It also ensures that universal principles have local relevance and enables citizens to make claims on the basis of concrete entitlements. Local level citizens’ action, in turn, fuels the political will to turn principles into practice.
6.3 In most developing countries disaggregated poverty-related data are rarely available on the basis of social, religious or ethnic status, or even sometimes according to where people live. When the data has been collected, governments should seek to make it widely available. The poorest countries may have minimal capacity to collect statistical information. This makes it very difficult for governments and citizens to identify the extent to which people’s failure to enjoy their human rights may be associated with processes of social exclusion and structural inequities. In some cases, there is separate information on men and women but, at present, the systematic collection of data from developing countries on the basis of other social differences is not possible. This data gap can be partially filled if national statistical institutions develop and implement targeted or sampled data gathering exercises to indicate the extent to which different categories of people are increasingly enjoying their human rights.
6.4 At the international level reports to Treaty Monitoring Bodies are often of patchy quality and some states parties fail to submit these regularly. Agreement on specific national level targets and plans of action to promote human rights, as agreed at the Vienna Conference, would provide one means of measuring governments’ actions in relation to their obligations to promote human rights instruments and national institutions to monitor and ensure implementation. DFID will explore how it can support the development of such an approach.
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International monitoring of human rights Increases in the comprehensive ratification of particular conventions provide an indicator of government commitment to the rights of those who have traditionally been discriminated against. The extent to which this commitment is translated into practice and outcomes has also to be measured. The main forum (after the General Assembly) for substantive discussion of progress on human rights in the UN is the annual meeting of the Commission on Human Rights (CHR). The CHR may deal with any matters relating to human rights. It considers and adopts resolutions on a wide range of general rights issues (such as torture, freedom of expression, the rights of the child) and some country-specific situations. It also commissions studies, drafts international instruments setting human rights standards, and reviews recommendations and studies prepared by the UN Sub-Commission on the Protection and Promotion of Minorities (its subsidiary body). Where it considers it warranted, the CHR appoints Special Rapporteurs, Special Representatives, Independent Experts or Working Groups to investigate subjects in depth. |
6.5 DFID will prioritise the development of participatory methodologies to provide information on poor people’s own assessment of their human rights situation. DFID will develop, with interested partners, a methodology for Participatory Human Rights Assessments. These could form the basis for the development of local indicators by which the progressive realisation of particular rights can be measured over time.
6.6 Each of the six core treaties has an expert Treaty Monitoring Body which monitors states' compliance. The Treaty Monitoring Bodies for the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) are the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights respectively. The ICESCR has until now not received the same level of attention and resources as the Human Rights Committee. All States that are parties to the conventions are required to submit regular reports on their implementation of the treaties and reports are also presented by non governmental organisations. Technical advice for the Treaty Monitoring Bodies is provided through the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).(1)
(1) See DFID’s Institutional Strategy Paper for the OHCHR
Comments on this section of the paper can be sent to can be sent to [HUMAN RIGHTS FOR POOR PEOPLE] Dr Phil Evans, Senior Social Development Adviser,DFID, 94 Victoria St, London SW1E 5JL email: gender-tsp@dfid.gov.uk
Published by DFID, 94 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 5JL United Kingdom. Email: enquiry@dfid.gov.uk
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