Title: Human Rights Accountability through Treaty Bodies: Examining Human Rights Treaty Monitoring for Water and Sanitation
Abstract: TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION I. THE TREATY MONITORING PROCESS A. Monitoring as Accountability B. Treaty Bodies as a Basis for Monitoring C. State Reporting to Treaty Bodies II. REPORTING TO THE COMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS A. The Committee's Monitoring Process B. Monitoring Water and Sanitation III. CODING STATE REPORTS TO THE COMMITTEE IV. EVOLUTION OF WATER & SANITATION IN STATE REPORTING A. Changes in Human Rights Implementation 1. Structure-Process-Outcome Typology 2. Rights-Based Principles B. Development of Human Rights Norms 1. AAAQ & the Focus on Affordability 2. Public Health Impacts C. Specificity of Reporting Guidelines 1. Quantitative Data 2. Housing Rights V. AN IMPERATIVE FOR REPORTING CONSISTENCY THROUGH UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS INDICATORS CONCLUSION INTRODUCTION Human rights treaty bodies, given an explicit state mandate to monitor human rights treaty implementation, have become the principle mechanism of treaty monitoring to ensure human rights accountability. With the end of the Cold War and an expansion of the United Nations (UN) human rights system, there has been a dramatic increase in state ratifications of human rights treaties and in reporting to human rights treaty bodies. Though treaty bodies were long seen as ineffectual in monitoring states, recent reform initiatives have renewed the promise of treaty monitoring for human rights accountability. This accountability is structured by state reports to human rights treaty bodies. Examining the process of monitoring state reports, this article assesses human rights treaty monitoring of the rights to water and sanitation, analyzing the evolving content of these rights in state human rights reports and guiding ongoing efforts to streamline water and sanitation reporting to human rights treaty bodies. Given the pressing implications of inadequate water and sanitation, which have undermined a wide array of economic development and public health goals, the UN system has looked to human rights as a means to address these pervasive harms. Initially elaborated through interpretations of core human rights treaties, water and sanitation--which are both essential for life and instrumental to realizing a wide range of human rights--have come to be seen as independent human rights. As human rights have expanded in scope and influence, the UN General Assembly's 2010 Resolution on the Human Right to Water and Sanitation has proclaimed international political recognition of this distinct right. Such efforts to develop international law have created a policy basis by which the implementation of human rights can structure water and sanitation systems, but for this right to take hold, there must be international monitoring mechanisms in place to ensure state accountability. Crucial to understanding human rights monitoring, this research examines the content of state human rights reporting on water and sanitation to human rights treaty bodies. There is a research imperative to assess the information that states report to treaty bodies, and this study employs water and sanitation as a case study for linking the development of human rights indicators to the content of state human rights reports. Through analytic coding of state human rights reports, this research traces the relationship between human rights advancements and state reporting on water and sanitation, providing an empirical foundation for understanding human rights reports and framing human rights indicators. With the UN currently seeking to strengthen the process of human rights treaty monitoring through human rights treaty bodies, this research on the rights to water and sanitation offers generalizable guidelines to streamline reporting and facilitate accountability for the implementation of human rights. By analyzing state reports to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR or Committee), this article examines how state reports have evolved alongside human rights advancements and considers how streamlined reporting could be more conducive to accountability for the realization of the human rights to water and sanitation. …
Publication Year: 2015
Publication Date: 2015-09-22
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 7
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