15 May 2006 - Rights CRINMAIL 23
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- EVALUATION: Does Implementing a Rights Based Approach Increase Impact on Poverty Reduction? [workshop report]
- PLAN: A Child Rights Approach to Disaster Risk Management [article]
- HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL: First Members Elected [news]
- LEARNING: Use of Information and Communication Technologies for Human Rights Work [course]
- CHILD RIGHTS INFORMATION NETWORK: Guidelines for Writing about Rights-Based Approaches to Programming [call for information]
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Rights CRINMAIL is a component of a project of the Child Rights Information Network (CRIN). It is published monthly with the purpose of informing and building the community of practitioners in rights-based programming. Your submissions are welcome. To contribute, email us at[email protected].
Adobe Acrobat is required for viewing some of the documents, and if required can be downloaded from http://www.adobe.com
If you do not receive this email in html format, you will not be able to see some hyperlinks in the text. At the end of each item we have therefore provided a full URL linking to a web page where further information is available.
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EVALUATION: Does Implementing a Rights Based Approach Increase Impact on Poverty Reduction? [workshop report]
Does Implementing a Rights Based Approach Increase Impact on Poverty Reduction? is a record of a two-day workshop, which was held in January in London, to discuss the preliminary case study findings of a one-year evaluation/ learning process to examine the impact of rights based and non-rights based projects on poverty and achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Case studies for the evaluation, which was initiated by the Inter-Agency Group – a loose network of UK based NGOs concerned with integrating human rights into development practice – were undertaken in Bangladesh, Malawi and Peru.
The workshop discussions aimed to help the various research teams to push their analysis further and identify gaps for further inquiry, looking at what the outcomes and impacts of implementing a rights based approach are in relation to poverty reduction, how they differ to non-rights based approach, and what recommendations can be made for using one or other approach.
International relief and development organisations are mandated to respond to human needs. Traditionally, this meant direct delivery of services, such as disaster relief, food aid, health services and education. Despite many successes related to these interventions over the decades, it has become evident that globally, poverty is not diminishing. Overall, the gap between rich and poor is getting bigger and over 20 per cent of the world’s population are completely excluded from development efforts.
Many relief and development organisations have now recognised that poverty is, itself, a denial of the human rights which are inherent to all people and which belong equally to all human beings. So the argument is that meeting basic needs is directly dependent on being able to assist people to fulfil their rights.
This way of thinking has prompted a change from a development model based on responding only to poor people’s needs, to one which supports duty-bearers in fulfilling their responsibilities, and which empowers the poor to claim their rights which are expressed in the international human rights frameworks, covering economic, social, cultural, civil and political fields. Putting this model into practice is known as a human rights-based approach (RBA).
Over the last few years, various UK-based international development NGOs have begun to apply RBA systematically in their programming. But, in doing so, they have uncovered numerous concerns and questions about the conceptual and practical applications of RBA. While many have accepted the logic behind RBAs, others remain to be convinced that there is any added value that they bring.
One of the fundamental questions has been: how to best show to project participants, host governments, staff and donors, that RBA makes a difference, and that this difference can be demonstrated. A few reports and case studies offer examples of successful projects using RBA, but there is little evidence that systematically demonstrates the impact that RBA can have in strengthening development work. Similarly, few studies have compared RBA projects and identified “best practices” and lessons that could be used to improve the use of RBA in the field. This learning process aims to fill this gap.
The workshop report, together with the in-depth country reports from Bangladesh, Malawi and Peru will be further analysed and synthesised in a final document which will be available in June/ July 2006.
For more information, contact:
Magdalene Lagu,
Rights Advisor
CARE International UK
10-13 Rushworth Street, London, SE1 0RB, United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0)207 934 9334; Fax: +44 (0)207 934 9335
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.careinternational.org.uk
More information from the Inter-Agency Group on Rights Based Approaches
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PLAN: A Child Rights Approach to Disaster Risk Management [article]
"We were very depressed after the tsunami. We attended trauma counselling activities at tent schools and other recreational activities sponsored by international aid agencies. With the activities, we thought that we could continue on living. We helped our parents with the daily chores so that our parents did not get stressed too long." A child in Aceh, Indonesia.
Tens of thousands of children lost their lives in the Indian Ocean tsunami of 26 December 2004. Many more children would have survived if they had had more information and skills related to disaster reduction and response. Thousands of children died in the Kashmir earthquake and countless others have died or suffered terrible trauma in many other less high profile disasters.
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) recognises that a child “is a subject of rights who is able to form and express opinions, to participate in decision-making processes and influence solutions, to intervene as a partner in the process of social change and in the building of democracy.” The case is now strongly made that initiatives that involve children benefit children and also benefit the family and wider community.
As the interpretation of the CRC develops, Plan is one of many child-rights-based organisations that have begun to highlight the need to extend this participatory principle to all aspects of disaster management. If we believe in the ability of those involved – be they adults or children – to articulate their needs, express their views, establish relationships with those who are there to assist them and take actions to improve their circumstances as essential to development, it must be even more critical in the humanitarian context. As children often constitute such a significant proportion of the affected population in disasters, ignoring their capacity means undermining the capacity of whole communities to cope with the situation.
Plan recognises that disaster management is a development issue. Fundamentally, development is about politics. That means encouraging all facets of society to work together to reduce the vulnerability of children and young people. Plan also recognises that disaster management is about children’s rights. As Amartya Sen’s work has confirmed, birth endows those rights, and living should entitle everyone to progressively realise those rights.
Plan’s recent experience in Asia has shown that children often form more than one third of the death toll in disasters. The lives of a similar percentage are severely disrupted through separation or loss of family members, through disruption to education and through the breakdown of communities. Elsewhere Plan has documented countless examples of how natural hazards have been exacerbated by poor governance, corruption and conflict. Almost everywhere, children’s specific needs are usually overlooked because they are ignored during planning processes. After Hurricane Mitch, it was consultation with children in El Salvador that highlighted the fact that emergency shelters did not allow for division of space between girls and boys and this created serious risks for girls. Plan’s experiences with community risk mapping and mitigation activities with youth disaster volunteer teams in the Philippines, Haiti and El Salvador have shown that children and young people’s capacity to participate in risk reduction is much greater than most realise, and can be invaluable in effective disaster preparedness and response.
There are big gaps in international policy, practice and knowledge about how best to articulate and recognise the roles, capacities and rights of children in disaster risk reduction (DRR). Plan is making a significant effort to fill these gaps. Plan is currently engaged on an extensive programme of action research, developing new approaches to child-centred risk reduction. Plan will be paying particular attention to the different impacts and roles of every segment of the young population; children are not all the same. Sensitivity to gender, age, ability and disability is essential. Through this work, Plan aims to reduce the impacts of ‘natural’ and ‘human-made’ disasters whilst reinforcing the rights of children.
Visit: http://www.crin.org/hrbap/index.asp?action=theme.infoitem&item=8232
For more information, contact:
Dr. Nick Hall
Disaster Risk Reduction Manager
Plan International UK
5-6 Underhill Street, London NW1 7HS, United Kingdom
Tel: +44(0)207 482 9774; Fax: +44(0)207 9778
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.plan-international.org
More information
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HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL: First Members Elected [news]
[NEW YORK, 9 May 2006] - The United Nations Commission on Human Rights ended its last session on 27th March after adopting a Resolution to transfer all its work to the recently created and stronger Human Rights Council. Find below the list of the 47 elected members as well as results for the first elections to the Human Rights Council. Preparations will now begin in Geneva for the first meeting of the Council on 19 June 2006.
A. Elected members by region:
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Africa (13 seats): Algeria, Cameroon, Djibouti, Gabon, Ghana, Mali, Mauritius, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Tunisia, Zambia
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Asia (13 seats): Bahrain, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Jordan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka
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Eastern Europe (6 seats): Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Russian Federation, Ukraine
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Latin American/Caribbean States (8 seats): Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay
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Western Europe/Other (7seats): Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, United Kingdom
B. Elected members by term:
1 year term (14): Algeria, Argentina, Bahrain, Czech Republic, Ecuador, Finland, India, Indonesia, Morocco, Netherlands, Philippines, Poland, South Africa, Tunisia
2 year term (15): Brazil, France, Japan, Gabon, Ghana, Guatemala, Mali, Pakistan, Peru, Republic of Korea, Romania, Sri Lanka, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Zambia
3 year term (18) : Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cameroon, Canada, China, Cuba, Djibouti, Germany, Jordan, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mexico, Nigeria, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Switzerland, Uruguay
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=8217
More information
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LEARNING: Use of Information and Communication Technologies for Human Rights Work [course]
Date: 20 September -12 December 2006
Location: Distance Learning
This e-learning course is intended for staff members of human rights and social justice NGOs and inter-governmental organisations who are responsible for information and communication (i.e. information officers, web editors, webmasters/webweavers, communication specialists) within their organisation. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) is a dynamic field where success is dependent upon skill development and practical experience. Participants will be introduced to proven methods of using ICTs to promote their human rights work. They will become equipped with the knowledge and tools to more effectively design and implement listservs, web sites, databases or multi-media for advocacy campaigns, training and information management.
Course outline
Week 1: Using ICTs - Special Considerations for Human Rights Work
Week 2: Research and Documentation
Week 3: Outreach and Information Dissemination
Week 4: Advocacy and Campaigning
Week 5: Open week
Week 6: Information Management
Week 7: On-line Collaboration
Week 8: On-line and Distance Learning
Week 9: Assessment of use of ICTs in participants' organisations
Week 10: Open week
Week 11: Peer-review of project(s) developed during the course
Week 12: Peer-review of project(s) developed during the course
The deadline for applications is 15 July 2006.
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=8233&flag=event
For more information, contact:
Human Rights Education Associates (HREA)
Postbus 59225, 1040 KE Amsterdam, Netherlands
Tel: + 31 20 524 1404
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.hrea.org
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CHILD RIGHTS INFORMATION NETWORK: Guidelines for Writing about Rights-Based Approaches to Programming [call for information]
The Child Rights Information Network (CRIN) is calling for information for future issues of our monthly CRINMAIL on rights based approaches to development to share best practices in programming. CRIN invites contributions about how your organisation uses rights based approaches. To this end, these guidelines, which have been adapted from a Save the Children UK document, offer some suggestions on how to think and write about your organisation's activities in a "rights based" way.
Here are some of the things that you can do to bring out what is "rights based" about your work:
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Think about which particular right(s) the project addresses, how these are unmet or violated, and which groups of people this affects.
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Think about how a rights based analysis gets to the roots of why this particular group of people's rights are violated, considering:
- the role of other stakeholders and duty bearers (i.e. those responsible for the fulfilment of rights);
- whether the project is planned from a holistic - that is, looking at the whole situation rather than just a small part of it - perspective and which other articles in human rights conventions are relevant;
- discrimination / invisibility issues, in other words, who has been left out and why.
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Apply a "rights based" intervention logic by considering:
- What has been identified as needing to change and why;
- How can a sustained change be achieved in attitudes and awareness, empowerment of the rights holder to claim rights, institutional change/legislation/authorities, building capacity, competency, and authority.
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Think about how the principles underpinning human rights are considered in the project, by looking at:
- how the project enables those people whose rights are unfulfilled to participate
- what efforts are being made to overcome discrimination.
As well as considering your successes also consider what has not been achieved and what challenges remain which can lead you to draw lessons for the future.
Visit: http://www.crin.org/hrbap/index.asp?action=theme.infoitem&item=7204
For more information or to submit contributions, please contact:
Child Rights Information Network (CRIN)
c/o Save the Children
1 St. John's Lane, London EC1M 4AR, UK
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.therightsapproach.org
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