Putting Rights into Practice
Incorporating the human rights-based approach into programming requires a shift from thinking in terms of satisfying needs to designing interventions based on fulfilling rights.
The human rights-based approach to programming addresses development complexities and humanitarian assistance holistically. It takes into consideration the connections between individuals and the systems of power or influence and endeavors to create dynamics of accountability.
This is a two-way street: individuals and communities need to be fully informed about their rights and to participate in decisions that affect them. Governments and other duty bearers often need assistance to develop the capacity, the resources and the political will to fulfil their commitments to human rights.
- Promote justice for women
on the basis of equality between women and men
(equity)
- Enable women and men to claim their rights (empowerment)
- Ensure that women and men
are involved in the design and implementation
of development initiatives (participation)
- Make services accountable to the women and men who use them (accountability)
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UNFPA works from both directions. It advocates
with policymakers and leaders in support of human rights standards
affirmed in national laws and international instruments, and
helps them to assume their duties of protecting these rights.
It encourages particular attention to the rights of the most
vulnerable women, men and youth.
UNFPA also fulfils its mission by empowering vulnerable individuals and communities through various strategies, including sensitization and awareness campaigns, training and life-skills projects. Stronger Voices is an example of a programme that works from both directions simultaneously: It helps communities mobilize to demand high-quality reproductive health services, and it also helps providers better understand how they can fully address the needs and rights of their clients.
A wide range of actors and legal mechanisms
form an interconnected network
of support for protecting human rights. This network includes
public institutions, the private sector, the media, multilateral
and bilateral organizations, NGOs, communities, associations,
leaders and political parties. Civil society, international
organizations and community and religious leaders as well
as the media play a critical role in educating individuals
and communities about the rights they are entitled to and
helping them to exercise them.
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National human rights institutions
– including human rights commissions, ombudsman
offices, and specialized institutions that protect the rights of a particular vulnerable
group – are increasingly active in a wide
range of human rights causes, and UNFPA has been
instrumental in supporting them.
Progress has been quite significant
in this area in the Latin America and the Caribbean
region. UNFPA co-sponsored, with the Office of
the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the
Inter-American Institute for Human Rights, a Seminar
on the Promotion and Protection of Reproductive
Rights through the work of National Human Rights
Institutions for Latin America, the Caribbean
and Canada (Costa Rica, 2002).
A workshop with similar objectives
was also held with Ombudsman Offices of the Caribbean
(Jamaica 2003). The resolution
that emerged from this meeting calls for strengthening
their monitoring capabilities. As a result, reproductive
health and rights are now being integrated within
country level action plans and in monitoring and
follow up.
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The human rights-based approach is concerned not just with outcomes but also with the process by which outcomes are achieved. It requires that all stakeholders be included. It recognizes that people are actors in their own development, rather than passive recipients of commodities and services. Informing, educating and empowering stakeholders is key. Participation is central, as both a means and an end, not only to ensure ownership, but also to guarantee continuity.
Culturally sensitive approaches, gender mainstreaming, advocacy and partnership are strategies that UNFPA employs to promote human rights in all of its work. However, the various programmatic areas may also require more targeted approaches and perspectives, as discussed in the following sections:
- Improving reproductive health care
- Making motherhood safer
- Promoting gender equality
- Preventing HIV/AIDS
- Addressing gender-based violence
- Supporting adolescents and youth
- Fighting poverty
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POPULATION ISSUES: Human Rights
