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[Claudio Schuftan]

Human Rights Reader 169



*THE LACK OF FUNDING TO CARRY OUT NATIONAL OR LOCAL HUMAN RIGHTS ASSESSMENTS
SHOULD NOT DELAY US IN LAUNCHING THEM! *



1. Human Rights assessments are government- or civil society-led
participatory processes that aim at diagnosing the human rights (HR)
situation in any given country.



2. Human Rights assessments enable the general public (claim holders
*and*duty bearers) to see more clearly how well HR are being
respected, protected
an fulfilled in the country;   they are a tool to mobilize the population;
they enable ordinary people (claim holders) to gain a better hold on the
present, to shun fatality and to prevent the indefinite perpetuation of HR
violations.



3. These assessments seek to establish the truth about HR violations as
an-element-of-democratic-rights; they are a powerful means for claim holders
to gain/recover some power over running state affair and to understand how
the global economy works to their detriment. Conducting HR assessments is
also an opportunity to strengthen North-South solidarity and alliances
between claim holders and HR organizations.



4. HR assessments are not a new idea; they have been promoted by numerous
movements working on HR for a long time. Primarily, they expose the
involvement of governments in the North and in the South in the perpetuation
of HR violations.



5. Therefore, carrying out HR assessments prepares claim holders for the
needed and unavoidable confrontation (not implied in a negative sense) with
their government. Without a doubt, HR assessments constitute one of the most
effective tools we have to jumpstart the process of reversing decades of
social injustice.



6. The initiative to launch HR assessments can be taken by different
players, provided they are mobilized.  For now, the immediate goal is to
force the government to launch a proper HR assessment. If it refuses, civil
society must take this upon itself. [This is why, in the spirit of this
goal, the *People's Health Movement* has embarked in a *Global Right to
Health and Health Care Campaign* covering some 30 countries in five
continents].



7. The assessments will strengthen local social movements and will help
build democratic spaces; they will also provide an opportunity to engage
with the media (as well as monitor and foster the freedom of the press,
because we have to ensure media coverage as part of the popular education
process when disseminating the assessments' results). An engagement with
universities, with labor unions and with professional associations is highly
desirable as well.



8. HR assessments start by establishing the historic, economic, social and
political root causes of HR violations. Training courses on assessing HR
methodically are needed to strengthen the monitoring capacities of the
assessment teams. [the People's Health Movement has prepared a multilingual,
user-friendly *Assessment Tool on the Right to Health* to be used in such a
training, as well as in the subsequent implementation of the assessment. See
www.phmovement.org and follow the links to the Right to Health Campaign].



Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City

cschuftan at phmovement.org  NEW ADDRESS

[All Readers can be found in www.humaninfo.org/aviva under No.69]

Adapted from 'Let's launch an enquiry into debt!: A Manual'. CETIM,
AAJ-ATTAC, CADTM, et al, booklet, Geneva, October 2006.
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