Economic Inequality

Can human rights make a difference?

Shutterstock/Donatas Dabravolskas (All rights reserved)

Extreme inequality is one of the defining issues of our time, with the gap between rich and poor widening across the globe. But while economic inequality has become a prominent issue on the international development agenda, as well as in national political debates in many countries, the human rights community has barely begun to address its implications for the full range of human rights. This oGR debate will explore the consequences for human rights of rising wealth and income inequality. How can the human rights framework help to understand its causes, as well as to push for more appropriate policy responses? What obstacles and blind-spots must the human rights community confront if human rights are to be a more effective agenda for equality in the socio-economic sphere?

Collaborating editors: Ignacio Saiz and Gaby Oré Aguilar
at the Centre for Economic and Social Rights

 

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Español | Français | Tagalog

The Trump administration is enabling Duterte’s abuses in the Philippines with unconditional support in the name of US foreign policy.

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Español | Français

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Español

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How can international human rights law be creatively deployed to expand protections to other characteristics related to severe and systematic rights violations?

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Non-invasive and non-punitive interventions that draw on positive emotions have promising potential to break the poverty cycle, but this approach risks ignoring ...

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Inequality, business and human rights: the new frontier?

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Despite the growing urgency to address inequality, the business and human rights field has remained rather silent on the issue. Why?

Phantom rights: the systemic marginalization of economic and social rights

By: Philip Alston
Español

Neither the UN nor civil society is doing much about the deep resistance of many states to proper recognition of economic and social rights.

The vicious spiral of economic inequality and financial crises

By: Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky 

There is compelling evidence that economic inequality is both a result of, and contributor to, economic crises

Who will take the lead on economic inequality, and who should?

By: Chris Albin-Lackey

Human rights lack the best language and tools to describe and solve inequality’s most pernicious impacts

How to get inequality on the global policy agenda

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Everyone does better when everyone does better

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Español

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Español | Français | العربية

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Human rights and the age of inequality

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Español | Français | العربية

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Extreme inequality as the antithesis of human rights

By: Philip Alston
Español

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Closing the doors of justice? The South African Constitutional Court’s approach to direct access

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Legal mobilization: a critical first step to addressing economic and social rights

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Legal mobilization for economic and social rights is a critical first step, not the end goal, as India's Right to Food campaign demonstrates.

Can legal interventions really tackle the root causes of poverty?

By: Sara Bailey

Legal interventions can ameliorate some of poverty’s most harmful consequences, but they cannot address poverty’s root causes. This can only be done through major ...

Poverty and human rights: can courts, lawyers and activists make a difference?

By: Chris Jochnick
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The founder of Human Rights Watch tells Stephen Hopgood and James Ron that this organisation is globalizing itself; though it has a long way to go, over time it ...

 
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