WUNRN
HUMAN RIGHTS INDICATORS - UN -
TOOL IN GENDER ADVOCACY
Direct Link to Full 188-Page
Publication:
The UN Human Rights Office
has spent the past several years researching, consulting and now implementing a
range of statistical indicators to assist in measuring progress in realizing
human rights. The indicators have been adopted in several countries in a number
of situations, including in the reform of judicial systems, in measuring the
rights of indigenous communities, the rights of persons with disabilities, the
success of national human rights institutions and in mainstreaming human rights
in national development planning.
At the launch of
“Human Rights Indicators: A Guide to Measurement and Implementation”, in
“Twenty years ago,
one of the recommendations of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action
was that we employ and analyse indicators to help measure our progress in human
rights,” Pillay said.
“Only robust and
accurate statistics can establish the vital benchmarks and baselines that
translate our human rights commitments into targeted policies,” she said, “and
only they can measure how effective those policies truly are.”
Pillay welcomed the
adoption of the indicators in a number of countries in Latin America, Europe,
Africa and
The former Mayor of Mexico City, Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon, described how human
rights indicators were developed for a project involving the Superior Tribunal
of Justice and with a specific focus on the right to a fair trial.
Loretta Rosales, the
chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights of the
“Because we had
the numbers to back up our negotiating points,” Rosales said, “it was easier
for us to generate meaningful reform commitments from the Armed Forces and
Police institutions which have been established as the biggest perpetrators of
enforced disappearance and torture, respectively.”
“Internally, the use
of human rights statistics relating to these violations resulted in targeted
deployment of institutional resources, increased professionalization of human
resources and justified requests for equipment in support of investigation and
monitoring,” she said.
Maria-Virginia Gomes,
a member of the Portuguese National Commission for Human Rights described a
project she has been involved in, where the list of indicators developed by the
UN Human Rights Office is being used to develop a tailored set of standards for
the right to education and the right to liberty and security of person.
In her role also as a
member of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, one of the
human rights treaty monitoring bodies, Gomes said it had been clear for a long
time that a “set of reliable indicators (was needed) to measure compliance of
States with their treaty obligations.”
“It is not that States do not provide statistical data but, often such data is
not geared towards compliance with human rights obligations because it
represents mainstream trends of progress or lack of progress and seldom takes
into account human rights standards of non-discrimination, equality,
participation and accountability,” Gomes said.
A major strength of
the human rights indicators produced by the High Commissioner’s Office is that
“they have used a common approach to deal with civil and political rights and
economic, social and cultural rights on an equal footing”, she said.
All panellists
underlined the importance of ensuring a firm platform for cooperation among
human rights, statistical and policy-making communities to help improve the
measurement and implementation of human rights, as one of the three pillars of
the United Nations, along with peace and security and development.
Jan Robert Suesser,
Senior Official Statistician, Member of the Board of the Ligue des droits de l'Homme, and Senior Advisor to the
International Cooperation Agency of the Ministry of Finance in France, said
that information is more legitimate if and when it is owned by all major
stakeholders.
Suesser referred to the experience of Poland, when the country was on a general
strike in 1980, and that among “the 21 claims put forward by strikers to the
authorities, the sixth was about making economic and social information
publicly available and not restricted to the ruling authorities.” He said
that “it shows how in practice, and not merely in theory, access to statistical
information and respect of human rights were understood by the population as
intrinsically linked”.
Rajeev Malhotra,
Executive Director at the Centre for Development and Finance and Professor at
the Jindal School of Government and Public Policy in India, said that
“above all, indicators help in improving follow-up on the recommendations
and concluding observations of treaty bodies and other mechanisms, and allow
national human rights institutions and civil society organizations to exercise
more effective oversight on the promotion and protection of human rights”.
Participants at the
launch underlined that that the establishment of national human rights
indicators is a good example of a practical, measurable and scientific way to
engage with a wide range of relevant stakeholders for human rights
implementation at country level. Comments from participants also
recognized the usefulness of the Guide for the post-2015 development agenda, in
particular in dispelling the misconception that human rights are not measurable
and therefore cannot be mainstreamed in development agendas.