The Necessity for Binding Human Rights Obligations for Private Actors in the Digital Age: A Submission to the UN Human Rights Council on New and Emerging Technologies

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monika Zalnieriute
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Emerging Technologies ◽  
Digital Age ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
Private Actors

Horizontal Human Rights Law

2008 ◽  
Vol 102 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
John H. Knox
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Transnational Corporations ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Social Responsibilities ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
International Human ◽  
Private Actors

What duties, if any, does international human rights law establish for individuals, corporations, and other private actors? For many years, the conventional answer has been that it places duties on states to respect the rights of individuals and creates few or no private duties. In other words, human rights law is aligned vertically, not horizontally. But that view has regularly been challenged. Most recently, in 2003, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (Commission), historically the most important incubator of human rights agreements, received two proposed instruments that might appear to realign human rights law horizontally: private actors would have duties as well as rights, and they would owe those duties to society as a whole or to individuals within it. The draft Declaration on Human Social Responsibilities (Declaration) would identify duties that all individuals owe to their societies; and the Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights (draft Norms) would set out duties of businesses under human rights law. The Human Rights Commission did not embrace the proposals before its replacement by the Human Rights Council in 2006, and the Council has not considered them. Both received some support, however, and it seems likely that their proponents will continue to pursue adoption of their principles in one form or another. This article argues that if adopted, those principles would cause serious damage to human rights law.

The Czech Republic in the UN Human Rights Council 2011 – 2014

2019 ◽  
pp. 247-265
Author(s):  
Lucie Hanzlíčková ◽  
Irena Melounová ◽  
Štěpánka Zemanová
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Czech Republic ◽  
The Czech Republic ◽  
Human Rights Council

scholarly journals Australia's appointment to the UN Human Rights Council means it must deliver on Indigenous engagement in alcohol control

2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 327-328
Author(s):  
Janani Muhunthan ◽  
Blake Angell ◽  
Andrew Wilson ◽  
Maree L. Hackett ◽  
Jane Latimer ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Alcohol Control ◽  
Human Rights Council

An International Relations Perspective on the Reform Needs of the Human Rights Council

2021 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-80
Author(s):  
Wolfgang S. Heinz
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Structure And Dynamics ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
Local Actors ◽  
Protection Of Human Rights ◽  
The Subject

Abstract: This article approaches the matter of institutional reform of the United Nations Human Rights Council from an international relations perspective. A well-known tension exists between State representatives acting for their governments in international organisations, but whose decisions are presented as UN policies. The latter should be guided primarily by the UN Charter and public international law. However, in reality, different worldviews and foreign policy considerations play a more significant role. In a comprehensive stock-take, the article looks at four major dimensions of the Council, starting with structure and dynamics and major trends, followed by its country and thematic activities, and the role of key actors. Council reform proposals from both States and civil society are explored. Whilst the intergovernmental body remains the most important authority responsible for the protection of human rights in the international sphere, it has also been the subject of considerable criticism. Although it has made considerable progress towards enlarging its coverage and taking on more challenging human rights crises, among some of its major weaknesses are the election of human rights-unfriendly countries into its ranks, the failure to apply stronger sanctions on large, politically influential countries in the South and North, and lack of influence on human rights crises and chronic human rights problems in certain countries. Whilst various reform proposals have emerged from States and NGOs, other more far reaching propositions are under sometimes difficult negotiations. In the mid- to long-term, the UN human rights machinery can only have a stronger and more lasting impact if support from national/local actors and coalitions in politics and society can be strengthened.

Environmental and Collective Rights: Differences between Indigenous and Non-Indigenous ngo s Involved with the United Nations Human Rights Council

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Maia Hallward ◽  
Charity Butcher ◽  
Jonathan Taylor Downs ◽  
Emily Cook
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Collective Identity ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
Non Governmental Organizations ◽  
Indigenous Organizations ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Environment Sustainability

Abstract Scholarship on human rights and environmental justice suggests that organizations vary in their messaging regarding outcomes related to environmental protection and sustainability, differences often found in the divide between the Global North and Global South. The literature also suggests that Indigenous organizations represent groups that traditionally focus on issues of sovereignty, while grappling with unique problems related to assimilation, cultural preservation, and oppression. This study utilizes empirical data gathered from 333 non-governmental organizations affiliated with the United Nations Human Rights Council to explore whether Indigenous and non-Indigenous organizations, which share many aspects of their mission with one another at the transnational level, differ on issues related to environment sustainability and collective identity rights. Our results indicate that Indigenous organizations take a more holistic approach in addressing the relationship between humans and the natural world, centring marginalized perspectives through restorative justice and the needs of current and future generations.

Financial literacy and sustainable development in the digital age (legal dimension)

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natal'ya Povetkina ◽  
Ekaterina Kudryashova
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Financial Literacy ◽  
Law And Economics ◽  
Digital Age ◽  
Practical Approach ◽  
Digital Revolution ◽  
Municipal Employees ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Legal Identification

The work is aimed at forming a systematic theoretical and practical approach to the development of financial literacy in the format of sustainable development in the age of the digital revolution. The authors address the current issues of the evolution of the development and legal identification of financial literacy, consider it in the context of human rights and sustainable development of the state. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the impact of financial literacy on the successful fight against poverty. For researchers, practicing lawyers and economists, state and municipal employees, teachers, postgraduates, students of law and economics universities and faculties.

From a Stark Utopia to Everyday Utopias

2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 575-606
Author(s):  
Michelle Staggs Kelsall
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Transnational Corporations ◽  
Public Domain ◽  
Due Diligence ◽  
Karl Polanyi ◽  
Business And Human Rights ◽  
Human Rights Council ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Human Rights Due Diligence

This article considers the emergence of the Business and Human Rights agenda at the United Nations (UN). It argues that the agenda can be seen as an example of the UN Human Rights Council attempting to institutionalise everyday utopias within an emerging global public domain. Utilising the concept of embedded pragmatism and tracing the underlying rationale for the emergence of the agenda to the work of Karl Polanyi, the article argues that the Business and Human Rights agenda seeks to institutionalise human rights due diligence processes within transnational corporations in order to create a pragmatic alternative to the stark utopia of laissez-faire liberal markets. It then provides an analytical account of the implications of human rights due diligence for the modes and techniques business utilises to assess human rights harm. It argues that due to the constraints imposed by the concept of embedded pragmatism and the normative indeterminacy of human rights, the Business and Human Rights agenda risks instituting human rights within the corporation through modes and techniques that maintain human rights as a language of crisis, rather than creating the space for novel, everyday utopias to emerge.

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