Greater accountability for the socio-economic wellbeing of vulnerable groups has come one step closer after Bosnia-Herzegovina and Bolivia ratified the Optional Protocol (???OP???) to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Their commitment to the new human rights complaints mechanism brings the total number of ratifications to seven.
Their endorsement is significant, as the question of justiciability lies at the very core of the challenges facing economic and social rights. If the dignity and inherent human rights of individuals and communities are to be effectively protected, those individuals must have access to justice, and thus accountability mechanisms, when their rights are put at risk.
In an ???age of austerity???, when fiscal policies are undermining social protection systems, the Optional Protocol can offer an important tool for people to defend their economic and social rights (ESCR). Given that lacklustre accountability systems have also undermined progress towards the Millennium Development Goals, while a lack of effective monitoring and poor enforcement of human rights standards continue to impede progress towards these rights, the importance of the OP should not be underestimated. With these facts in mind, CESR continues to push for the advancement of the Optional Protocol, and thereby better protection of ESCR rights around the world.
Once it comes into force, the ???OP??? will allow persons whose rights have been violated to present complaints before the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. While it will only cover those countries that have ratified it, such a facility would offer a crucial recourse to those denied access to justice in their own countries, enabling them to claim their rights at the international level. Moreover, the existence and international backing of the OP will serve to further the cause of justiciability of economic and social rights, and may well have an effect in strengthening ESCR recognition at the national level.
Indeed, domestic implementation of the ICESCR has already led to changes in national laws and policies, including constitutional amendments, in many countries. In this way, greater awareness and recognition of states??? obligations to respect, protect, promote and fulfill economic and social rights has been achieved. Full implementation of the OP will help take this process one step further, providing these rights the full and equal status they deserve, and thereby reinforcing the indivisible and interdependent character of all human rights.
The OP must be ratified by ten countries before it comes into force, however. And even though some 39 countries have already signed it, thereby signalling their intention to ratify in the future, only seven have thus far taken the definitive final step. Ecuador, Mongolia and Spain were the first to do so, in 2010, before El Salvador and Argentina followed suit in 2011. There are high hopes that three more ratifications will be delivered before the year is out, though, after Bosnia-Herzegovina and Bolivia added their names to the roster in January. The Republic of Ireland may soon become the second European country to ratify, and eighth overall, having indicated this intention at its recent appearance before the Universal Periodic Review.
When the OP finally becomes operational, it will mark an important milestone in the advancement of economic and social rights. To this end, CESR will continue to collaborate with the NGO Coalition for the Optional Protocol to ICESCR to help narrow the long-standing gap in accountability and justice for economic, social and cultural rights violations.