The Rio+20 conference on Sustainable Development was originally intended to achieve consensus on a framework for sustainable and just global development. As the conference gets underway in the eponymous Brazilian city, the only consensus in evidence is that the international community may once again fail to reach a meaningful agreement, despite the critical importance of the event for current and future generations.
Disagreement between various countries over how the costs of development should be borne, and by whom, has effectively blocked agreement on a plan that can provide for the needs of the current generation, without undermining the ability of future generations to do the same. Against a backdrop of multiple crises, widening inequality and potentially catastrophic environmental degradation, the international community faces a moral and political imperative to find a way past this deadlock. Indeed, as UN Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon recently warned, the world runs the risk of sabotaging its future if it does not rise to the challenge of wresting a meaningful result from the Rio+20 meeting.
The political leaders gathering in Brazil must not only find a way through the obstacles to agreement, but also ensure that the resulting outcome document is grounded in human rights. Past experience has made it abundantly clear that the failure to include human rights norms and principles into international development frameworks can lead to the most fundamental rights of vulnerable groups being undermined rather than promoted. Development-induced pollution of air, soil and water resources all too often leads to people???s rights to health, housing, food, water and even life being put at risk. CESR???s work in countries such as Ecuador has illustrated the devastating impact irresponsible business activities can have on both human rights and the environment. Examples of the human rights infringements stemming from ill-considered development efforts are many. Indigenous peoples??? land rights are often trampled on in the rush to exploit resources, while forced evictions are carried out to clear the ground for infrastructure projects and biofuel production displaces traditional agriculture, thereby threatening the right to food.
The integration of human rights norms and standards into development plans can not only avert such lamentable outcomes, but also ensure that the fruits of development are more fairly distributed while also protecting the environment. Proper participation mechanisms, in accordance with the provisions of international human rights law, can be incorporated into both the design and implementation of development plans and policies so as to ensure these efforts serve to protect and fulfill the rights of ordinary people.
Operationalizing the principles of equality and non-discrimination in development policy can likewise guarantee that economic progress serves to protect vulnerable sectors and diminish the disparities in our society, rather than exacerbate them. Given that rising inequality both within and between countries was one of the key contributory factors to the global economic crisis, the importance of tackling this issue cannot be understated. Entrenched inequality is not only a moral question - it is also represents an economic blight as it manifests in a dearth of opportunities which in turn translates into the wasting of our most valuable resource: people.
In an age when economic crisis is being used as a pretext in many countries to cut the types of social spending needed to meet the Millennium Development Goals, state representatives gathered in Rio should remember that international human rights law mandates them to deploy the maximum of available resources for the fulfillment of economic and social rights. This includes the generation of resources, through progressive taxation and whatever other means may be available, and the fullest possible international cooperation by both donor and recipient states. It is likewise imperative that existing aid promises be fulfilled. Moreover, the standards that form the human rights framework apply to states not only in their domestic policy-making, but also through their international interactions and their membership of international governance institutions.
The strength or weakness of the outcome document emerging from this week???s negotiations in Rio will have a determinative influence on the future course of global development, and thereby on the lives and wellbeing of people everywhere. With the deadline for the MDGs just a few years away, and dialogue on a new set of objectives already in full swing, the Rio +20 summit will also serve as a crucial precursor to further development negotiations at a pivotal moment in our collective evolution. Amidst warnings from a panel of Nobel laureates, ministers and scientists that a business-as-usual approach may ???trigger abrupt and irreversible changes with catastrophic outcomes for human societies and life as we know it,??? settling for a weak or inadequate agreement would amount to a massive abdication of responsibility. It is not only our future, but also that of coming generations, that is at stake.