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« Obama vs. Clinton: distraction from world reality? | Main | ‘Governance Matters’: A new blog on governance at the World Bank »

Human Rights, Aid Effectiveness, and Development: a few findings for debate today, and tomorrow…

By Kaufmann | May 15, 2008

     Today, May 15th, an initiative called Bloggers Unite for Human Rights, was launched. The international NGO on Human Rights, Amnesty International, is partnering with BlogCatalog.com, the bloggers’ social network, so to raise global social awareness on this important issue.  Bloggers around the world are being asked to post about human rights.  Hundreds of postings on this issue entered the blogosphere over the past 24 hours alone.

     Let me contribute modestly to this day’s initiative, based on some research we have carried out on the link between Human Rights and Development.  Let me keep some perspective, though, and not focus just on research today: first I should highlight the concrete priority of saving countless lives in places like Burma (Myanmar), where assistance to the desperately needy is being hampered by an unresponsive regime there, and by the timid response so far by other governments in the (ASEAN) region.  Such human tragedy, unravelling right now, in real time, offers a poignant illustration of the extent to which respect for Human Rights does matter.  About the last thing the Burmese people need right now is a presentation on ‘research findings’…

     More generally, for initiatives in many other less extreme situations, a global analysis based on data may spur further debate within both the international development and human rights communities — insofar as these findings have implications for development aid effectiveness.  For too long, the question of human rights in development has been inadequately dealt with.  For starters: a decade ago we published research codifying the extent to which aid-financed investment projects in developing countries are more likely to succeed where civil liberties are present (link here). The implications of that finding are quite obvious, yet there has been reticence to discuss, let alone to act on, them.

     More recently we looked at the broader links between civil liberties and political rights, on the one hand, and socio-economic developmental rights and outcomes, on the other. Let me highlight here 4 implications from that work (link here to the background materials):…

     First, success in attaining socio-economic development is dependent in great measure on an environment where there is control of corruption, transparency, and rule of law. These, in turn, depend in part on citizen voice and civil liberties, including women rights and press freedoms. These are important rights on their own, but also they are likely to enhance aid effectiveness.

     Second: it is misplaced to wait for improvements in governance and civil liberties to come about automatically when a country has an income windfall or a major infusion of aid. Good governance is not a “luxury good,” to which a country automatically graduates into when it becomes wealthier. Instead, sustained efforts to improve governance and civil liberties in countries where there are lacking are needed.  They, in turn, would be expected to help improve socio-economic and development rights.

     Third: it is naïve to argue that human rights are enhanced simply because development projects are being funded (and even if effectively implemented).  Traditional public investments – say, roads–, are obviously important when well designed and executed, and may further some socio-economic and development rights.  But the effective design and execution of such investment projects in particular, and more generally the attainment of socio-economic and development objectives, do depend at least in part on political and civil rights.  The latter cannot be ignored. 

     Fourth: The ‘power of data’ needs to be further unleashed in the field of human rights, for research, policy and activism. Insufficient attention has been given to the development of reliable and periodic databases on human rights worldwide, in contrast with other dimensions of governance.  Even though some pioneering efforts to quantitatively rate human rights performance around the world exist by now, much more can be done.

     In closing, let us keep in mind that protection of property rights is the basic tenet anchoring the importance of Rule of Law for development, one that gets enormous attention, and measurement.  Too often it has been politically convenient to narrowly interpret property rights focusing on physical capital.  But human capital, and the protection of human rights, do matter at least as much, and ought not take a backseat in such development quest.

Topics: Aid Effectiveness, Corruption, Measurement Frontiers, Rule of Law, Transparency, Voice and Human Rights | |

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