The adoption of the 2030 Agenda along with the Sustainable Development Goals provide an excellent platform for elevating the Right to Development (RtD) to a higher threshold in policy making and research, and thereby enhancing its impact in development practice. It also presents a significant impetus in terms of operationalizing this right in the implementation of the SDGs, with a view to realizing both the RtD and the SDGs in a mutually reinforcing manner. The RtD can be a guiding force to ensure that SDG implementation is carried out in accordance with human rights obligations, including the RtD.
This 4-week interactive e-learning module is aimed specifically at understanding how the RtD can be operationalized in order to ensure a successful implementation of the SDGs. It is intended to contribute to implementing the SDGs, through specific application of the RtD, especially its international dimensions vis-à-vis SDG 17 and global partnership. The module will be based on, and rigorous in its application of, the text of the UN Declaration on the Right to Development, 1986, and other international human rights instruments as well as on the text of the 2030 Agenda.
The development of this module is a joint and collaborative project between the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the University for Peace (UPEACE), and the United Nations University’s International Institute for Global Health (UNU-IIGH), with contributions from senior academic experts from several regions across the world. The module is guided, coordinated and edited by Dr. Shyami Puvimanasinghe, Human Rights Officer, Right to Development Section at the OHCHR, Geneva; Dr. Mihir Kanade, Director, Human Rights Centre and Head, Department of International Law and Human Rights at UPEACE; and Dr. Obijiofor Aginam, Assistant Director at UNU-IIGH.
The course is based on a dynamic pedagogy including reading materials, video clips, case studies, and interactive webinars with the instructor.
- Teacher: Obijiofor Aginam
- Teacher: Mihir Kanade
This certificate course organised by the Human Rights Centre of the UN-mandated University for Peace introduces participants to Child Rights and Development. The first eighteen years of a child’s life encompass a wide range of capacities and vulnerabilities. ‘Children’ in any society, constitute the most vulnerable group who need a nurturing environment and protection for the full realization of their rights and capabilities. Children are critical agents of change and they are a responsibility of the family, society as much as that of the state. Comprehending the need for a consistent and harmonized approach, international agencies and national governments have developed and implemented a variety of child development and child protection measures.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDGs) envisages a world of universal respect for human rights and human dignity; a world which invests in its children and in which every child grows up free from violence and exploitation; a world in which every woman and girl enjoys full gender equality and all legal, social and economic barriers to their empowerment have been removed. A just, equitable, tolerant, open and socially inclusive world in which, the needs of the most vulnerable are met.
This e-learning course on child rights focuses on child protection issues, which will look closely at the entire gamut of international legal framework on the rights of children and protection of children with a particular focus on child rights violations and remedies globally. The course will explore legal, humanitarian, development and other strategies for understanding and advancing the human rights of children.
- Teacher: Geeta Sekhon
This certificate course introduces learners to the international and regional systems for protection of refugees. Issues concerning international protection of refugees have undergone a sea change from the 1950s when the international instruments for protection of this vulnerable group of persons was first adopted. The contemporary world order poses serious challenges to their protection, beginning with identifying refugees within mixed migratory flows, inadequate national policies by states to protect them, their incompatibilities with international law, the challenges to durable solutions, the role of international organisations like the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), issues of xenophobia and security in host countries amongst various other issues.
This e-learning course is designed to provide a comprehensive picture to participants on what the international system for the protection of refugees is from the international and regional perspective, what are their needs and available legal protections, which are the relevant actors involved in their protection and what are the challenges facing today’s refugees and host countries. The course also analyses the regional systems protection with the help of selected case studies. The course is based on a dynamic pedagogy including reading materials, video clips, case studies, and interactive webinars with the instructor as well as officials of UNHCR.
- Teacher: Mihir Kanade
This certificate course offered by the Human Rights Center of the University for Peace will provide participants with a comprehensive outlook on the interface between business, development, and human rights. Business corporations have always been, some may argue even before the advent of the nation-state system, important drivers of economic growth. At the same time, businesses have also often been accused of engaging in activities which may lead to violations of human rights of different stakeholders. This has enabled strong critiques of their role in the overall development process. This e-learning course will critically examine this business-development-human rights nexus with a particular focus on case studies from around the world. Several questions such as the human rights obligations of businesses, the manner in which human rights are affected by businesses including during armed conflicts, the specific linkages with the right to environment and labour rights and the ever elusive solution for accountability will be examined. We will also look at the idea of corporate social responsibility within the right to development debate. A major part of the course will be devoted to an analysis of the successes and challenges of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, which were endorsed by the Human Rights Council of UN in 2011. Participants will also learn the tools for conducting human rights and stakeholder identification and designing due diligence policies.
- Teacher: Mihir Kanade
Trafficking in Persons (TIP) is a global human rights violation that constitutes a contemporary form of slavery. It has acquired alarming proportions generating profits of billions of dollars annually, an organized trade in which women and girls are particularly vulnerable. This course is designed to introduce participants to the different manifestations of trafficking, and to examine the broad spectrum of issues related to trafficking from an international and regional legal framework perspective. The course is oriented towards a human rights based approach to TIP and the recognition of the trafficked person as a ‘victim of crime’. Special emphasis will be given to developing an understanding of the measures taken to protect human rights of the trafficked persons.
- Teacher: Geeta Sekhon
This course introduces participants to the diverse, yet interlinked, issues related to the trans-boundary movement of people and how this affects human rights. It starts off by exploring the notion of 'forced migration', and distinguishing it from various other notions that are used to refer to the phenomenon of trans-boundary movement of people. In particular, it looks at how different people have different access to other states. Is there a right to be allowed into an other state? If so, under what conditions? The course then moves on to look at the specific regimes protecting, in varying degrees, different groups of vulnerable people. First, it gives an overview of the international law of refugee protection. Second, it looks at how human rights apply, or not, in the case of undocumented migrants. Third, it covers the protection of victims of human trafficking and the policies in place against the smuggling of people. Fourth, it considers whether migrants in general are entitled to enjoy specific social rights. Finally, it takes a closer look at the human rights dimension of border control, in particular in cases where people die in their attempts to reach the countries of their destination.
- Teacher: Juan M. Amaya-Castro
This certificate course offered by the Human Rights Center of the University for Peace introduces participants to the major themes and debates concerning the relationship between human rights and development. The course begins with an examination of the different conceptions of ‘development’, including its evolution in theory, policy and practice, and its linkages with human rights. Participants analyze the human right to development, which treats development itself as a human right and not just a process which leads to improvement in human rights. The doctrinal and policy implications of adopting a ‘human rights-based approach to development’ based on the ‘right to development’, are discussed along with what such approaches mean, and what are the tools to implement them in the field. Participants will also explore the new streams of critique that have enabled a confluence as well as a questioning of the human rights-development linkages. These include a critical analysis of the successes and failures thus far of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals. The role of strategic litigation in the interface between development and human rights is also looked at with the help of case studies from around the world. In the latter part of the course, selected current issues in the human rights-development interface that are salient from a policy perspective will be examined, including the role of trade, finance, investment, development aid, and aid for trade. Finally, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the development and human rights is examined.
The course is designed both as a stand-alone specialized course on the linkages between Development and Human Rights, but also as a foundation course of the Diploma in Sustainable Development and Human Rights.
- Teacher: Mihir Kanade