Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights in International Law Contemporary Issues and Challenges

Recent years have seen a remarkable expansion in the scale and importance of economic, social, and cultural rights (ESC rights), culminating in the adoption of the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in December 2008. The Protocol gives individuals and groups the ability to bring complaints about rights violations before the UN Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. Against this background, this book focuses on the question of how fundamental socio-economic human rights enshrined in international law are defined, interpreted, understood, and implemented. It assesses how effective efforts to realize ESC rights have been and investigates the contemporary challenges obstructing their protection. It sets out the impact of the global financial crisis and austerity measures, the human rights responsibilities of corporations, and trends in the justiciability of those rights at the national and international level. The interrelationship between ESC rights and other legal regimes such as trade and investment law, environmental law, international criminal law, and international humanitarian law is also thoroughly examined. After an introduction by the editors the book contains seventeen chapters looking at the main questions which shape the progressive realization of ESC rights and their monitoring mechanisms. The authors of the chapters, both scholars and practitioners, adopt interdisciplinary approaches that move beyond traditional analyses of ESC rights. In doing so, they clarify and illuminate multiple aspects of the law by bringing together the different aspects of ESC rights, restating the challenges they face, and assessing the progress that has been made in expanding their adoption.

1 - The Development of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights in International Law
2 - The Sovereign Bond Markets and Socio-Economic Rights: Understanding the Challenge of Austerity
3 - Economic and Social Rights in the 'Great Recession': Towards a Human Rights-Centered Economic Policy in Times of Crisis
4 - Realizing Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights for All
5 - Gender and Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
6 - The Nature and Meaning of 'International Assistance and Cooperation' under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
7 - Corporations and Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
8 - Trade and Investment Agreements: What Role for Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights in International Economic Law?
9 - Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights in the World Trade Organization: Legal Aspects and Practice
10 - From the Other Shore: Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights from an International Environmental Law Perspective
11 - The Relationship between Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and International Humanitarian Law
12 - Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights: International Criminal Law's Blind Spot?
13 - Budget Analysis and Economic and Social Rights
14 - Human Rights Impact Assessments: Emerging Practice and Challenges
15 - Judicial Review in National Courts: Recognition and Responsiveness
16 - The Intersection of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and Civil and Political Rights
17 - Building Bridges: National Human Rights Institutions and Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
18 - Transitional Justice Without Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights?

Eibe Riedel is Emeritus Chair of German and Comparative Public Law and European and International Law at the University of Mannheim, Germany, Swiss Human Rights Chair at the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights, and a member of the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in Geneva. He studied law and theology at King's College London, and law at the University of Kiel. He obtained his Dr. iuris in 1974 and Dr. iur. habil. in 1983. He has been a Professor of Public Law and International Law at the University of Mainz, then at the University of Marburg, then at Mannheim. Prof. Riedel has recently been appointed a Judge at the Hague Court of Arbitration. He is a Director of the Inland Navigation Law Institute, and the Director of the Institute of Medical Law, Bioethics and Public Health. He was Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University of Mannheim from 1996-2000. Dr Gilles Giacca is a Legal Adviser at the International Committee of the Red Cross. He was formerly a Research Fellow at the Law Faculty and Co-ordinator of the Oxford Martin School Human Rights for Future Generations programme. He holds a MA from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (IHEID) in Geneva and a LLM from the University of Essex and holds a PhD in International Law from the University of Geneva and IHEID. Between 2006 and 2012, Gilles Giacca was teaching assistant and then research fellow at the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian and Human Rights Law. Gilles has advised States, international organizations and NGOs on matters of international law. He has also provided training on international law to diplomats and practitioners. His teaching interests include the law of armed conflict and international human rights law. Christophe Golay is Research Fellow and Joint Coordinator of the Project on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights. From 2001 to 2008, he was the Legal Advisor to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food. He teaches courses on ESC rights, the right to food, and human rights and development in different universities. He has published extensively on ESC rights in general and the right to food in particular.