Bård A. Andreassen

What's the Goal? What's the Purpose? Observations on Human Rights Impact Assessment

Human rights indicators and human rights impact assessment have become subjects that attract a wide interest within the human rights community and among donor agencies and development NGOs. This interest has evolved parallel to a growing interest in implementation of human rights projects and in the application of human rights-based approaches to national and international development. The article discusses practices of human rights impact assessment. A particular emphasis is put on the need to focus on how indicators are defined as part of a wider process of defining goals and objectives of human rights change. Organisations are often unclear about their objectives; they tend therefore to have unclear strategies of change that are conducive to international human rights. It is argued that the construction of indicators should be seen as an integral part of defining a viable strategy of human rights change.

Food variety consumption and household food insecurity coping strategies after the 2010 landslide disaster - the case of Uganda.

Objective To evaluate the nutritional situation of the victims of the 2010 landslide disaster in Uganda, food varieties consumed and coping strategies were assessed. Design Cross-sectional. Food variety scores (FVS) were obtained as the total of food items eaten over the last week while an index was based on severity weighting of household food insecurity coping strategies. We included 545 affected and 533 control households. Setting Victims in the affected Bududa district in Eastern Uganda and those victims resettled in the Kiryandongo district, Western Uganda. Results Adjusted for covariates, in Bududa significantly higher mean FVS were observed among: affected than controls; farmers than others; and relief food recipients. Control households scored higher means (se) on severity of coping: 28·6 (1·3) v. 19·2 (1·2; P<0·01). In Kiryandongo, significantly higher FVS were observed among: control households; household heads educated above primary school; those with assets that complement food source; and recipients of relief food. Severity of coping was significantly higher among affected households and non-recipients of relief food. Affected households had a higher likelihood to skip a day without eating a household meal in Bududa (OR=2·31; 95 % CI 1·62, 3·29; P<0·01) and Kiryandongo (OR=1·77; 95 % CI 1·23, 2·57; P<0·01). Conclusions Whereas FVS and severity of coping showed opposite trends in the two districts, resettlement into Kiryandongo led to severe coping experiences. Administrative measures that provide a combination of relief food, social protection and resettlement integration may offset undesirable coping strategies affecting diet.

Household food insecurity and diet diversity after the major 2010 landslide disaster in Eastern Uganda: a cross-sectional survey

In 2010, a landslide in Bududa, Eastern Uganda, killed about 350 people and nearly 1000 affected households were resettled in Kiryandongo, Western Uganda. A cross-sectional survey assessed household food insecurity and diet diversity among 1078 affected and controls. In Bududa, the affected had a lower adjusted mean score of food insecurity than controls – 9·2 (se 0·4) v. 12·3 (se 0·4) (P<0·01) – but higher diet diversity score (DDS) – 7·1 (se 0·1) v. 5·9 (se 0·1) (P<0·01). On controlling for disaster and covariates, recipients of relief food had higher food insecurity – 12·0 (se 0·6) v. 10·4 (se 0·3) (P=0·02) – whereas farmers had higher DDS – 6·6 (se 0·2) v. 5·6 (se 0·3) (P<0·01). Household size increased the likelihood of food insecurity (OR 1·15; 95 % CI 1·00, 1·32; P<0·05) but reduced DDS (OR 0·93; 95 % CI 0·87, <1·00; P=0·04). Low DDS was more likely in disaster affected (OR 4·22; 95 % CI 2·65, 6·72; P<0·01) and farmers (OR 2·52; 95 % CI 1·37, 4·64; P<0·01). In Kiryandongo, affected households had higher food insecurity – 12·3 (se 0·8) v. 2·6 (se 0·8) (P<0·01) – but lower DDS – 5·8 (se 0·3) v. 7·0 (se 0·3) (P=0·02). The latter reduced with increased age (OR 0·99; 95 % CI 0·97, 1·00; P<0·05), lowest education (OR 0·54; 95 % CI 0·31, 0·93; P=0·03), farmers (OR 0·59; 95 % CI 0·35, 0·98; P=0·04) and asset ownership (OR 0·56; 95 % CI 0·39, 0·81; P<0·01). Addressing social protection could mitigate food insecurity.

Human Rights and Development: Putting Power and Politics at the Center

Human rights are not primarily technical-legal issues. While much research and debate has revolved around the legal nature of human rights, comparatively little attention has been offered to their political character. Human rights define basic norms, values and interests in human and social life, but they are, at the same time, always secured or denied in political and social contexts of power, and situations of competition over resources. This article reports on a research project that made detailed empirical analyses of how different forms of power constrain human rights activism in six different countries, and examines the construction of countervailing empowerment to challenge such power structures. It argues that more systematic analytical attention should be paid to power and political analysis of human rights in development contexts.

Perceptions on the right to adequate food after a major landslide disaster: a cross-sectional survey of two districts in Uganda

BackgroundDespite the instruments on the right to adequate food adopted by the United Nations, there exists limited information on how this right is perceived. Following a major 2010 landslide disaster in the Bududa district of Eastern Uganda and the resettlement of some affected households into the Kiryandongo district in Western Uganda, we surveyed both districts to explore perceptions about the right to adequate food among households with different experiences; disaster-affected and controls.MethodsWe deployed qualitative and quantitative techniques to a cross-sectional survey. The index respondent was the head of each randomly selected household from the landslide affected communities and controls from a bordering sub-county. Data was collected by interviews and focus group discussions (FGDs). Structured entries were tested statistically to report associations using Pearson’s Chi-square at the 95% CI. Information from FGDs was transcribed, coded, sequenced and patterned. Findings from both techniques were triangulated to facilitate interpretations.ResultsAnalysis included 1,078 interview entries and 12 FGDs. Significant differences between the affected and control households (P < 0.05) were observed with: age; education level; religious affiliation; existence of assets that complement food source; and having received relief food. Analysis between groups showed differences in responses on: whether everyone has a right to adequate food; who was supposed to supply relief food; whether relief food was adequate; and preferred choice on the means to ensure the right to adequate food. FGDs emphasized that access to land was the most important means to food and income. Affected households desired remedial interventions especially alternative land for livelihood. Despite the provision of adequate relief food being a state’s obligation, there was no opportunity to exercise choice and preference. Comprehension and awareness of accountability and transparency issues was also low.ConclusionThough a significant proportion of participants affirmed they have a right to adequate food, relief food was largely perceived as insufficient. Given the high regard for land as a preferred remedy, a resettlement policy is of the essence to streamline post-landslide displacement and resettlement. Information materials need to be assembled and disseminated to stimulate awareness and debate on the right to adequate food.

Governing the Asian giants: development policy in China and India

In addition to exercising control over large territories, with the two largest populations in the world, China and India share the interesting characteristic of being a developed and developing country at the same time. Both countries are known to have experienced remarkably high and sustained economic growth over the last couple of decades, but high levels of poverty, internal political turmoil, persistent tensions with neighbours and recurrent natural disasters pose numerous challenges of governance in everyday life. In addition, both countries exhibit large regional differences and rising rates of urbanization coupled with increasing rural–urban disparities, which create further challenges in improving educational facilities and providing adequate nutrition and healthcare for the rapidly growing population. On the international arena, the growing middle class in both countries and their increasing purchasing power appear to be the primary force driving the recent shift in the global terms of trade in favour of hard commodities and consequently their high degree of industrialization compared to other developing countries. However, enormous challenges also remain in relation to issues such as the environment and climate change. In recent years, China and India have also marked themselves as major donors to other countries, particularly in Africa. The practice of, and attitudes to, governance in these two countries may therefore, at least in the long run, spread to other parts of the world through this aid channel. Thus, one already notices the fact that Chinese monetary aid is largely tied to the use of Chinese goods and services and requires adherence to the ‘One China’ policy, but is not subject to the ‘good governance’ conditionalities that typically characterize the aid policies of many Western donors. Returning to the domestic scene, the two countries differ considerably in relation to development indicators and democratic governance. China fares better than India on virtually all development indicators today than it did a decade ago, although inequality is rising. But, it is not a democracy. India’s success has primarily been in relation to the resilience of its democracy, which helps to avoid large-scale crises, such as famines, although chronic hunger has consistently been high, with the country topping world hunger charts. With the above in mind, the Human Rights and Extreme Poverty (HUREP) project at the University of Oslo organized two workshops, one in Kolkata in December 2008 and another in Hong Kong in March 2010. We invited authors from India and China to reflect on the

Examination of the roles and capacities of duty bearers responsible for protecting the human rights to adequate food, nutritional health and wellbeing in Ugandan children’s homes

BackgroundThe majority of Ugandan children face vulnerability and malnutrition. As a State Party to international human rights treaties, Uganda has legal obligations of guaranteeing the fundamental rights and the best interest of the nation’s children. Despite being protected under international and national law, Uganda is not providing adequate child protection, including safeguarding children’s food security. Numerous privately owned and unregulated children’s homes face this problem. The overall aim of the study was to examine to what extent children’s homes’ operations are consistent with the right to adequate food, nutritional health and wellbeing of children.MethodsWe performed a qualitative role- and capacity analysis of duty bearers with human rights duties towards children living in children’s homes. We studied three groups of duty bearers: caretakers working in private children’s homes, State actors working in government and its institutions, and non-State actors working in civil society organizations. A human rights based approach guided all aspects of the study. An analysis of the roles, performance and capacities of duty bearers was employed, with individual face-to-face structured qualitative in-depth interviews, self-administered structured questionnaires, and a structured observational study, as well as a desk review of relevant literature.ResultsThe State of Uganda’s efforts to respect and realize its obligations towards children living in children’s homes is inadequate. There are numerous capacity gaps among the duty bearers, and the concepts of human rights and the best interest of the child are not well understood among the duty bearers.ConclusionThe efforts of the State of Uganda to realize its human rights obligations towards children in children’s homes are lacking in important areas. Hence the State does not fulfill its minimum obligations under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to ensure all children freedom from hunger. There is a need for capacity development at all levels in the Ugandan state and the international society to delimit capacity gaps in order to realize these human rights’ obligations.

International Election Observation: Promoting Human Rights-based Governance

On 8 August 2017, Kenya held its General Elections to elect members of the National Assembly, a new President and County Assemblies. According to the Kenyan Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), 25 international teams were registered to observe the elections, joining an estimated 7,000 local (citizen) observers. Assumedly, it was one of the most observed elections in Africa at any given time. Reacting to the conduct of the elections in the following days, all the main international observer groups issued statements commending the people of Kenya for voting peacefully, and the election commission for conducting free and fair elections, and urged the poll losers to follow judicial processes and ensure that disputes over results be handled within the law. As has been well recorded, the losing presidential candidate, Raila Odinga of the National Super Alliance, disputed the announced election victory of the incumbent president Uhuru Kenyatta of the Jubilee Party, and petitioned the Supreme Court with reference to the Constitution’s article 140(1), which regulates the validity of presidential elections. Commenting on this development, the head of The Carter Center’s observation mission and former US Secretary of State, John Kerry, urged the losers in the elections, including Odinga, to accept defeat and referred to his own experience of losing a presidential election (to George W. Bush in the 2004 US presidential election): ‘I know how it feels to lose’, he said, ‘but you have to move on’. This comment, of course, did not go well with Odinga and other ‘losers’. More importantly, the Supreme Court, operating under the Kenyan Constitution of 2010, handled the case within the constitutionally defined time limit of determining the petition (article 140 (2)), and decided on 1 September in favour of the claimant, Raila Odinga. The six-bench of Supreme Court Judges ruled 4–2 to annul the elections and ordered a new vote within 60 days. This was the first time in African history that a presidential election had been annulled and the ruling accepted by both contestants to said ruling (Kenyatta and Odinga). This Special Issue of the Nordic Journal of Human Rights presents a series of articles on international and national/citizen election observations against the backdrop of this Supreme Court ruling. The ruling, indeed, raises important, principled and operational questions about the dilemmas regarding the conduct of international election observations (IEO). Rightly, IEO has grown significantly in frequency, methodological rigour and operational professionalism over the last three decades, and the adoption of the Declaration on Principles for International Election Observations, and the accompanying Code of Conduct for Election Observers adopted by the UN in October 2005, represent an important normative and operational milestone in the professional development of IEO. Further, international election observations and the operationally different, yet related activity of election monitoring are increasingly seen as important human rights-based institutional