WELDI’s partners are already doing it: experiences of Saint Denis and Timișoara
All WELDI’s partners have background and some good practices on translating international Human Rights standards into local actions, as two examples presented in the Masterclass demonstrated.
The Mobile maternal and child protection in Seine-Saint-Denis promotes access to the right to health care for pregnant women and children under 6 who live in informal settlements and camps. Due to a high infant mortality rate and vulnerability detected in the informal settlements this outreach service was developed in partnership with organised civil society stakeholders.
The Timișoara House of Youth - UKRKid-Hub is a grass-roots initiative of the Ukrainian refugees community that has the support of the Timișoara local authorities and UNICEF. It promotes the right to education of Ukrainian children and youth by offering space for both online and face-to-face learning in Ukrainian language. At the same time, the House of Youth offers cultural activities to the whole Timișoara youth, including the Ukrainian refugees, so that young people from different backgrounds can meet, be creative together and learn from each other. This illustrates well how protecting fundamental rights of specific groups can benefit the whole society.
Some WELDI partners highlighted the importance of overcoming categories such as “refugee” or “migrant” under the common objective of building a city for all. This perspective does, however, not free cities from their duty of tackling the specific obstacles that some groups face to become a part of this community and to feel safe, protected and welcomed.
Identifying challenges and strategies to overcome them
WELDI partners shared a series of challenges when improving reception and inclusion policies from a human rights perspective. From an organisational point of view, the HRBA is sometimes seen as an additional layer to existing sectoral policies, whose benefit against the time and money invested is contested by some. There is also a lack of knowledge, when actors see Human Rights as “something that is for the United Nations, not for local government”, or are simply unsure about its precise meaning. It does not help either that some national governments are increasingly questioning the Human Rights framework in its entirety or are undermining it in their practice, e.g. with regard to people without papers.
When it comes to strategies for overcoming such challenges, WELDI-partners underlined that first and foremost Human Rights are international and national law, and therefore an obligation and not a matter of goodwill. A second, more pragmatic argument can be that the well-being of the whole community depends on everybody having their rights respected; and that excluding some members of the community from their fundamental rights undermines common goods such as social cohesion. Some WELDI’s partners highlighted the importance of overcoming categories such as “refugee” or “migrant” and stressing the common objective of building a city for all, without losing sight of the specific obstacles that some groups face to become a part of this community and to feel safe, protected and welcomed.
The HRBA as integrated and participatory approach
The HRBA aims to achieve social transformation by collectively addressing the structural causes of problems and turning them into rights that need to be protected. Reflecting their legal duty within the human rights framework, cities are “duty bearers” for protecting human rights, and act together with the relevant “responsibility bearers” (in URBACT terms: stakeholders) that must not violate human rights and support rights holders in claiming their rights. In this way, the HRBA can produce holistic interventions and broaden the scope of strategies required to address each problem (training, program, project, strategic litigation, advocacy at national or international level, awareness raising campaign…). In a continuous dialogue, rights-holders, duty bearers and responsibility bearers) voice their distinct opinions, views and interests and reach a consensus about the direction of policies.
Human Rights-Based approach meets URBACT - action planning from a human rights perspective
What does the HRBA mean concretely for the Integrated Action Plans of WELDI partners? The HRBA is perfectly compatible with URBACT’s integrated approach and results framework for action-planning - it just puts Human Rights at the centre stage. The human rights perspective advocates for an transversal approach acting across sectors and levels of government - an integrated approach, in URBACT language. Applying it means that we should identify challenges through the lens of the human rights violations and the rights holders that are affected and define a better protection of specific rights as objectives that guide the action planning process. The HRBA also puts the rights holders into the foreground and demands their empowerment to claim their rights, instead of seeing them as clients, service users or beneficiaries. The HRBA can also be seen as a reminder to do a thorough analysis of the actors that affect human rights, and to make a serious effort to engage all employers, housing providers and other actors whose cooperation is needed to ensure that human rights of newcomers are respected.