The crisis in financial markets in 2008 that triggered the most serious economic crisis since the
1930s has been overwhelmingly viewed as a failure of policy and regulation. Yet international
human rights standards and obligations were scarcely mentioned by analysts and policy-makers
as they developed a response. Were human rights not perceived to be relevant? Are advocates of
rights simply not explaining themselves effectively? Where, precisely, are internationally agreed
human rights principles pertinent to economic policy? What should advocates focus on?
This report presents some of the key points, controversies, dilemmas, and possible ways forward that
emerged from a Colloquium, convened in January 2010, which brought together economists, human rights
advocates, development professionals, and social activists to discuss these questions.
The report notes the potential congruence of human rights with approaches in economics that
recognise the state’s central role in underpinning core functions on which societies depend,
especially policies to manage public resources and redistribute wealth.
Since states have a duty to respect, protect and fulfill human rights, it argues that their policies
should: revisit trade-offs in economic policy to ensure they respect rights, regulate markets in a
manner that will protect rights, and, redistribute resources in ways that are equitable and prevent
impoverishment.
The report indicates how human rights advocates might engage more effectively with economic
policy-making and create wider agreement about what human rights can contribute to it. In
particular, it suggests that human rights actors need to reflect on questions of social justice and
structural inequity, and economic theory and policy, while expanding their links and alliances with
economists and experts in monetary and fiscal policy, and with social movements.

Human Rights in the Global Economy - Colloquium report 2010 PDF

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