Economic and Social Rights Post-Graduate Reading Group (ESRG)

The ESRG has been set up to provide post-graduate researchers (PGRs) an informal space to share ideas, readings, and research, as well as learn from one another and advance their skills. With a keen focus on economic and social rights, the Group is designed to provide those working within this field an opportunity to broaden their network and engage with other scholars in the field. The coordinators of the group are currently also active members of the International Association of Constitutional Law (IACL) Research Group on Social Rights.

In addition to pre-existing structural pressures, PGRs across universities have faced a loss of academic community during the pandemic. We felt that there was a need to further grab the opportunities presented by the pandemic and our changing work patterns to open up access to intellectual communities across academic institutions. We are an open group, interested in furthering the field of economic and social rights and democracy. 

Should you wish to join us for engaging and rich discussions on economic and social rights, please email esr.readinggroup@gmail.com with 100 words explaining your interest in the reading group and how you think your participation will benefit you and the reading group.

Structure of sessions

The ESRG holds monthly sessions led by a discussant who presents key ideas from a reading or a set of readings, followed by an informal discussion. Once you have attended one of the sessions, you may also present a paper, chapter, or your own work to the group. 

Co-founders and Co-ordinators of the network 

• Aidan Flegg (University of Glasgow), PhD candidate on minimum core obligations for economic and social rights and human rights budgeting. 

• Gaurav Mukherjee (Central European University), doctoral candidate on complex remedies in social rights litigation aimed at transformative constitutionalism in the so-called Global South.

• Lisa Montel (University of Bristol and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine), PhD candidate on the right to health and breast cancer & Research Associate in law and the creation of healthy urban environments. 

• Luciano Bottini Filho - PhD candidate and Teacher in Law, researching economic and social rights, resource allocation and global health governance (University of Bristol).

Tentative schedule, Summer-Fall 2021

1. June 16: Luciano Bottini Filho, to discuss Octavio Ferraz, 'Health as a Human Right - The Politics and Judicialisation of Health in Brazil'

2. September 2021: Gaurav Mukherjee to discuss Malcolm Langford, ‘Socio-Economic Rights: Between Essentialism and Egalitarianism', in Reidar Maliks Johan Schaffer (eds.) Moral and Political Conceptions of Human Rights implications for Theory and Practice (2017)

3. October 2021: Aidan Flegg to discuss Paul O’Connell, (2011) ‘The Death of Socio-Economic Rights’  74(4) Modern Law Review 532

4. November 2021: Lisa Montel, Text TBD

Digest of Developments in Social Rights (2020-2021)

 

Developments in Courts and News

1. The United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights decided the the case of Rosario Gómez Limón Pardo v Spain on merits. It concerned the unfair eviction of an elderly woman who was not entitled to social housing. The Committee found a violation of the her right to adequate housing (article 11), since the Spanish Court had failed to undertake a proper proportionality assessment that considered the consequences for the author, before ordering the eviction. The Committee also found a violation of the Optional Protocol (article 5), since the State had failed to comply with the interim measures ordered by the Committee. 

2. The CESCR met in October 2020 for its 68th session and deliberated upon general comments relating to land and sustainable development, in addition to a statement about access to vaccines and treatment.

3. Maldives and Cyprus have ratified and signed the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (OP-ICESCR) on 23 Dec 2020 and 29 Jan 2021 respectively. The Optional Protocol now has a total of 46 signatories and 26 parties. Cyprus’ signature marks the first time since 2013 that the OP-ICESCR has been signed by a State. 

4. The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that the penalty imposed by Switzerland on a Romanian woman for begging in public in Geneva breached the European Convention on Human Rights.

5. Over 120 civil society organizations expressed their solidarity with UN Special Rapporteur Leo Heller’s position to denounce privatisation of water.

6. The Supreme Court of India has affirmed the right to reasonable accommodation under the domestic statute and overruled a precedent that denied the same to persons with disability.

7. The Supreme Court of India has stayed the order of the Karnataka High Court that had directed the state to reconstruct the migrant’s huts that were illegally and unjustly demolished during the COVID-19 lockdown.

8. The Madras High Court (India) held that implementation of the directives of the Human Rights Commissions was mandatory on the State Government or Authority. 

New Scholarship

1. The NGO Network on UN Treaty Bodies (TB-Net) launched the 2019 edition of the annual yearbook on the jurisprudence of the UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies. The Yearbook provides a useful summary of important cases from across the Human Rights Treaty Bodies, identifies each treaty body’s central issues of concern, and explores common themes across the system. 

2. The Research Handbook on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as Human Rights was released in October 2020, offering a combination of practitioner and academic perspectives which provide a comprehensive, cutting-edge analysis of economic, social and cultural rights (ESCR). 

3. Gaurav Mukherjee published an article on ‘Democratic experimentalism in comparative constitutional social rights remedies’ in the Milan Law Review (2020).

4. Hart Publishing published an edited volume by Shreya Atrey and Peter Dunne on Intersectionality and Human Rights Law. This collection of essays analyses how diversity in human identity and disadvantage affects the articulation, realisation, violation and enforcement of human rights. 

5. Christoph Sperfeldt and Rachel Hughes have published an article in the Journal of Human Rights Practice on ‘use of project-based organization for truth and justice-seeking in the wake of mass atrocities’.

6. Luke Graham has published an article on the ‘Right to Clothing and Personal Protective Equipment in the Context of COVID-19’ in the International Journal of Human Rights.

7. National Law School of India University, Bangalore has published a special volume on gender based violence in the context of COVID 19.