Today in The Geneva Observer, we put our primary focus on migration as Amy Pope, the first woman ever to lead the International Organization for Migration (IOM), started her job last Monday, October 1. As you will read in “Amy Pope, unfiltered,” her plan for the IOM is bold and ambitious, and the hyperactive new DG is determined to hit the ground running. As the EU finds itself once again urgently grappling with the immensely divisive issue of migration, Amy Pope offers a radical break with the prevailing narrative in the Global North. While not dismissing the challenges ahead, she vehemently rejects the notion that migration poses a threat to our societies: “The evidence is overwhelming that migration actually benefits economies. When you look at economies that have had a significant influx of migrants over the years, we see that people tend to be better off as a result of migration, whether it's because it's fueling innovation or it's fueling labor supply,” she told reporters in Geneva, during a lengthy exchange in which she expressed her vision and the priorities of her five-year term at the helm of the organization.  

Amy Pope, IOM’s new DG: “Ultimately, our number one goal is to really harness the benefits and the promise of migration.”

Against the backdrop of Europe and the Americas struggling once again to manage an unprecedented surge in migration, the new Director General of the International Organization for Migration (IOM)—the first woman ever to lead the organization—met the UN Geneva Press Corps on Tuesday, her second day on the job. Here, slightly edited for clarity and brevity, are excerpts of her opening statement and answers, in the order they were addressed.

-PHM

“I'm taking the helm of IOM at a moment of unprecedented movement around the world. I was recently in the eastern Horn of Africa, where we are seeing hundreds of thousands of people on the move, most recently as a result of drought. I've been spending quite a lot of time engaging with our member governments in Latin America, where millions of people continue to be on the move. Just last week, I met with a number of experts in Asian migration, who tell us the same thing. Whether it's because of climate change, conflict, the inability to find a job or a future at home, or violence within neighborhoods or communities, more and more people are looking to find a better life somewhere else in the world. That's where IOM comes in. We provide humanitarian assistance, we provide development support, and we work in the context of peace, finding peace, and post-conflict societies. But ultimately, our number one goal is to really harness the benefits and the promise of migration. And it's my belief that when we work together with communities, when we work together with governments, we can start to build out ways to find opportunities for people who are on the move, rather than just treating the issue as a problem to be solved. Now, that's not easy work. It requires engagement from our Member States, but it also requires the engagement of partners from different sectors of society. Much more work can be done with the private sector, and with with civil society. It means building an ecosystem where vulnerable people on the move can find opportunities, and the communities which they ultimately [settle in] can benefit from the migrants who land there. So there is plenty of work to do, and I'm tremendously excited to be doing it.”

On how to change the narrative so migration is not seen as a problem but as an opportunity 

“It starts by making sure that we are in a dialogue with the people whose communities are impacted by migration and with the migrants themselves. The evidence is fairly overwhelming that migration actually benefits economies. And when you look at economies that have had a significant influx of migrants over the years, if you look at how they're performing [subsequently], we see overwhelmingly that people tend to be better off as a result of migration, whether it's because it's fueling innovation, fueling labor supply, or fueling the renovation or revitalization of aging communities. Migration overall is a benefit.

“We need to engage with the communities that are seeing what works. For example, we've heard from mayors around the world where migration is very much needed and valued. So there are opportunities to partner with those mayors. We hear from civil society [and] from the private sector—globally, but especially in Europe and North America—that they are desperate for migration in order to meet their own labor market needs and in order to continue to fuel innovation within their own companies. And as a result, that creates additional jobs and additional economic benefits. It's critical that IOM begins to engage these partners who recognize the benefits of migration, and demonstrate to our member states how that can work, in a very pragmatic way, rather than in a political way.” 

On the situation across the Americas

“The situation across the Americas is one that we haven't seen in the past in terms of people on the move. Also, the profile of people on the move has evolved considerably. There are, of course, a number of Venezuelans who continue to move—some who had been previously settled in a neighboring country, but are now choosing to move north. But we're seeing people from all over the world show up and try to cross the Darién [the Darién Gap, or Isthmus, separating North and South America] these days. And there are a couple of factors that this really brings out for all of us who work in this space. Number one is that there are simply not enough regular pathways for people who are desperate. But what we hear over and over again is that people are leaving because they have no hope at home. Sometimes it's economic, they have no opportunity to find a job; sometimes they're fleeing xenophobia; sometimes they're fleeing conflict or violence; sometimes they're fleeing persecution. But for most of these people, they do not have another alternative. So one of my priorities coming into the job is to really focus on how do we build out more regular pathways for people who cannot stay at home for whatever reason. Right now, when we look at the opportunities that exist, most people are searching out asylum pathways, and so they're crossing the Darién because they look to present themselves at a border to seek asylum at that border. In many of those cases, the people who are seeking asylum will not qualify for asylum, but they see it as the only open pathway for them. That, to me, says that we need to build out more regular pathways, whether they are labor pathways, humanitarian or family reunification pathways. But the second priority is that we need to recognize what is fueling the migration in the first place and continue the assistance that is targeted at stabilizing communities that would otherwise be on the move.”

On climate change and the use of data in migration

“We hear in the technology space that there’s an overwhelming need for new ideas for people to create a sustainable workforce. Migration is our most obvious way to build out a sustainable workforce. It means investing in skills training, to have sufficient numbers of people globally who can do the work. We know that climate change is going to deprive people of their economic livelihoods in many cases, through drought or desertification. I think it's our challenge and our opportunity to engage with those communities to help them develop the skillsets of the future. [This is] where data can be really helpful, [using] the datasets that exist to anticipate where communities are going to be displaced as a result of something like climate change. And before we see millions of people on the move, [we need to] start to engage, either in interventions to help stabilize the community or, in some cases, interventions so people will have the skillset they need to get jobs in other sectors. But ultimately, when we look at the confluence of demographic changes, and we look at the impact of climate, we know that we'll have to have a new way of responding to the movement of people—and data will be at the center of doing that successfully.”

On a new EU migration deal and rescues at sea

“On search and rescue, in particular, as an organization, our biggest concern is that the deaths in the Mediterranean have been normalized and that people take for granted that this is just a cost of human movement. Our first concern is changing the expectation, changing the narrative, and really humanizing the people we're talking about. These are people first, before we label them as migrants. It is an important moment to recognize and recall that ultimately, this isn't about a problem. It’s about people. But it also comes down to the fact that when we see people getting on a boat to come across the Mediterranean, it means that there have been several opportunities to engage where the international community has failed to stabilize or provide sufficient support for communities who are extremely vulnerable, starting first with where the migrants are coming from, recognizing what is happening at home that is causing them to move and building out better solutions for them in partnership. So our goal should be increasingly to build out regular realistic pathways for people, recognizing that there are job opportunities, whether it's high skill or low skill. This is where the EU leadership is especially needed, and where we've seen very important developments. But we need to recognize that if we're really going to stop people crossing the Mediterranean on rickety boats, and dying as they do so, we need to approach the situation far more comprehensively.” 

On migrants in Africa and in the Gulf states

Starting with my first trip, I’ll be traveling on Monday (October 9) to Addis Ababa to meet with the African Union Commission. The purpose of going to the African Union so early is to recognize that when we talk about migration, over 80% of migration takes place in Africa. Our job as a UN organization is not to focus just on South-to-North migration, which I know occupies a lot of the political and print space. In Africa, we can see that there are many migrants who are heading on pathways into the Gulf, and of course, there have been very troubling reports about the treatment of migrants who are coming back from [the region]. We need to ensure that there is better protection and access to services for migrants.”

On Libya 

“I would say a lot of times we focus the conversation on Libya, or we focus the conversation on Tunisia. But in reality, not everyone leaving Libya is a Libyan national. We are seeing migrants from all over the world leave from Libya. For me, that's why it's absolutely critical that we start the conversation in terms of where people are coming from, and what’s driving them, and how do we come up with a much more pragmatic, humane way for people to move [rather than] just trying to deal with migration at the shores of Libya or Tunisia. Not only is it extremely expensive, and extremely complicated, but you lose an awful lot of human life along the way.”

On the debate about the 1951 Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights

“In the aftermath of World War II, collectively, we developed a system for the resettlement of the most at-risk people who had been displaced, resulting in the 1951 convention. At that time, many people were on the move because they had been subjected to persecution as a result of their particular social characteristics, their religion, their race, or their sexual orientation. Increasingly, we're seeing numbers of people who are on the move for a whole host of different reasons. So in my view, it's important that as an organization we work with Member States to build out other pathways. It's about protecting the 1951 Convention and protecting the rights of people who have been outlined in that protection in that convention. But if we're going to ensure that persons who are described in that convention have timely adjudication and access to those rights, it's absolutely critical that we build out pathways for people who cannot stay at home or do not have opportunities at home, whether that's through development assistance, through private sector investment and engagement, or through the creation of other pathways for migrants. It's critical that we start to think about the issue much more comprehensively in order to ultimately protect what Member States put into place after World War II.”

If French academic and migration expert Antoine Pécoud shares the conviction that migration represents an opportunity—one that Europe cannot afford to miss, given its aging demographic make-up—he also believes that a state-centric approach to managing the challenge will not be enough to deliver. “It is an illusion to believe that states can solve the migration problem. They can’t solve it any more than a politician today can claim to be able to solve the unemployment problem. I suspect that even those who claim they can, know it to be untrue,” the Professor of Sociology at Sorbonne University, told me in an interview. “Today’s migration crisis shows that the current migration governance framework is woefully inadequate.” It is time, Pécoud argues, to develop a better understanding of which actors and institutions shape today’s global migration dynamics, if we want to design a better migration governance framework.  This is exactly what the just-published highly comprehensive Research Handbook on the Institutions of Global Migration Governance he co-edited with Hélène Thierry aims to do.

Research Handbook on the Institutions of Global Migration Governance

‘This anthology on the institutions of global migration governance is unprecedented in its scope. The editors have created a one-stop resource for scholars, students, and practitioners.’ – David Scott FitzGerald, University of California, San Diego, US

Edited by Antoine Pécoud, Hélène Thiollet

“Our handbook is not about how migration should be governed or about who governs migration. It takes an empirical look at how migration is governed by many actors and institutions.” Changes, Pécoud and his co-authors say, will come from the bottom-up, not from the top-down. With comprehensive and authoritative chapters on the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Labour Organization (ILO), and IOM, their book should be of particular interest to readers here in Geneva.

Antoine Pécoud: "As the current migrant crisis illustrates, states alone seem unable to solve the problem"

Philippe Mottaz: The EU reached a deal to try to manage a surge of asylum seekers. However, it is once again facing a crisis. What lesson do you draw from the situation? 

Antoine Pécoud: We have seen such a crisis before, and for me, it illustrates that the governance framework for migration is woefully inadequate. Nobody is happy with it, and yet somehow, no one seems to know how to fix it. One of the problems is, of course, that in the Global North the far right and the populists seem to have won the day in saying that migration is a problem, that from the economy and employment to social cohesion and culture, migration is a bad thing. And once you operate within an ideological framework, it is of course very difficult to make the right decisions, because the whole premise is wrong, and you are not able to come up with good policies and with the right governance framework. Another problem is that, overall, the debate is a bit biased, because often people assume that migration can be controlled by states and so politicians run on the claim that “if you put me in power, I’ll solve the problem.” But you wouldn’t believe a politician telling you that he or she could eradicate unemployment. Migration is probably infinitely more complex, and yet people still think governments can solve the problem. 

PHM: Recognizing that states alone can’t solve the migration issue, and that you need international cooperation to tackle the challenge, is exactly why the UN came up with the Global Compact on Migration (GCM) for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration in 2018. Has the GCM failed?

AP: The GCM is still fairly recent, and it will probably take one or two generations before it achieves its goals. But the key actors behind the Global Compact, such as the International Organization for Migration (IOM), remain fundamentally intergovernmental actors. They may have good intentions, but they will continue to find it very difficult to go beyond a state-centric approach to migration. But I wouldn’t say that the GCM has failed; it is very ambitious and there is simply no way that its objectives could have been met over a period of five years. 

PHM: Instead of a state-centric approach, your handbook advocates a complete redesign of the governance of migration through the inclusion of a great number of different actors. You even argue that states, in some cases, might not need to be as involved in managing migration as they currently are—for instance in making operational decisions that might be best left to other actors. It’s a pretty tall order, isn’t it?

AP: It is, and again I think it will take time. 75 years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we are still struggling to achieve some basic human rights in some parts of the world…

I also believe that the drivers of change will be the people themselves, and that it will come from the bottom. The handbook has chapters on the growing importance of migrant networks, on diaspora groups, on cross-border marriages. All these are very powerful social forces that in the end will transform society, as more and more people, for more and more reasons, will be on the move. That is an opportunity. Europe is experiencing a demographic problem. It must integrate migrants in large numbers if it doesn’t want its economy to shrink dramatically—and as the current crisis illustrates, states seem to be unable to solve the problem.

PHM: Some chapters of the handbook are dedicated to what you call the “usual suspects” of the migration ecosystem: the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the IOM, and the International Labour Organization (ILO), all Geneva-based. One of the chapters describes, for instance, how the ILO was marginalized over the last two or three decades, and how the current debate about revisiting the 1951 Refugee Convention might impact the UNHCR. How do you see this playing out? Will we be witnessing major shifts in significance among these actors? 

AP: I think we will see a new dynamic within and between them. The Refugee Convention was imagined after the Second World War; the transformation of capitalism has impacted the ILO. But they still are extremely relevant and needed. Rich Western states tend to be unsupportive of refugees, but 80% of the world’s refugees are in the Global South, and they are taken care of by the UNHCR. The ILO’s mandate is more relevant than ever because of the globalization of labor, and labor mobility, and the need to protect labor standards. It is a difficult moment for the ILO because it was unfortunately not established as a key actor in migration, and today labor rights are often seen as costs and incompatible with the evolution of global capitalism. And then you have the IOM, which is a very strong agency but does a bit of everything, and has no clear mandate—and, unlike the UNHCR and the ILO, no normative mandate. This explains why it’s often been communicating aggressively, to keep putting itself at the center of the migration picture.

PHM: Going back to your handbook, how would you summarize the conceptual breakthrough that you think it brings to the literature on migration governance? 

AP: We looked at migration and migration governance from a completely new perspective. We're not asking the question “how should migration be governed,” but instead, we’re looking empirically at how migration is actually governed, who are the actors and institutions of all kinds who contribute to shaping migration. We look at the role of non-state actors, at sub- and supranational agencies and institutions, at the private sector, at religious movements, at the unions. And to see if states are still central actors in migration—or if they should be. We try to imagine a governance that, thanks to these new actors, could offer a look at migration that could deemphasize all the traditional questions, such as border and visa issues, residence and work permit issues, when talking about a growing number of “people on the move.”

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Staying with people on the move, while leaders across Europe seemingly compete over who can be toughest on immigration, and with this year's IOM tally of migrant deaths in the central Mediterranean hitting 1,800 by August, another book caught our attention. In The Golden Passport: Global Mobility for Millionaires Kristin Surak investigates the global market for citizenship, examining the wealthy elites who buy passports, the states and brokers who sell them, and the normalization of a once shadowy practice.

State your case, keep pressing for it, and hope you will be heard: that’s what 17 emerging countries—among them Indonesia, Brazil, Malaysia, Mexico, Argentina, Nigeria, and Ghana—have chosen to do, after first complaining to Brussels about a new European regulation they have very serious issues with. They have now decided to bring their grievances to Geneva and the WTO, in the hope of getting a wider audience. The move, Jamil Chade reports, is unlikely to result in the EU amending its legislation. But, his sources tell him, emerging economies are determined to keep pressing for the creation of a more diverse and representative system of global governance—and to do so at the very institutions that they want to reform, including the ones paralyzed.

Green Geopolitics Is Turning Red at the WTO

Accusing the EU of being deaf to their grievances, several emerging countries have decided to escalate their fight against the EU’s new Regulation on Deforestation-Free Products (EUDR). After an unsuccessful attempt to engage with Brussels, they have opted to bring their concerns to the Agriculture Committee of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Irrespective of the merits of the case, the move has all the appearances of yet another clash between emerging and rich economies. 

The row stems from the adoption earlier this year of a new EU regulation which requires EU-based companies to ensure their imports and exports are “deforestation-free” and have not been produced on land deforested after December 31, 2020. The EUDR covers seven agricultural commodities: cattle, cocoa, coffee, palm oil, rubber, soy, and wood. Several derived products, such as chocolate and leather, are also included in the new legislation, which will enter into application in late 2024.

In a submission sent to the EU on September 7, 2023, the governments of Indonesia, Colombia, Malaysia, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Nigeria, Ghana, and a few others expressed their shared concerns that the EUDR is unfair, discriminatory, and possibly counter-productive in advancing sustainable trade. The EUDR, the countries complain, does not take into account local circumstances, national legislations, and certification mechanisms in their respective countries. 

The governments also claim that the new regulation overlooks their efforts to fight deforestation and goes against the principles of common but differentiated responsibilities. The regulation squarely puts the burden of complying with the legislation on companies—which are also requested to guarantee that their supply chains are free from child labor or forced displacement and comply with human and labor rights. The signatory countries consider that, taken as a whole, the EUDR “establishes a unilateral benchmarking system that is inherently discriminatory and punitive, inconsistent with WTO’s obligations.”

“We consider that the legislation, by itself, will bear no positive impact on deforestation rates and may even produce other adverse effects, such as increased poverty, diversion of resources, and hindrance of the attainment of SDGs,” the group of 17 countries asserts. 

The EU, they demand, should acknowledge their efforts to improve sustainability practices and recognize the significant challenges these countries face due to their debt burden, coupled with limited access to financing schemes and new technologies. 

“Smallholders may end up being excluded from international value chains not because they have deforested their land but due to their inability to show compliance with the stringent requirements imposed by the EUDR,” they write. This “would unfairly deprive smallholders of an important source of income and livelihood and even impact their ability to adopt sustainable practices.” 

The démarche to the WTO will, however, have limited impact: the Agriculture Committee can register concerns and force governments to reply, but it cannot take any action. South American diplomatic sources told The G|O that the move is a political gesture aimed at putting pressure on the EU and rallying other countries to their cause.

An alternative course of action would be to bring a formal complaint to the WTO, an option that the 17 signatories of the letter do not entirely rule out. But with the continued paralysis of the Appellate Body, WTO’s supreme trade dispute settlement mechanism, observers say it would be extremely unlikely that the case could be settled. “This is the price poorer countries pay when the multilateral system stops and the mechanisms fail,” one Central American diplomat told me.

The EU imports billions of Euros worth of agricultural commodities and products. Officials from exporting economies accuse the EU of practicing “green colonialism” and of imposing what they say are protectionist measures. 

But European diplomats and trade observers the G|O talked to reject the accusation of protectionism and insist the EUDR was precisely meant to mitigate the negative impact of deforestation, pointing to a large body of research that concludes that regional trade agreements are an increasingly important factor in deforestation and agricultural land expansion. According to a study cited by the European Parliament, “the EU accounts for 10% of global embodied deforestation in consumption, and EU imports account for 36% of global embodied deforestation in world trade.”

However, a WTO study reveals that deforestation is mostly driven by commodity prices. In “Trade and Deforestation: What have we found?” Juan Robalino and Luis Diego Herrera conclude that “deforestation is affected by agricultural output prices. […] If trade liberalization brings local agricultural prices upwards, deforestation will increase. But if trade liberalization leads to local agricultural price reductions, deforestation will decrease,” they contend. For some agricultural trade watchers, raising tariffs on entire categories of commodities is not the solution. A more differentiated approach, they contend, would yield better results without imposing an additional financial burden on emerging economies.

-JC

If you think China is only competing with the West geopolitically, in the South China Sea, and materially, in advanced technology, you are partially mistaken. Beyond geopolitical and material confrontations, an ideological battle dating back to the Cold War is being re-ignited over the universality of human rights and their implementation. Daniel Warner has been looking at a debate about economic, social, and cultural (ESC) rights that has its roots in the initial drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights…

Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights: China Attacks Western Norms as a Cold War Debate Re-ignites in Geneva

If you think China is only competing with the West geopolitically, in the South China Sea, and materially, in advanced technology, you are partially mistaken. As we revealed in last week's Briefing, at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, the Chinese are proposing a resolution to prioritize economic, social, and cultural (ESC) rights ahead of the traditional Western concerns of civil and political rights. Beyond geopolitical and material confrontations, an ideological battle dating back to the Cold War is being re-ignited over the universality of human rights and their implementation.

Western countries concerned about what they see as Beijing’s renewed attempt to curtail the independence of the Office of the UN Human Rights Chief

Our exclusive story today reveals how China is using the moment to try to restrict both the independence and the mandate of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, de facto using the multilateral system itself to hollow it out from within.

THE GENEVA OBSERVERJamil Chade

For the uninitiated in the history of human rights, this may seem like a typical United Nations debate; lots of words with little substance. But as the Canadian scholar and former UN official Robert Cox wrote, “Theory is always for someone and for some purpose.” The Chinese attempt to prioritize ESC rights over civil and political rights is similar to the debates surrounding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the two human rights covenants written at the height of the Cold War. This is as pertinent now as it was then.

The Chinese proposal highlights deep philosophical and cultural biases with political ramifications. If Beijing’s resolution is accepted, it could indicate a re-alignment in priorities around human rights—and also a marker of shifting power relations in the multilateral system.

To set the context of today’s tensions at the Human Rights Council: Following 1945, the ideological struggle between Western liberalism and Soviet communism was simmering. The UDHR was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly on December 10, 1948 (making this year the 75^th anniversary). Created under the leadership of Eleanor Roosevelt, the first chairperson of the UN’s Commission on Human Rights, the final document has a preamble and thirty articles, much of it containing the language of Western liberalism and America’s conception of inalienable rights. However, clear differences between East and West developed during its conception.

The preamble begins: “Whereas the recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world […].” Article 3 states its major premise: “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and the security of person.” Articles 1-21 describe political rights, primarily for individuals, Articles 22 to 27 involve economic, social, and cultural rights: In other words, the first set of rights deal with individuals, the second set of rights concern individuals as social beings

The Soviet Union and seven other countries abstained from supporting the UDHR, although it was non-binding and contained no legal obligations. For Soviet legal theory, the UDHR was “too judicial,” and could infringe on national sovereignty. For the Soviets and their allies, governments were more important than individuals.

The General Assembly asked the Human Rights Commission to prepare a draft covenant on human rights that was to have legal obligations. A single covenant was envisioned, the General Assembly affirming that the two sets of rights were “interconnected and interdependent.” The debate surrounding the inclusion of both sets of rights in one covenant was highly contentious—in an early draft, economic, social, and cultural rights came after political rights, similar to what was in the UDHR.

Finally, after 18 years, two covenants were adopted. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights was adopted in 1966 and entered into force in 1976 after being ratified by a sufficient number of countries. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights was also adopted in 1966 and entered into force in 1976. However, although the two covenants were adopted by the same General Assembly Resolution, the division between them has affected human rights activities ever since. Significantly, the United States signed the Covenant on ESC rights in 1977 but has not ratified it; China signed the Covenant on Civil and Political rights in 1998 but has not ratified it.

Although officially “interconnected and interdependent,” the two sets of rights can be presented as follows: ESC rights require government action; they are resource-intensive, progressive, social, ideologically divisive, non-justiciable, aspirational. Civil and political rights require no government interference; they are cost-free, precise, justiciable, non-ideological, measurable, manageable.

While many scholars have demonstrated the close relationship between the two sets of rights, ESC rights remain essentially secondary in the West and a vestige of the East-West confrontation. They are sometimes called “red” rights.

One outlier in the West’s prioritization of civil and political rights has been Australian Philip Alston, Professor of Law at New York University. The recent UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, in 2020 Alston started his final report with a damning critique of the failure to eliminate extreme poverty: “The world is at an existential crossroads involving a pandemic, a deep economic recession, devastating climate change, extreme inequality, and a movement challenging the prevalence of racism in many countries,” he wrote. “A common thread running through all these challenges and exacerbating their consequences is the dramatic and longstanding neglect of extreme poverty and the systemic downplaying of the problem by many governments, economists, and human rights advocates,” he noted. Long a champion of ESC rights, Alston visited the United States and the United Kingdom during his tenure, harshly criticizing both countries for their inaction to eradicate extreme poverty.

But Alston is an exception that proves the rule when it comes to the West’s prioritizing civil and political rights while de-emphasizing ESC rights. The philosophical and cultural biases between the two sets of rights have remained politically charged since the 1948 debate over the issue of whether there should be one or two covenants. And this is what has come to the fore in the current meeting of the Human Rights Council.

China and Pakistan presented Beijing’s draft resolution to the Council, including a demand that the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights “enhance” its work in the field of economic, social, and cultural rights and calling on the High Commissioner to “set his priorities” on this issue. The draft resolution goes beyond Geneva. It calls on all pertinent UN agencies and regional organizations, as well as civil society, to make the necessary resources available to prioritize ESC rights.

China may get sufficient support among the Council members for its resolution. If they do, it would show a significant change in human rights priorities. Beyond that, it would also show a significant power shift in international relations.

-DW

Updates

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Right to Strike

Speaking of following up, we revealed on September 14 that, supported by 34 governments, the Workers’ Group at the International Labour Organisation is asking the International Court of Justice to rule on the right to strike. The demand is moving forward. According to a note posted on the ILO’s website, the decision on whether or not to go to The Hague will be taken by the ILO’s governing body in November.

Exclusive: Showdown between Workers and Employers at the ILO: Workers and 34 Member States are asking the Governing Body to call upon the International Court of Justice to rule on the right to strike; Employers are accusing the ILO of partiality

Locally international

THE GENEVA OBSERVERPhilippe Mottaz

That’s all from us for today. As always, thank you for reading us, and don’t forget to recommend The G|O to those around you. We’ll be back in your inbox on Sunday with one of our guest essays.

Today's Briefing: Philippe Mottaz - Jamil Chade - Daniel Warner

Editorial assistance: David Jenny

Edited by: Dan Wheeler