Rights-Based Approaches to International Development

Abstract

“Tt’s a great idea, but how do you do it?” This was a question I heard at least four times from one puzzled conference participant during a presentation on a rights-based approach to development given at the International Civil Society Forum in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The skeptic then continued, “The UN and other development agencies have struggled for years to understand how to actually implement a rights-approach and they have not been able to come up with a model that works.”