The Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions: Responding to Complex Global Challenges

Description

What does the right to the continuous improvement of living conditions in Article 11(1) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights really mean and how can it contribute to social change? The book explores how this underdeveloped right can have valuable application in response to global problems of poverty, inequality and climate destruction, through an in-depth consideration of its meaning. The book seeks to interpret and give meaning to the right as a legal standard, giving it practical value for those whose living conditions are inadequate. It locates the right within broader philosophical and political debates, whilst also assessing the challenges to its realisation. It also explores how the right relates to human rights more generally and considers its application to issues of gender, care and the rights of Indigenous peoples. The contributors deeply probe the meaning of ‘living conditions’, suggesting that these are something more than the basic rights to housing, water, food and clothing. The chapters provide a range of doctrinal, historical and philosophical engagements through grounded analysis and imaginative interpretation. With a foreword by Professor Sandra Liebenberg (former Member of the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights), the book includes chapters from renowned and emerging scholars working across disciplines from around the world. Foreword by Sandra Liebenberg Acknowledgements Contents Notes on Contributors 1. Introduction: Situating the Right to Continuous Improvement
of Living Conditions and Considering its Interpretations
and Applications I. Introduction II. Situating the Right III. Organising Themes and Emerging Ideas IV. Unanswered Questions and Future Research Agendas 2. Sources for a Nascent Interpretation of the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions: The Travaux Préparatoires
and the Work of the CESCR I. Introduction II. Sources for Interpreting the Right in International Law III. Conclusion: Toward a Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions 3. Cooperating to Continuously Improve I. Introduction II. The Contentious Duty to Cooperate in ICESCR III. The Practice of Monitoring Cooperation IV. Conclusion: Continuously Improving Cooperation 4. The Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Response to Poverty I. Introduction II. Poverty, Extreme Poverty and Living Conditions III. Poverty Eradication: A Limit on Continuity? IV. Prioritising the Impoverished V. Poverty and the Subject Matter of the Right VI. Poverty Eradication Measures as Improving the Living Conditions of All in Society VII. Conclusion 5. Is Financial Inclusion a Proxy for Continuously Improving Living Conditions? I. Introduction II. Financial Capitalism III. Households' Debt IV. A Typology of Debts V. Household Debt and the Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions VI. Concluding Remarks 6. The Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions
and Progressive Realisation: The Case of the Right to Social
Security in Canada I. Introduction II. Social Rights, Human Needs and the Right to Social Security: Understanding the Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Meta Right III. The Recent Creation and Rapid Transformation of a Canadian Social Protection Regime: Transformative or Regressive? IV. Looking for a Contemporary Reading of Obligations Under the ICESCR: From the Adequate Allocation of Resources to More Resources V. Conclusion 7. Understanding Forgotten Rights I. Introduction II. The Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Forgotten Right III. Overcoming the Challenges Facing the Right to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions IV. Conclusion 8. The Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions and Human Rights of Future Generations – A Circle Impossible to Square? I. Introduction II. The Understanding of the 'Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions' as a Human Right III. Human Rights of Future Generations IV. Tensions between the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions and Human Rights of Future Generations V. Concluding Remarks 9. New Synergies and Possibilities in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights: From Dignified Life to the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions I. Introduction II. Dignified Life as a Departure Point for the Right to Continous Improvement of Living Conditions III. Direct Justiciability of Economic and Social Rights and the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions: Synergies IV. Conclusion 10. (Dis)Continuous Improvement: Canada, Indigenous Peoples,
Lobster and Child Welfare I. Overview II. Case Study No 1 – R v Marshall III. Case Study No 2 – Caring Society ET AL v Attorney General of Canada IV. Conclusion 11. The Work of Living: Social Reproduction and the Right
to the Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions I. Introduction II. Social Reproduction III. Ideas from Recent Manifestoes to inform the Development of the Right IV. Interpreting the ICESCR V. Conclusion: Continuous Improvement and Utopian Process 12. Measure for Measure: The Challenges of Measuring
Continuous Improvement and Lessons from the Sustainable
Development Goals I. Introduction II. Defining Goals and Measuring Progress: The SDGS and the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions III. From Quantity to Quality: The SDGS and the Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions IV. Conclusion 13. Entangled Rights and Reproductive Temporality: Legal Form,
Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions, and
Social Reproduction I. Introduction: On Rights-Work as Legal Reproduction II. Social Reproduction, Materiality and Continuous Time III. The Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Multiple Normative Commitment to Timeliness IV. The Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Collection of Material Resources for Time V. The Right to Continuous Improvement of Living Conditions as a Felt Arrangement of Temporality VI. Conclusion: Entangled Legal Forms Index