The
right to adequate housing is a human right that is laid
down in international human rights instruments like covenants,
conventions, declarations and recommendations. The difference
between international conventions on the one hand and declarations,
recommendations and resolutions on the other hand is explained
below.
Covenants
and Conventions
are legally binding treaties for the countries that have
signed and ratified them. Ratification means that
after representatives of a country have signed a treaty
this signature is approved by the head of state or government
of that country. In a treaty it will be stated if ratification
is necessary or not.
Covenants and Conventions can be bilateral (between two
countries) or multilateral (between more than two countries).
If done under the auspices of the United Nations, covenants
and conventions are first adopted (by resolution) by the
General Assembly and then opened for both signature and
ratification. All treaties entered into by member states
to the UN are registered with the UN secretariat. An updated
list of which countries are member to which treaties can
be found under http://www.unhchr.ch/html/intlinst.htm
Declarations
and Recommendations are generally documents
of intent, and in most cases do not create legally binding
obligations on the countries which have signed them. Declarations
and recommendations cannot be ratified. In some instances,
a declaration and/or recommendation may gain the force of
binding law if its contents are widely accepted by the international
community. It then achieves the status of customary international
law. The Universal Declaration on Human Rights is an example
of a Declaration that has gained the force of binding law.
Resolutions
are documents without legally binding force (except
for the resolutions of the UN Security Council), and cannot
be signed by states. As they are usually issued by UN bodies,
they can however carry considerable weight and often are
much more detailed about one particular subject than other
international instruments.
Under
some well known Conventions, Committees have been established
that oversee how states who are party to such a Convention
implement the rights and obligations in it on their national
level. Furthermore, these Committees provide explanations
as to what the human rights mentioned in such a Convention
actually mean. One of these Committees is the Committee
on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights, which was established under the 1966
International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights. This Committee has issued explanatory texts (which
are called General Comments), for example on the right to
adequate housing. In one of
these General Comments, which is also listed below
under Other relevant documents, the Committee elaborates
on what the right to adequate housing actually means and
what states need to do to fulfill the progressive realization
of this human right. The General Comment on the right to
adequate housing shows that security of tenure is
one of many components of the right to adequate housing.
Security of tenure is not mentioned as such in most international
instruments but falls under the right to adequate housing.
The
list below shows in which international instruments the
right to adequate housing is laid down. To read the full
text of a convention, declaration, resolution or other document
it is enough to click on the word convention or declaration
etcetera and follow the link. Otherwise just click on the
specific article to open that particular text.
The list may not be exhaustive. Updating and correction
is still on-going, so if you know of any other international
and/or regional instrument in which the right to adequate
housing is mentioned, please let us know. For already listed
documents that we could not find a link to in the Internet,
please let us know if you found such a link, or if you have
the electronic version of any absent text, by clicking
here
Legal
sources of the right to adequate housing
Conventions:
Declarations:
Regional
instruments:
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African
Charter on Human and Peoples Rights (1981): Articles
14 and 21(2)
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UN Resolutions:
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UN
General Assembly
- The Realization of the Right to Adequate
Housing: Resolutions 41/146
(1986) and 42/146 (1987)
- Global Strategy for Shelter to the Year 2000:
Resolution 43/181
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Economic
and Social Council (ECOSOC)
- The Realization of the Right to Adequate
Housing: Resolution
1987/62 (1987)
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UN
Commission on Human Rights
- Forced Evictions: Resolution 1993/77
- The Right to Adequate Housing: Resolutions
1986/36, 1987/22 and 1988/24
- Promoting the realization of the right to adequate
housing: Resolution 1994/8
Resolution 1994/14
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UN
Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination
and the Protection of Minorities
-
Forced Evictions:
Resolution 1991/12, Resolution 1993/41,
Resolution 1994/39 , Resolution
1996/27
- The right to adequate housing: Resolution
1993/15 , Resolution 1994/20,
Resolution 1995/12
- Promoting the Realization of the Right to Adequate
Housing: Resolution 1991/26, Resolution 1992/26,
Resolution 1993/36, Resolution 1994/38
, Resolution 1995/27
and Resolution 1995/19
- Women and the Right to Adequate Housing and to
Land and Property: Resolution
1997/19 and Resolution 1998/15
- Children and the Right to Adequate Housing: Resolution
1994/8
- Housing
and property restitution in the context of the return
of refugees and internally displaced persons: Resolution
1998/26
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UN
Commission on the Status of Women
- Human Rights and Land Rights Discrimination:
Resolution 42/1 (1998)
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Other
relevant documents:
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Committee
on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights:
- The Right to Adequate Housing:
General
Comment No. 4
- Forced Evictions:
General
Comment No. 7
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Committee
on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women,
- General Recommendation No. 21, 13th session,
1994;
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Global
Strategy for Shelter to the Year 2000, Point 13, 1988;
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Agenda 21:
Chapter 7.6, 7.9(b), 7.9(c) and 7.30(f)
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Beijing
Platform of Action, Fourth World Conference on Women:
A/Conf.177/20, 17/10/1995
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Habitat Agenda: Paragraphs 8,
26, 39,
60 and
61
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UN-HABITAT: Strategic
Vision and Work
Programme 2000-2001
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- United
Nations Development programme (UNDP), Human Development
Report. (Oxford University Press, 1999) [Back]
- Global
Environment Outlook 2000, UNEP, (Earthscan, London,
1999), pg 11[Back]
- International
Federation of Red Cross and red Crescent Societies, World
Disasters Report 1999, pg. 7 [Back]
- GEO
2000, op cit. [Back]
- These
points are elaborated in the UNDP's 1997 Human Development
Report, Human Development to Eradicate Poverty [Back]
- This
legal framework is taken to include both customary and
statutory systems [Back]
- Report
of the Executive Director: A Strategic Vision for Habitat,
HS/C/17/2/Add.2 [Back]
- Habitat
Agenda, Paragraph 61 [Back]
- Commission
on Human Rights Resolution 1993/77. Also, see Agenda 21
(Paras 7.6 and 7.9 (b)) [Back]
- Habitat
Agenda. Chapter III: Commitments. Section A: Adequate
Shelter for All, Para 40 (n) [Back]
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