The Right to Development

In the year 2017, the United Nations appointed a special rapporteur on the right to development, the Egyptian diplomat Saad al-Farghari. This comes within the framework of the United Nations efforts to make human development the main goal for it and to work in all parts of the world.

The first document providing for the right to development is the Declaration on the Right to Development (41/128) of 1986, which states:

The right to development is an inalienable human right, under which every human being and all peoples have the right to participate and to contribute to and to enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized.

The human right to development also implies the full realization of the right of peoples to self-determination, which, taking into account the relevant provisions of the International Covenants on Human Rights, includes the exercise of their inalienable right to exercise full sovereignty over all their natural wealth and resources.

Since then, the right to development has been guided by the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development of 1992, the Vienna Declaration and the United Nations Development Plan 2030, as well as in the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, as noted in the Arab Charter on Human Rights Human.

The right to development is often understood as a purely economic process, while the right to development emphasizes the overall economic, social, cultural and political development, and the people, not governments and businessmen, are at the center of their attention.

The right to development also emphasizes the creation of a healthy and healthy global and local environment for the realization of all human rights and public freedoms, for all individuals in all countries, thereby affirming civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights by expanding the choices and welfare of individuals.

Although the Declaration on the Right to Development is not legally binding but its basic principles are enshrined in binding international laws, in the Charter of the United Nations and in other texts and covenants.

The right to development faces many obstacles identified by the Special Rapporteur in three points:

Politicization:
More than 30 years after the adoption of the right to development, countries are still divided in interpreting the concept of right, and there are differences on the relative commitment to development and on development standards and procedures.

Lack of participation:
This is the result of political division and the low level of participation by United Nations agencies in the protection and realization of the right to development.

Negative global trends:
This includes obstacles to the right to development, such as the global financial crisis, the energy crisis and the climate crisis, the growing number of natural disasters, corruption, the privatization of public services and austerity measures.

We would like to point out here that we believe that there are very great challenges that stand in the way of .achieving development in Iraq. One of them is that the right to development is not discussed yet

In addition to many obstacles, the most important corruption, and increase military spending at the expense of spending on projects and development agencies, in addition to mismanagement and the absence of effective and thoughtful development planning.

Wissam Ibrahim Anbar

Executive Manager of Ufuq for Human Development Organization

wissam@ufuqorg.org