UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies (TBs) are a central pillar of the international human rights system, essential in their independent, quasi-judicial monitoring of State Parties’ respect for and implementation of ratified UN human rights treaties. National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) function in a similarly independent and quasi-judicial manner and are today recognised as crucial components of a functioning National Human Rights System. The 2020 UN Human Rights TB Review presents an opportunity to analyse current challenges inherent to the domestic institutionalisation processes specific to NHRI engagement, considers variances amongst different TB procedures and develops innovative proposals and solutions. Although exploring the effectiveness of TB–NHRI engagement presents inherent difficulties, this article proposes such evaluation against the backdrop of a goal-based approach to organisational effectiveness. This approach may facilitate the development of a framework for understanding the relations between TBs and key stakeholders, such as NHRIs. In other words, by identifying the key generic goals of these two quasi-judicial bodies – monitoring norm-compliance, regime support, and legitimisation – this paper attempts to systematise the interaction between NHRIs and two specific TBs, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), in view of a possible harmonisation of procedures following the 2020 Review process.
1. Introduction
The UN Human Rights Treaty Body (TB) system affords engagement opportunities to National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) throughout its different procedures.1 However, a clear and systematised approach to such inter-institutional engagement is yet to be implemented. As recently highlighted by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), ‘Committees vary not only in their practices regarding participation by NHRIs, but also in the choice of instrument through which they communicate these practices’.2
It is due to the current Committee-specific approach to engagement with NHRIs that three consecutive Annual Meetings of Chairs of the Treaty Bodies have discussed ways to ensure the implementation of a common TB approach to engagement with NHRIs.3 One useful step to resolve the current procedural dissonance is to anchor TB–NHRI relations within each respective treaty, denoting the peculiar characteristics of each TB-specific framework for NHRI engagement. Furthermore, an investigation into the effectiveness of this important inter-institutional cooperation is of timely relevance as the TB Review 20204 milestone is soon approaching. Discussions on the possible harmonisation of TB–NHRI engagement must take into consideration all available structures and processes, with a view to assess strengths and weaknesses of the current system.
In line with the theme of the Special Issue, this article wishes to highlight two specific aspects of the growing domestic institutionalisation of human rights.
Firstly, a direct representation of the efforts made by TBs to develop guidance aimed at ‘… supporting human rights mainstreaming and action by State actors’.5 Secondly, evidence of international human rights law starting ‘… to prescribe the structures and processes that States should set up domestically in order to implement treaties’.6 However, exploring the effectiveness of such public institutions is no easy task. There is an inherent difficulty in both quantifying public goods which results from TB–NHRI engagement as well as in isolating the effects that external factors might have in the process. The analysis in this article suggests such assessment against the backdrop of a goal-based approach (GBA) to organisational effectiveness, which essentially considers an institution as effective ‘… if it accomplishes its specific aims’.7
This article will be structured as follows. Firstly, it will outline the institutional framework available for NHRI engagement within the TB system, focusing on the specifics of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) under the State Reporting Procedure. For the purposes of this article, ‘institutional framework’ is understood as the system of rules specific to NHRI engagement currently available within TB instruments.
Two main reasons lie behind choosing these specific TBs as case studies. Common to both the CEDAW and CRPD Committees, their main function is that of monitoring State Parties’ implementation of Conventions relating to a specific group in society (not generally applicable treaties). Notwithstanding this similarity of focus, each represents a distinct category of NHRI-engaging TBs, CEDAW coming into force prior to, and CRPD following, the adoption of the United Nations Principles Relating to the Status of National Institutions for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights – commonly known as the Paris Principles.8
As explained by the editors of this Special Issue, the adoption of the Paris Principles during the 1993 Vienna Conference represented ‘… an institutional shift taken by the international human rights regime that began to prescribe for states more specific organisational structures and processes in the domestic setting’.9 The analysis below highlights this shift towards stronger institutionalisation processes, with clear distinctions between pre- and post-1993 human rights treaties, thus underlining the tendency of international actors to prescribe institutional features domestically.
Secondly, it will outline the contours of a Goal Based Approach (GBA) to organisational effectiveness, applying its model to the institutional framework available for NHRI engagement within the specifics of the CEDAW and CRPD Committees. The aim is to test their respective institutional frameworks’ effectiveness when engaging with NHRIs.
A GBA to effectiveness analysis suffers from similar delimitations to those pertaining to what have been defined in existing literature as mandate-based approaches to NHRI effectiveness analysis.10 It is important to acknowledge the inherent limitations of resting the analysis of effectiveness solely on a GBA approach. This article is in fact an integrating part of a larger research project, inclusive of separate impact-based analyses of distinct NHRIs and their engagement with the TB system in their national context.11 However, it is equally important to respond to the main criticism directed to the over-formalistic nature of mandate-based evaluations: that ...
