On Monday 21 January, Salil Shetty gave a lecture at the Institute entitled “Human Rights: Divided They Fall” to a full auditorium. During his lecture, moderated by Professor Andrew Clapham, the Secretary-General of Amnesty International called for an end to the separation of human rights into different categories and the inclusion of human rights into the Post-2015 Development Agenda, the successor of the Millennium Development goals.

“I believe the artificial disconnect between civil and political rights, on the one hand, and economic, social and cultural rights on the other, has continued for too long,” he said during the lecture. “The separation is neither helpful nor healthy. Indeed, it undermines the implementation of all rights.”

Salil Shetty said that while many constitutions around the world embrace these sets of rights and that courts are more and more willing to adjudicate on them, the world is still a long way off from embodying them in daily practice. “It is time for the United Nations membership and its political bodies to speak not just of the indivisibility of rights, but to make that indivisibility a cornerstone of human rights promotion and protection. I submit that the elaboration of the Post-2015 Development Agenda offers an excellent opportunity to do just that”, he said.

For Mr Shetty, the absence of human rights in the Millennium Development Goals had a negative impact on the debate around human rights. “To inform what we want in a post-2015 development framework, it is essential that we assess the main obstacles to achievement of Millennium Development Goals for all from 2000 to date.” Mr Shetty said that one challenge was that the MDGs were agreed on globally but had to be implemented nationally. Another challenge was that during the process sections of the population that have been traditionally excluded remained excluded because of their gender, ethnicity, religion, disability and social status. The issue of accountability and enforceability was also a major obstacle to the goals, he said.

“Time is running out. But there is still time for one simple and ambitious goal to be achieved – the goal of putting rights back together, which should never have been separated in the first place”, he said in closing.

Read the full speech here.

The event was organised jointly by the Graduate Institute, the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights, and Amnesty International. Andrew Clapham is Professor at the Institute and Director of the Academy.

See more photo's of the event on the Graduate Institute Facebook page.