The failure to respect, protect, or fulfill human rights is a fundamental and leading obstacle to economic development and social justice. Practically speaking, however, organisations are still struggling to understand what this major organisational shift means. The term ‘rights-based approaches’ (RBAs) has become so familiar that we tend to assume that it is well-understood and that it is a foregone conclusion that human rights-based approaches offer more potential for sustainable impact. This report presents the findings of a collaborative Learning Project between CARE USA and Oxfam America, which compared RBA projects with non-RBA projects and identified ‘best practices’ and lessons that could be used to improve the application of rights-based approaches in programming. In doing this they confirmed that rights-based approaches strengthen development work. For field-based staff, partners, and other development practitioners working on the design and implementation of rights-based projects. Includes case studies from Bangladesh, Ethiopia, and Guatemala.
