Aim for human rights develops human rights impact assessment methods and tools to assess the impact of governmental and other policies on human rights. These help to translate human rights norms into practical and workable objectives, and thus contribute directly to the realisation of human rights.

The right to health is a human right. The building of hospitals is one of the aspects that can help realise this right but in order to ensure the availability of adequate healthcare, governments must consider issues such as how they will attract sufficient and qualified staff to run the hospitals, if the hospitals are accessible to all (including people living in remote rural areas), and if everyone can get the medication they require. Furthermore, it is important for the realisation of the right to health that everyone has access to clean water, hygienic sanitation, food, protected homes, safe working conditions and the correct information. Without these the health facilities will have little effect as long as these basic health conditions are not fulfilled. Experience has shown that this is the complex truth.

By formulating practical objectives, all the actors involved can ensure that the right to health can be attained. This however requires action and not only words. Organisations with proposals should have the opportunity to enter a serious debate with government, and policy makers should predict what impact their activities will have concerning the right to health.

The objective of translating human rights norms into practice is to improve policy formation by governments and others. Human rights impact assessment means that the results and impact of policy-related activities are visible and can be tested. This contributes to the realisation of concrete rights for people worldwide. 

There are many organisations and governments around the world who are active in the field of human rights impact assessment. Aim for human rights works together with these to stimulate the development and use of human rights impact assessment processes. This is not a straightforward task as there is no single human rights impact assessment method that is applicable to all situations. Depending on the objective and context of the impact assessment, a specific tool is usually required. Policy makers and others can learn from previous initiatives however, and in order to support this and to promote a deeper understanding of human rights impact assessment, Aim for human rights has developed its Human Rights Impact Resource Centre.

You will find information and material concerning human rights impact assessment methods, as well as practical examples, on our Human Rights Impact Resource Centre (English version) at www.humanrightsimpact.org. For further information on this or any aspect of Aim for human right’s impact assessment work, please contact Baldwin Beenakkers by phone +31 (30) 233 40 27 or by email.