This edited collection explores key human rights themes and situates them in the context of developments on the African continent. It examines critical debates in human rights bringing together conceptually and empirically rich contributions from leading thinkers in human rights and African studies. Drawing on scholarly insights from the fields of constitutional law, human rights, development, feminist studies, public health, and media studies, the volume contributes to scholarly debates on constitutionalism, the right to water, securitization of development, environmental and transitional justice, sexual rights, conflict and gender-based violence, the right to development, and China’s deepening role in Africa. Consequently, it makes an important scholarly intervention on timely issues pertaining to the African continent and beyond.

An interpretative history of human rights in Africa, exploring indigenous rights traditions, anti-slavery, anti-colonialism, post-colonial violations and pro-democracy movements.

This book explores the nexus between natural resources ownership and the right to development in Africa. The right to sovereignty over natural resources and the right to development are recognised and protected in an extensive framework of international, regional and domestic instruments. They guarantee people's entitlement to fully and freely utilise their natural resources as a means of subsistence and for economic, social and cultural development. Yet, despite the abundance of natural resources in Africa a majority of the people on the continent remain largely impoverished. This book articulates the central argument that to achieve the right to development in Africa requires appropriate governance of the continent’s natural resources to which the people of Africa are guaranteed sovereign ownership. With case study illustrations from Zimbabwe, Ghana, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, chapters explore the normative measures, specific guarantees and community entitlements to natural resources for the realisation of the right to development. The book will be an invaluable guide to scholars and postgraduate students of Natural Resources, Development and African studies as well as policymakers and practitioners in these areas.

The African human rights system has undergone some remarkable developments since the adoption of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights, the cornerstone of the African human rights system, in June 1981. The year2011 marked the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the African Charter. It also marked 25 years since the African Charter entered into force on 21 October 1986.This book aims to provide reflections on most of the major human rights issues in the past 30 years of the African human rights system in practice and discussion on the future: the African Charter s impact and contribution to the respect, protection and promotion of human rights in Africa; the contemporary challenges faced by the African Human rights system in responding adequately to the demands of rapidly evolving African societies; and how the African human rights system can be strengthened in the future to ensure that the human rights protected in the African Charter, as developed in the jurisprudence of the African Commission since the Commission was inaugurated in 1987, are realised in practice.The chapters in this volume bring together the work of 20 human rights scholars and practitioners, with expertise in human rights in Africa, under the following general themes: rights and duties in the African Charter; rights of the vulnerable under the African system; implementation mechanisms for human rights in Africa; and towards an effective African regional human rights system.

1 The dominant discourse

Within the context of the 2009 Kampala Convention, this book examines how a balance can be struck between the imperative of development projects and the rights of persons likely to be displaced in Africa. Following independence, many African states embarked on large-scale development projects such as dams, urban renewal and extraction of natural resources and have had to grapple with how to protect displaced communities while implementing development projects. These projects were considered a panacea for Africa’s development and the economic interests of the majority were often considered over and above the interests of the minority of people who were displaced by these projects .This book examines how a balance can be struck between the imperative of development and the rights of displaced persons within the context of the African Union Convention on the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (the Kampala Convention). Romola Adeola analyses the obligations that are placed on African states by the Kampala Convention in the context of development-induced displacement. This book will be of interest to scholars of human rights law, forced migration, African Studies and development.

This book is open access under a CC BY-NC 2.5 license. This book offers a devastating look at deeply flawed development processes driven by international finance, African governments and the global consulting industry. It examines major river basin development underway in the semi-arid borderlands of Ethiopia, Kenya and South Sudan and its disastrous human rights consequences for a half-million indigenous people. The volume traces the historical origins of Gibe III megadam construction along the Omo River in Ethiopia—in turn, enabling irrigation for commercial-scale agricultural development and causing radical reduction of downstream Omo and (Kenya's) Lake Turkana waters. Presenting case studies of indigenous Dasanech and northernmost Turkana livelihood systems and Gibe III linked impacts on them, the author predicts agropastoral and fishing economic collapse, region-wide hunger with exposure to disease epidemics, irreversible natural resource destruction and cross-border interethnic armed conflict spilling into South Sudan. The book identifies fundamental failings of government and development bank impact assessments, including their distortion or omission of mandated transboundary assessment, cumulative effects of the Gibe III dam and its linked Ethiopia-Kenya energy transmission 'highway' project, key hydrologic and human ecological characteristics, major earthquake threat in the dam region and widespread expropriation and political repression. Violations of internationally recognized human rights, especially by the Ethiopian government but also the Kenyan government, are extensive and on the increase—with collaboration by the development banks, in breach of their own internal operational procedures. A policy crossroads has now emerged. The author presents the alternative to the present looming catastrophe—consideration of development suspension in order to undertake genuinely independent transboundary assessment and a plan for continued development action within a human rights framework—forging a sustainable future for the indigenous peoples now directly threatened and for their respective eastern Africa states. Claudia Carr’s book is a treasure of detailed information gathered over many years concerning river basin development of the Omo River in Ethiopia and its impact on the peoples of the lower Omo Basin and the Lake Turkana region in Kenya. It contains numerous maps, charts, and photographs not previously available to the public. The book is highly critical of the environmental and human rights implications of the Omo River hydropower projects on both the local ethnic communities in Ethiopia and on the downstream Turkana in Kenya. David Shinn Former Ambassador to Ethiopia and to Burkina Faso Adjust Professor of International Affairs, The George Washington University, Washington D.C.