A New Human Rights Council — Real Change or More of the Same?

For starters, the Council’s elections actually had contested seats unlike the procedures followed by its predecessor, the Human Rights Commission. The Commission operated as a sub-organ of the U.N.’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), which in turn was an organ of the U.N. General Assembly. ECOSOC’s 54 members elected the Commission’s members, and they generally did so using a “clean slate” formula. How did this work? Basically, the various U.N. geographic regions would be allocated a certain number of seats, and those regions would nominate only enough states to fill their allotted seats. For example, if Africa was allotted 8 seats on the Commission, only 8 African states would be put before ECOSOC for a membership vote. Two notable exceptions to the clean slate approach were the U.S. objection to Libya’s election to the Commission’s chairmanship in 2003 and the United States’ own failure to secure one of the three “Western European and Others Group” seats in 2001. Overall, however, the system lacked contested elections, and consistently allowed for regional politics to trump an evaluation of a state’s suitability to monitor and comment on human rights conditions

In contrast, the Council will operate as an organ of the U.N. General Assembly, cutting out any role for ECOSOC. A majority of the entire General Assembly determines the Council’s composition. Moreover, although seats are still allocated geographically, there will now be more candidates in each region than seats available. Thus, yesterday witnessed states such as Colombia, Egypt, Greece, Iran, Iraq, and Venezuela lose in their bids to join the Council.

A second sign of optimism lies in the fact that Council members will face some public accountability for their own human rights actions. Under Resolution 60/251, “members elected to the Council shall uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights, shall fully cooperate with the Council and be reviewed under the universal periodic review mechanism during their term of membership.” Thus, states like China and Pakistan have effectively agreed to have their human rights’ records reviewed as part of the cost of Council membership. This is an improvement over the Commission, where states sought membership so that they could effectively block unfavorable reviews of their own practices.

Now, I’m not naïve enough to think that this means China or Cuba will dramatically change their methods of governing as a result of their election to the Council. Nor am I suggesting that the Council will offer a real change over the Commission in terms of halting or minimizing human rights abuses; states are still likely to debate the content of human rights’ obligations, just as they are likely to argue over whether the facts exist to find violations of those human rights on which all agree. But, for the Council to have any success, it needed to improve dramatically over its predecessor. Yesterday’s elections suggest some improvement, but it’s surely not enough. The Council still has very few tools to address the human rights problems that it finds. In theory, it will be able to call public attention to violations through its new universal review mechanism, but the method of review and its frequency remain to be determined by the new Council Members. It is also possible that if a Council member is responsible for “gross and systematic violations,” two-thirds of the General Assembly may vote that member off the Council. I’d be very surprised, however, if these removal provisions are actually put into play with respect to any of the Council’s inaugural members, no matter how poor their human rights record may be. Still, the Council’s first meeting in June will bear watching to see if members will work to avoid the mistakes of their predecessors or if we’re doomed to more of the same.