The implementation of the right to social protection through the adoption of social protection floors 2014, para. 44
Paragraph- Paragraph text
- However, the relationship between instrumentalist arguments of that sort and normative arguments that invoke treaty obligations is a matter of contention in the human rights literature. Human rights purists are reluctant to have much to do with instrumentalist arguments which seek to demonstrate that a pro-human rights policy can bring a pay-off, whether in terms of productivity, efficiency, or even social cohesion. The understandable fear is that in the absence of proof that there will be a pay-off, it might then seem justified and legitimate to reject the rights approach. If such a calculus is unacceptable in relation to torture, why should it be entertained in relation to the right to social protection? However, it is also important to acknowledge that instrumentalist arguments are almost always present, whether the debate is over torture, privacy, freedom of assembly, or the right to food. Politicians and the general public cannot be relied upon simply to do the right thing regardless of perceived costs and benefits and so it is entirely appropriate to reinforce moral or normative positions by arguing that they can also bring pay-offs in other respects. It is as well to remember that the classic arguments on behalf of social security invoked in radically different contexts by Bismarck, Franklin Roosevelt and Beveridge all had ulterior motives of one kind or another.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Means of adoption
- N.A.
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Food & Nutrition
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2014
- Paragraph type
- Other
- Paragraph number
- 44
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