This evening, HRI presented a discussion on the role of human rights in sustainable development featuring Jeffrey Sachs and moderated by Human Rights Law Professor Peter Rosenblum. The conversation ranged from an overview of the distinct histories of human rights groups and sustainable development initiatives and their recent convergence to the dangers of downplaying international law and the inadequacies of analyses from a human rights perspective.

The current state of international law was a major focus of the discussion. Sachs began by noting the great number of international agreements and commitments, and lamented the subsequent lack of relevant accomplishment. The focus on the nonexistent follow-ups to these agreements begged the question of how such agreements could be enforced when states are unwilling to cede sovereignty to international organizations, governments, and courts. Sachs argued that domestic law and international law are fundamentally similar with the key difference of scale of enforcement, in which the main problem lay. He bemoaned the danger in drafting so many agreements in which states put such little stock and argued that this dismissive attitude towards international law would ultimately come back to haunt us.

Questions focused on economic analyses of development problems and Sachs accused human rights organizations of failing to consider economics in their arguments, calling the anti-globalization movement “heavily wrong”. While he approved of their moral fervor, he called for that passion to be linked with “good diagnosis” of problems rather than playing the shame game—the potency of which can frequently be useful—merely to reach unspecific and poorly considered ends.

Sachs did acknowledge the importance of a human rights vocabulary in argument and averred that economists’ narrow focus on purchasing power parity in poor countries fails to consider the uselessness of that power if there are no clinics and no water. He argued that any definition of basic human rights must include food, water, shelter, health, and clothes, along with enough purchasing power to lead a life of dignity.

The brief concluding discussion of the genocide in Darfur saw Sachs take a “development approach” and distinguish himself from human rights groups who call for military intervention, claiming that because of the dire poverty in the region, the killings are unsurprising. He instead proposed that the billions of dollars that might be used to send a few thousand troops to the area should instead be put much more efficiently towards development initiatives in the region.