Budgets are where the rubber of international commitment meets the road of government policy. Budget analysis allows advocates to enter complex debates concerning a country’s political economy and analyze budgetary decisions, beginning with country obligations under international and national law. Armed with budget data, human rights researchers can assess governments’ budgetary policies and provide alternatives. Yet, budget analysis is a vastly underutilized tool in human rights circles. As demand for numerical data on human rights continues to rise, practitioners should take budget analysis seriously as a method of confronting governments about their revenue, allocation and spending on human rights-related aspects of their budgets, particularly within the realm of economic and social rights (ESR).
Governments often argue that they are unable to meet their obligations in terms of economic and social rights because they do not have the resources to do so. Yet, as recently articulated in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda issued by the United Nations, millions of dollars that governments could use to address socio-economic disparities are lost through illicit financial flows created through corrupt practices and tax evasion by wealthy individuals. Understanding how budgets operate and what governments prioritize is becoming more necessary to rebut these claims and hold governments accountable.
Understanding how budgets operate and what governments prioritize is becoming more necessary to rebut these claims and hold governments accountable.Budget analysis is not new in the human rights field, of course. It is especially relevant to monitor ESR, which, in terms of the International Covenant on Economic and Social Rights, requires an assessment of whether a government has made attempts to progressively realize its ESR obligations over time, and within its maximum available resources.
