5 October 2011: The UN Human Rights Council’s (HRC) 2011 Social Forum focused on the Right to Development, in commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Declaration on the Right to Development.

At the Forum, held from 3-5 October 2011, in Geneva, Switzerland, presentations were made on topics including: development challenges and futures; legal and social action strategies and right to development; social justice and right to development; innovative approaches to participation and accountability in development; an enabling environment for the right to development; and financing for development.

The Ibon Foundation called for the promotion of a rights-based approach to sustainable development in response to the global economic, social and environmental crises, as the best way to advocate the Right to Development and the Rio principles. Ibon added that the forthcoming UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20) provides an opportunity for promoting such a rights-based approach. According to Ibon, the Right to Development can support one of the UNCSD’s themes – the institutional framework for sustainable development (IFSD), as it provides a normative framework for policy coherence because it expresses all three sustainable development pillars in terms of peoples’ rights and underscores the international community’s duty to protect, respect and fulfill these rights. He underscored that such an IFSD must ensure civil society participation through multi-stakeholder mechanisms.

Speaking at the closing of the forum, the Chairperson-Rapporteur of the Forum, H.E. Mr. Minelik Alemu Getahun, highlighted key points made by participants, including: the urgent need to go beyond theoretical and legalistic debates and to move to practical conclusions to help realize the right to development; the mutually-reinforcing relationship between development and human rights; the mutually reinforcing nature of the right to development and the right to education; the need to ensure the free, active and meaningful participation in the development process, including of indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, women and children; the important role of civil society; the importance of international cooperation; and the need for a fair, ambitious and binding climate change instrument. [Forum Website] [Statements and Presentations]