1. Human Rights and the Politics of Redistribution Mark Goodale Professor of Cultural and Social Anthropology University of Lausanne Series Editor, Stanford Studies in Human Rights

2. “We have the torch, but don’t have education, health, security, or quality of life” 27-year-old, Maracaju, Brazil

3. Indicators of Global Inequality: (1) Richest 1% of adults owned 40% of global assets in the year 2000 (World Institute for Development Economics Research) (2) Richest 10% of adults accounted for 85% of the world total in (3) Bottom 50% of the world adult population owned 1% of global wealth in (4) In 2013, richest 1% owns 48 % of the global wealth (Oxfam International) (5) In 2014, 85 wealthiest individuals in the world have a combined wealth equal to that of the bottom 50% of the world's population, or about 3.5 billion people (Oxfam International) (6) The 5 wealthiest people in the world have a combined wealth of about 350 billion dollars, more than the GDPs over 150 countries. (7) By 2016, wealthiest 1 percent will own > 50% of the global wealth (Oxfam International).

4. Piketty’s “unified field theory of inequality” (Krugman, 2014)

5. Consequences of long-term global inequality: (1) Health (2) Social and political discord (3) Environmental damage (4) Regional and global conflict: war, chronic instability (5) Institutional weakness (6) Ideological extremism (7) Ideological disenchantment

6. Statement of the problem(s): (1) If global inequality is a fundamental driver of many problems (now and in the future), what are the best responses? (2) Among the different responses, what role does law have to play? (3) Among potential legal responses to the problem of global inequality, what role should rights play? (4) If rights are to play an important role in challenging global inequality, which rights? (civil, political, social, cultural, economic, environmental, indigenous…)

7. Key economic rights, ICESCR: Art. 6: right to work Art
Key economic rights, ICESCR: Art. 6: right to work Art. 7: right to just and favorable conditions of work Art. 8: right to collectivize Art. 9: right to social security and insurance Art. 11: right to “adequate” standard of living (food, clothing, housing, and continuous improvement of living conditions) ** 1936 Soviet Constitution: First fundamental right (Art. 118): right to full employment and payment “in accordance with quantity and quality” Second fundamental right: right to rest and leisure, annual vacations with full pay, provision of “wide network of sanatoria, rest homes and clubs for the accommodation of the working people”

8. Most people in the world “have” economic and social rights, so what’s the problem?

9. Theoretical background: theories of justice for a “postsocialist” age (early 1990s)

10. Nancy Fraser’s attempted synthesis: 1995

11. Other approaches: > Human development /capabilities (Mahbub ul Haq and Amartya Sen) --Human development index (HDI) --United Nations Development Programme --Millennium / Sustainable Development Goals

12. HDI Map, 2015

14. How to explain this startling contrast
How to explain this startling contrast? (1) Simple failure of implementation? law on the books vs. “enjoyment” (2) Does global inequality itself create a double bind? (pressure to adopt rights because of conditions, failure to “enjoy” because of those conditions) (3) Bad faith by countries whose wealth depends on immiseration/exploitation of others? (4) Or is something inadequate with rights as a dominant framework for redistributive change? (If time, South Africa, case of Bolivia) --a right to work is not the same as work --a right to a standard of living is not the same as a standard of living --a right to clean water is not the same as access to clean water

15. In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread (Anatole France, 1894)