The Legal Path to Sustainable Development: Module 2  

Putting People First: The Law and Human Development

 NEW Live session: How can the law ensure the right to health for all?

**25th May 2021: 17.30-19.00 (BST - UK time)**



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  • Pre-reading study time
    2 hours
  • Live session 
    3.5 hours
  • Community of Practice
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Session 1: How can the law ensure the right to health for all?

Goal #3 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) calls on countries to make a committed effort to eradicate disease, strengthen treatment and healthcare, and address new and emerging health issues. In post-colonial societies like South Asia, neoliberalism led to accelerated socio-economic development often at the cost of exacerbated inequalities, particularly in the domain of healthcare. There continue to persist staggering health inequities, particularly in the domain of sexual and reproductive health rights and these have resulted in reduced life-expectancy and high maternal mortality rates. Further the intersection of social structures of caste, class, gender, race and other interwoven systems of power and the interaction of the same with the socio-economic, cultural, and political have raised some serious concerns in the domain of health equity. The present COVID-19 crisis has also pointed to the failures of the neoliberal order that fueled privatization at the cost of disinvestment in essential social services like health and education.

In this course, we will focus on the development of the right to health in India and South Africa, and the underlying causes for the persisting health inequities that continue to plague these societies. Mapping judicial efforts that have been made over the years, such as landmark HIV treatment related cases in both countries, the course will require participants to critically engage with material including laws, policy papers and judicial decisions that have played a significant role in shaping the discourse of the right to health in these countries. This course will also analyse the legislative and advocacy efforts undertaken on a regional, national and international scale, to tackle the inequalities in health. For example, in the past few years, India has seen mobilization on reproductive rights, specifically for the right to abortion. The Centre for Justice, Law and Society (CJLS) has undertaken comprehensive studies and published a number of reports on the legal barriers to abortion access, highlighting challenges due to the pandemic as well as gaps in the legal framework itself.

Course Aims
• To provide participants with an overview of the global health situation (with a focus on the challenges of the global south, especially post-colonial societies)

• To provide participants with an overview of the key legislative and judicial developments related to right to health in India and South Africa

• To ensure participants gain an understanding of the organisations, campaigns and groups are involved in the milieu and how lawyers can advance the agenda towards improving access to health care for all

The course will be conducted as an interactive session and will utilise Zoom breakout rooms and problem-solving group exercises.

MEET THE INSTRUCTOR

Prof. Dipika Jain
Centre for Justice, Law and Society 

Dipika Jain is Professor of Law, Vice Dean (Research), Vice Dean (Clinical Legal Education) and the Director of the Centre for Justice, Law and Society at Jindal Global Law School (JGLS), India. Her research was recently cited by the Supreme Court in the landmark decision of Navtej Johar v. Union of India (2018) In 2018, she was designated as the first Research Associate Professor at JGLS. In 2020, her research was cited in the legislative debate on abortion laws in the Indian Parliament.

She has been published in several prestigious journals, law reviews, and compendia internationally.
She has consulted for the UNDP; Centre for Reproductive Rights (New York); and IPAS Development on Reproductive Justice, Digital Health and Family Law. As the Director of CJLS, she has addressed various barriers in access to justice for marginalized persons. CJLS had crafted policy interventions and advocacy with parliamentarians, legislative and judicial interventions; facilitated consultations with social movements, grassroots movements and civil society; organized workshops on critical pedagogies, and conducted legal empowerment workshops and courses for activists, professionals and students.

Before joining the academia, she was a lawyer with Human Rights Law Network. She conceptualized, managed and coordinated the national programs on legal aid for People Living with HIV/AIDS while specifically leading a large team of lawyers and social workers across several HRLN offices across India. During this time, she worked on precedent setting public interest litigations in the Supreme Court of India including Sampurna Bahrua vs. Union of India (petitioning for the implementation of the Juvenile Justice Act, 2000 in fifteen States in the country. The Act was amended as a result of this petition.) the Right to Food and Access to Antiretroviral Drugs Case.
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SESSION 2: Right to Education: Learning for Development

The session will discuss current context of the right to education, particularly the challenges arising from the increasing involvement of private actors in education.  It will discuss how human rights can help shape concrete solutions, drawing from the recently adopted the Abidjan Principles on the human rights of States obligation to provide public education and regulate private involvement in education, that has become the reference point to implement the right to education.

The course will highlight the lessons from its unique adoption and implementation process and reflect on key elements of content, including some points that are central to contemporary discussions on education, in particular in the COVID-19 context, related to public-private partnerships, regulations, and the right to public education.
MEET THE INSTRUCTOR

Sylvain Aubry
Global Initiative on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

Sylvain Aubry is currently working as a Senior Research and Legal Advisor with the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, where he’s been heading the research and advocacy on human rights and the role of the State in the delivery of public services with the organisation since 2014, focusing in particular on private actors in education. He has coordinated or supported research in 20 countries on this issue, as well as engagement with States, international organisations, and UN mechanisms, and was one of the main drivers of the development of the Abidjan Principles on the right to education.

He has previously carried research, capacity building and advocacy for various organisations, including Amnesty International, the Right to Education Initiative, FIAN International, ActionAid, and ESCR-Net, working on economic, social and cultural rights for the past 10 years. Sylvain holds an LLM in international human rights law from the University of Essex, UK and a Master’s in political sciences and international relations from Sciences Po Aix, France. 
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