Socio-Economic Rights Project (SERP)
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The Socio-Economic Rights Project , which focuses on the realization of the socio-economic rights of groups and communities living in poverty.
Recent Submissions
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They keep saying, ‘My President, my Emperor, and my All’: Exploring the antidote to the perpetual threat on constitutionalism in Malawi
(Community Law Centre, University of the Western Cape, 2013)Constitutionalism is the liberal democratic value that aims at having a constitutional government whose powers are capable of being effectively limited. A country’s constitution plays the major role in ensuring constitutionalism ... -
Accountability and the right to food: A comparative study of India and South Africa
(Food Security SA Working Paper Series, 2018)It remains a great source of concern that, as richly endowed as the world is, each day millions of people go to sleep hungry and almost 870 million people, particularly in developing countries, are chronically undernourished. ... -
The Right to Primary Education of Children With Disabilities in Malawi: A Diagnosis of the Conceptual Approach and Implementation
(Pretoria University Law Press, 2013)The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which Malawi ratified in August 2009, affirms the recognition that disabled children are entitled to enjoy human rights such as primary education, including ... -
Contribution of the health Ombud to accountability: The life Esidimeni tragedy in South Africa
(Health and Human Rights Journal, 2018)Between October 2015 and June 2016, 1,711 people were relocated from mental health facilities operated by long-term provider Life Esidimeni in the South African province of Gauteng to alternative facilities managed by ... -
Implementing legal accountability to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity in Uganda
(African Human Rights Law Journal, 2018)Accountability is a vital human rights principle to address preventable maternal morbidity and mortality in Uganda. The continuous use of ‘accountability’ as a term without elaborating on it gets in the way of using its ... -
'Jumping the queue', waiting lists and other myths : perceptions and practice around housing demand and allocation in South Africa
(ESR Review : Economic and Social Rights in South Africa, 2014)On 13 and 18 June 2014, the Socio-Economic Rights Project of the Community Law Centre, University of the Western Cape, held roundtable discussions in Cape Town and Johannesburg on housing demand and allocation in South Africa. -
The Constitutional Protection of Those Facing Eviction from “Bad Buildings”
(ESR Review : Economic and Social Rights in South Africa, 2008)The Constitutional Court’s judgment in the Olivia case, handed down on 19 February 2008, represents a victory for the occupiers of “bad-buildings” in the inner city of Johannesburg as well as other poor people facing ... -
Giving effect to the right to adequate housing : the need for a coherent (national) policy on special needs housing : legislationtion and policy review
(ESR Review : Economic and Social Rights in South Africa, 2006)According to the Centre for Housing Rights and Evictions (2006), the right to housing is one of the most widely violated human rights. Over a billion people worldwide have inadequate housing -
Evictions in South Africa during 2014: An analytical narrative
(ESR Review : Economic and Social Rights in South Africa, 2015)The South Africa Constitution and pertinent legislative frameworks recognise the right of access to housing. This right extends to people who live in informal settlements, where they erect shacks and other structures. These ... -
Revisiting the Trips Regime: Rwanda-Canadian ARV Drug Deal Tests the WTO General Council Decision
(African Journal of International and Comparative Law, 2009)On 17 July 2007, the world was awakened to Rwanda's notification of the World Trade Organisation's (WTO) Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) that it plans to import the HIV-drug TriAvir ... -
Limitation of socio-economic rights in the 2010 Kenyan Constitution: a proposal for the adoption of a proportionality approach in the judicial adjudication of socio-economic rights disputes
(Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal, 2013)On 27 August 2010 Kenya adopted a transformative Constitution with the objective of fighting poverty and inequality as well as improving the standards of living of all people in Kenya. One of the mechanisms in the 2010 ... -
Old age pension decision : out of sync with legal developments
(ESR Review : Economic and Social Rights in South Africa, 2010)On 17 March 2010, the North Gauteng High Court finally handed down judgment in the Christian Roberts case, which the Court had heard on 11 and 12 September 2007. It concerns a constitutional challenge to section 10 of the ... -
The Place of the "Minimum Core Approach" in the Realisation of the Entrenched Socio-Economic Rights in the 2010 Kenyan Constitution
(Journal of African Law, 2015)The high levels of poverty, inequality and socio-economic marginalisation that bedevilled Kenya for generations led to a struggle for a new constitutional dispensation, which culminated in the promulgation of a new, ... -
Poverty, women and the human right to water to grow food
(ESR Review, 2014)The global community is united in its commitment to remove the scourge of world poverty. One core factor to achieve this is access to water from which poor people, especially women, draw multiple benefits. Such benefits ... -
Using international human rights law to promote constitutional rights: The (potential) role of the South African parliament
(Law, Democracy & Development, 2011)Parliaments are guardians of human rights due to their role of representing the people in the management of public affairs. The activities of parliaments cover the entire spectrum of human rights and have an immediate ... -
The interrelationship between equality and socio-economic rights under South Africa's transformative constitution
(South African Journal on Human Rights, 2007)This article develops the interrelationship between the equality and socio-economic rights in the Bill of Rights to enhance the responsiveness of our jurisprudence to the mutually reinforcing patterns of poverty and ... -
Implementation of Housing Rights in South Africa: Approaches and strategies
(Journal of Law and Social Policy, 2015)Ensuring access to adequate housing, especially for the poor and disadvantaged in society, including those faced with evictions and displacement, continues to be a global challenge. The situation remains critical in South ... -
Muddying the waters: the Supreme Court of Appeal’s judgment in the Mazibuko case
(ESR Review, 2009)On 25 March 2009, the Supreme Court of Appeal handed down judgment in the Mazibuko case. The case was an appeal against the judgment of the Johannesburg High Court (now the South Gauteng High Court) of 30 April 2008, ... -
Socio-economic gains and losses: The South African Constitutional Court and social change
(Social Change, 2011)The inclusion of socio-economic rights in South Africa’s transformative Constitution, it was felt, would make the Constitution relevant to the majority of South Africans, in particular the previously oppressed. Accordingly, ... -
The constitutional protection of those facing eviction from “bad buildings”
(ESR Review, 2008)The Constitutional Court’s judgment in the Olivia case, handed down on 19 February 2008, represents a victory for the occupiers of “bad buildings” in the inner city of Johannesburg as well as other poor people facing ...