The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights as a Collective Human Security Resource: Promise, Performance and Prospects

This chapter argues that contrary to the way in which it has been generally imagined in the dominant collective human security literature, the African Commission is by design, and in terms of its institutional practice, an important collective human security resource in Africa. Section 2 of this chapter provides a short background on the African Commission. Section 3 discusses the normative and textual promise that the African Commission shall, through the effective discharge of its broad human rights mandate, serve as an important collective human security resource. Section 4 then systematically considers the institutional practice of the African Commission in this regard, and reaches analytical conclusions as to the quality of its performance. Section 5 examines the African Commission\u27s prospects as a collective human security resource, and makes some recommendations as to what needs to be done to enhance its utility and significance as such a resource. Section 6 summarizes and concludes the chapter