Exploring Human Rights in Development - A Rights-Based Analysis of the EU's Development Strategies

There is constant dispute on how ? and even if ? development policy should be formulated and implemented. This thesis focuses on the approach called the rights-based approach to development (RBA).. The aim is to explore the theoretical framework on RBA in order to understand the relationship and tension between human rights and development. Central themes of the RBA will then be applied to the EU's development strategies. The EU is one of the most important development actors in the world and its policies have huge impact on third countries. The importance of a coherent approach to human rights and development can thus not be stressed enough. Compared to development actors like the World Bank, the EU makes frequent and explicit reference to human rights in the development strategies in question. However, this is not accompanied by a deeper rights-based presentation of development objectives in terms of claims for identified rights-holders. The thesis concludes that the EU's approach to human rights in development is incoherent and confused. This does not imply that the EU's human rights incorporation is meaningless, but rather that it does not fulfil the criteria of a rights-based approach to development