Reassessing the Prospects of a Human Rights Safeguard Policy at the World Bank Suzanne Zhou 1. Introduction For much of its history, the World Bank has been criticised for taking an approach to development overly focused on economic growth at the expense of social and environmental concerns, and in particular, for ignoring the human rights impact of its projects. Over the last 20 years, however, it has been increasingly willing to engage with the question of how human rights concerns affect its work, with this engagement intensifying in the last five years with the establishment of the Nordic Trust Fund and a number of World Bank studies in the use of international human rights concepts in Bank policy. Despite these developments, significant legal and institutional obstacles, including the prohibition on political interference in its Articles of Agreement,1 have meant that engagement with human rights at the Bank remains largely ad hoc, informal, and independent of the international law on human rights, a fact that continues to fuel criticism of the Bank.2 A frequent suggestion arising from such criticism is that the Bank should adopt a formal human rights safeguard policy, incorporating norms drawn from international human rights law, for its public sector lending arms, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (‘IBRD’) and the International Development Association (‘IDA’).3 This article examines whether existing social safeguard policies at the World Bank could be subsumed into a comprehensive human rights based safeguard policy of this type, and the possible ways of accommodating such a policy within the constraints set by the Bank’s constitutive documents. It argues that while the Articles of Agreement are no longer seen to automatically exclude all human rights concerns, they continue to constrain the potential form of a human rights safeguard policy. Additionally, institutional obstacles which limit the desirability of adopting a policy and the effectiveness of such a policy if adopted remain. These include concerns over the appropriateness of having the Bank impose human rights conditionalities, internal incentive structures that cause pressure to lend, and the difficulty of enforcing safeguard policies through the Bank’s existing oversight mechanisms. Given these constraints on the potential of a safeguard policy to improve human rights accountability, I advocate for 1 Articles of Agreement of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, opened for signature 27 December 1945, 2 UNTS 134 (entered into force 27 December 1945)(‘IBRD Articles’); Articles of Agreement of the International Development Association, opened for signature 26 January 1960, 439 UNTS 249 (entered into force 24 September 1960)(‘IDA Articles’)(collectively ‘Articles of Agreement’). 2 See, e.g., D. L. Clark, ‘The World Bank and Human Rights: The Need for Greater Accountability’, 5 Harvard Human Rights Journal 205 (2002); R. Ball, ‘“Doing It Quietly”: The World Bank’s Engagement with Human Rights’, 34 Monash University Law Review 331 (2008). 3 For simplicity, this essay will not consider the International Finance Corporation (‘IFC’), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (‘MIGA’), or the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (‘ICSID’). ‘Bank’ will be used hereafter to refer to the IDA and IBRD collectively. -1- a system which incorporates human rights safeguards into evaluations of project effectiveness, accompanied with broader reforms of Bank incentive structures. Such a system would not only work with rather than against the Bank’s institutional limitations, but also make the best opportunity to advance existing Bank initiatives. 2. What Would a Formal Safeguard Policy Add To Existing Bank Practice in Relation to Human Rights? It is perhaps an overstatement to say, as some authors do, that human rights are ‘marginal’ at the World Bank.4 At present, much of the Bank’s work engages human rights, particularly in terms of the obligation to ‘fulfil’ human rights under the tripartite taxonomy of obligations to ‘protect, respect, and fulfil’ human rights. As David Kinley has noted, however, it is difficult to identify with precision what the Bank already does in the area of human rights, because although many of its activities may have an effect on human rights, few of them are couched explicitly in rights language. 5 The Bank’s approach may therefore be better described as ‘doing [human rights] quietly’: 6 while it is broadly accepting of the factual congruence between the goals of human rights and poverty reduction, and of the guidance that principles from human rights may bring to development projects, it stops short of incorporating human rights as legal obligations into its work.7 A number of Bank projects engage human rights related concerns in an indirect manner. The Bank’s official position is that its existing activities, pursued primarily for the goal of poverty reduction, already result in greater fulfilment of human rights, particularly economic and social rights, by providing for the basic needs of those in borrower countries. It also runs a host of programs concerned with the policy climate in the borrower country which can be broadly considered to promote human rights issues. Among these are programs on governance, judicial reform, and anti-corruption; postconflict stability, gender equality, disability, and public health. By and large these programs are expressed in terms of their economic benefit – very few explicitly use the language of human rights, and even fewer specifically acknowledge international human rights law norms, although there are notable exceptions such as a 2004 project to design a human rights law curriculum at the University of Chile Law School.8 Additionally, a number of pilot and ‘learning’ projects have been set up to explore how a more direct adoption of human rights can aid Bank activities. A special trust fund set up in 2006 and operational since 2009 investigates the relevance of human rights to the Bank’s work, 9 and since the early 2000s a number of workshops and official See, e.g., G. Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters in International Institutions: The Marginality of Human Rights at the World Bank’, 103 American Journal of International Law 647, at 648 (2009). 5 D. Kinley, ‘Human Rights and the World Bank: Practice, Politics and Law’ in C. Raj Kumar and D. K. Srivastava (eds), Human Rights and Development: Law, Policy and Governance (2006) 155, at 159. 6 See Ball, supra note 2. 7 See generally S. Mclnerney-Lankford, ‘Human Rights and Development: A Comment on Challenges and Opportunities from a Legal Perspective’ (2009) 1 Journal of Human Rights Practice 51. 8 World Bank, ‘A Women's Human Rights Grant for Chile’ (5 April 2004) 9 World Bank, ‘The Nordic Trust Fund’ (2010) <http://go.worldbank.org/PKPTI6FU40>; Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters’, supra note 4, at 679. 4 -2- pronouncements have broadly supported the use of human rights concepts in the Bank’s development projects.10 Most recently, the Nordic Trust fund has sponsored a study into the adoption of human rights indicators in development. 11 There is therefore broad acceptance of the role that the Bank can play in promoting the values embodied by human rights, even if many of these are more commonly labelled ‘empowerment’, or ‘pro-poor’ polices than ‘rights’ at present.12 However, the Bank takes a more cautious approach to human rights as legal obligations. At present, there is no systematic integration of human rights into Bank policies, despite the increasing recognition of their relevance to the Bank’s work, and the adoption of human rights policies by national development agencies, international development institutions, and even certain private financial institutions.13 The closest analogues the Bank has to a human rights policy are its social safeguard policies, adopted during the 1980s and 1990s after a series of highly criticised projects including the Sardar Sarovar dam. 14 These policies are part of the Bank’s Operations Manual, and consist of Operational Policies (‘OPs’), which constitute a binding set of standards on Bank staff, Bank Procedures (‘BPs’) which provide elaboration and guidance on OPs, and nonbinding memos which provide guidance where no policies exist. 15 Existing safeguard policies provide human rights protection in a limited set of circumstances, by requiring consideration of the effects of Bank-funded projects on indigenous populations, gender and involuntary resettlements, as well as a number of other environmental and social interests.16 Staff who contravene these policies may be the subject of investigations by the Inspection Panel. 17 While these provide valuable protection for groups most vulnerable to adverse effects from Bank projects, particularly in large infrastructure or extractive industries projects,18 they remain ad hoc rather than comprehensive policies, See e.g., Symposium, ‘Human Rights and Development’ 3 Development Outreach 1 (2006). See also J. Wolfensohn, ‘Some Reflections on Human Rights and Development’, in P. Alston and M. Robinson (eds), Human Rights and Development: Towards Mutual Reinforcement (2005) 19. 11 S. McInerney-Lankford and H Sano, Human Rights Indicators in Development: An Introduction (World Bank Study, 2010). 12 See, e.g., IBRD, World Development Report 2006: Equity and Development (2005). 13 See, e.g., United Nations Development Programme, ‘Human Rights in UNDP: Practice Note’ (April 2005); AusAID, ‘Human Rights and Australia’s Aid Program’ (26 August 2010) <http://www.ausaid.gov.au/keyaid/humanrights.cfm>. 14 See B. Morse and T. R. Berger, Sardar Sarovar — Report of the Independent Review (1992). 15 See World Bank, ‘Operational Manual’ (3 September 2010) <http://go.worldbank.org/DZDZ9038D0> 16 The environmental and social safeguard policies are: OP/BP 4.00 (environmental assessment); OP/BP 4.04 (natural habitats); OP/BP 4.09 (pest management); OP/BP 4.10 (indigenous peoples); OP/BP 4.11 (physical cultural resources); OP/BP 4.12 (involuntary resettlement); OP/BP 4.36 (forests); OP/BP 4.37 (safety of dams). Additional OPs/BPs in the manual relevant to human rights include OP 4.20 (gender and development), OP/BP 4.76 (tobacco), and OP/BP 8.00 (rapid response to crises and emergencies). 17 Resolution Establishing the Inspection Panel, IBRD Res 93-10; IDA Res 93-6, [12] (22 September 1993). See also World Bank, Review of the Resolution Establishing the Inspection Panel: 1996 Clarification of Certain Aspects of the Resolution (17 October 1996). 18 See, e.g., the preponderance of infrastructure and extractive industries projects in Inspection Panel, Summary of Inspection Panel Cases (30 June 2007). 10 -3- and potential human rights situations not involving the particular groups named by OPs remain outside their reach.19 The gap between recognition of human rights as values and human rights as legal obligations has driven continuing calls for an international human rights law safeguard policy, 20 couched in similar terms to the current policy relating to environmental assessments, which requires consideration of both a borrowing state’s domestic environmental legislation and its obligations under international environmental law and states that the Bank does not fund projects that contravene such obligations.21 This would add a number of mechanisms which would increase the level of human rights scrutiny given to Bank projects. First, a safeguard policy would allow for the possibility of civil society complaints through the Inspection Panel, which can only consider compliance with operational policies, rather than being a general forum for complaints. 22 Second, such a policy would require staff to evaluate a project’s potential impact on a borrower state’s ability to comply with domestic and international human rights law obligations, and to identify ways in which this impact can be mitigated. While the policies are binding only on staff, in practice they often also form the basis for loan conditions, Country Assistance Strategies, and Poverty Reduction Strategy Plans.23 As a borrower country is also allowed to substitute its own equivalent system for the safeguard policy, 24 a policy would set a minimum level of consideration that must be given to a borrower country’s human rights obligations. Finally, advocates for safeguard policies at the Bank note that such policies would provide clarity for staff on how to balance the potential benefits against the potential adverse effects of a development project. 25 Thus, an effective safeguard policy would improve both the consideration of and accountability for the human rights impacts of the Bank’s operations. 3. Legal Considerations in the Adoption of a Safeguard Policy A number of legal and institutional obstacles, however, constrain the ability of the Bank to adopt comprehensive human rights safeguards. The first of these, and the one that explains the Bank’s persistent reluctance towards human rights, is the mandate of each of the Bank entities. Both the IBRD and the IDA are institutions with limited mandates, set out in their respective Articles of Agreement. While historically, the mandate has been seen to prevent consideration of human rights law, it has increasingly been seen to permit 19 For example, a 2003 study evaluating the operation of Operational Directive 4.20 (now OP 4.10) noted that policies specific to indigenous peoples would in some contexts make unfair distinctions between indigenous populations and other marginalised social groups, such as those subject to caste or class-based discrimination: World Bank Operations Evaluation Department, ‘Implementation of Operational Directive 4.20 on Indigenous Peoples: An Evaluation of Results’ (10 April 2003), at 13. 20 See supra note 2. 21 OP 4.02, supra note 17, at [2]–[3]. 22 Resolution Establishing the Inspection Panel, supra note 17, at [12]. 23 See, e.g., BP 4.12, at [8]–[12]; I. Shihata, ‘Remedies Available to the Bank/IDA under the Loan/Credit Agreements on the Sardar Sarovar Projects’ (16 July 1992) in I. Shihata, The World Bank Legal Papers (2000) 619. 24 OP 4.00, ‘Country Systems Assessment’. 25 G. Sarfaty, ‘The World Bank and the Internalization of Indigenous Rights Norms’, 114 Yale Law Journal 1791 (2005), at1803. -4- a certain level of engagement with human rights by both Bank General Counsel26 and academic commentators.27 A. Legal Framework Three related sets of obligations govern the scope of the Bank’s mandate: the requirement that the Bank’s activities further its purposes, the prohibition on political activities, and the legal obligations on the Bank as a subject of international law. First, the decisions of both institutions must be guided by the purposes in art I of each of their Articles of Agreement. For the IBRD, this includes: assist[ing] in the reconstruction and development of territories of members by facilitating the investment of capital for productive purposes … promot[ing] the long-range balanced growth of international trade and the maintenance of equilibrium in balances of payments by encouraging international investment … thereby assisting in raising productivity, the standard of living and conditions of labor in their territories… [and] conduc[ting] its operations with due regard to the effect of international investment on business conditions in the territories of members. Similarly, the purposes of the IDA are: to promote economic development, increase productivity and thus raise standards of living in the less-developed areas of the world included within the Association's membership, in particular by providing finance to meet their important developmental requirements on terms which are more flexible and bear less heavily on the balance of payments than those of conventional loans, thereby furthering the developmental objectives of the [IBRD]. These establish the primary purpose of the Bank’s public sector lending agencies as that of promoting economic development. This is now primarily framed as a focus on poverty reduction.28 Additionally, each of the institutions is prohibited from considering the ‘political affairs’ of each member. Article IV(10) of the IBRD Articles and art V(6) of the IDA Articles state that each institution and its officers shall not interfere in the political affairs of any member; nor shall they be influenced in their decisions by the political character of the member or members concerned. Only economic considerations shall be relevant to their decisions, and these considerations shall be weighed impartially in order to achieve the purposes stated in [their respective Articles of Agreement]. Taken together, these provisions establish that ‘economic’ considerations may be taken into account, but not ‘political’ ones. See, e.g., R. Dañino, ‘Legal Opinion on Human Rights and the Work of the World Bank’ (27 January 2006); A. Palacio, ‘The Way Forward: Human Rights and the World Bank’, 3 Development Outreach 35 (2006); I. Shihata, ‘Prohibition of Political Activities in the Bank’s Work’ (11 July 1995), in The World Bank Legal Papers, supra note 23, 219. 27 See, e.g., S. Skogly, The Human Rights Obligations of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (2001); M. Darrow, Between Light and Shadow: The World Bank, The International Monetary Fund, and International Human Rights Law (2003); B. Ghazi, The IMF, The World Bank Group, and the Question of Human Rights (2005). 28 See, e.g., OP 1.00. 26 -5- B. The Bank’s Evolving Interpretation of Its Mandate Exactly what constitutes an ‘economic’ or a ‘political’ matter has evolved considerably since these Articles were adopted, in part because of the Bank’s evolving understanding of development. Early interpretations took a narrow view of the Bank’s permissible activities, with the most notorious example of this interpretation being the Bank’s behaviour during the South African loan controversy, where the Bank refused to cease loans to South Africa and Portugal despite recommendations by the General Assembly to impose sanctions on both regimes for their apartheid policies.29 This interpretation did not entirely prevent ad hoc suspension of loans based on political events, usually construed legally as an intervening event which frustrated performance of the loan agreement. 30 Nevertheless, the general approach was to construe the mandate as prohibiting a broad range of activities. While these are primarily examples of conditionality rather than safeguard policies, they do show the Bank’s then-rejection of responsibility for human rights obligations, consistent with its understanding of its mandate as being focused on economic growth, rather than its current wider focus on human development.31 Evolution in the understanding of development economics, particularly in the reconstruction of poverty as ‘capability deprivation’32 and the increasing attention paid to the relevance of institutions and governance in economic growth 33 meant that this mandate began to widen in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In 1990, an influential opinion by then-General Counsel Ibrahim Shihata on governance paved the way for an expansion of the Bank’s activities away from infrastructure projects and toward a variety of reform projects in the borrower country. 34 Shihata argued that political activities which had economic effects, or which constituted binding obligations under the Charter of the United Nations (such as embargos imposed under Security Council resolutions), could be taken into account, as long as the Bank avoided interfering in partisan politics and did not seek to influence the borrower country’s political character.35 This allowed for a variety of civil service and legal reforms that could improve the investment climate in the borrower country.36 A 1998 opinion on the scope of the political prohibition went slightly further, acknowledging that the Bank played an important role in promoting economic, social and cultural rights, but limiting involvement in ‘political’ rights to those of ‘pervasive proportions’, or where freedoms of speech and assembly were necessary to ensure that participation requirements in Bank environmental assessments could be met.37 While Shihata’s opinions were cautious about the Bank’s role in relation to human rights, 29 See Memorandum of the Legal Department of the IBRD, A/6825 (5 May 1967) Annex II, 9. See, e.g., I. Shihata, ‘Effect of Security Council Decisions on Bank Operations — The Case of Yugoslavia’ (2 June 1992). 31 See Skogly, supra note 27, at 17–19. 32 See generally A. Sen, Development as Freedom (1999). 33 See, e.g., IBRD, Sub-Saharan Africa: From Crisis to Sustainable Growth (1989). 34 I. Shihata, ‘Issues of “Governance” in Borrowing Members — The Extent of Their Relevance under the Bank’s Articles of Agreement’ (21 December 1990) in The World Bank Legal Papers, supra note 23, 245. 35 Ibid. at 265–6, 269–71. 36 Ibid. at 274–9. 37 Shihata, ‘Political Activities’, supra note 26. 30 -6- they served as the legal basis for a dramatic increase in the scope of the Bank’s functions.38 This culminated in initiatives in the late 1990s and early 2000s under Wolfensohn’s presidency to more explicitly integrate human rights into the Bank’s work. A series of workshops were held from 2002 to 2004 on integrating development and human rights, and in 2006, at the request of Bank management, General Counsel Roberto Danino issued a legal opinion on human rights that went several steps further than Shihata’s earlier opinions, recognising human rights as ‘an intrinsic part of the Bank’s mission’. 39 Danino’s opinion removed Shihata’s previous distinction between economic and social rights and civil and political rights, arguing that human rights considerations and international human rights law obligations of either type could be relevant to Bank decisions ‘provided there is economic impact or relevance’ and were done in ‘a nonpartisan, non-ideological and neutral manner, and so long as these are related to projects the Bank aims to support’.40 Human rights could also be an acceptable consideration in gaining an understanding of the context of a project, and if the borrower country requested assistance in fulfilling its obligations.41 Although the status of this opinion as a formal interpretation of the Bank’s articles is uncertain, given that it was never presented to the Board,42 subsequent statements by Danino’s successor, Ana Palacio, have appeared to support its approach. 43 The eventual creation of the Nordic Trust Fund and the Bank’s general preponderance of activities in the area of gender, post-conflict, and disability would also seem to indicate a more expansive view of the relevance of human rights to the Bank. This broader view of ‘economic’ and narrower view of ‘political’ would seem generally supported by principles of interpretation. Articles 31 and 32 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 44 which post-date the Articles of Agreement but are generally accepted, including by a series of Bank General Counsels,45 to codify the customary law applicable at the Bank’s founding, 46 allow for the plain meaning of an article to be construed ‘in their context and in light of their object and purpose’,47 with reference to travaux preparátoires as a ‘supplementary means of interpretation’.48 The purpose most commonly given for the political prohibition is that of ensuring that the Bank could serve a wide variety of member states with differing ideologies, as well as for ensuring that the Bank would remain an efficient financial institution and not an instrument for the Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters’, supra note 4, at 660. Dañino, supra note 26, at [25] 40 Ibid. at [13]–[14]. 41 Ibid. at [12], [19]–[20]. 42 Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters’, supra note 4, at 665. 43 Palacio, supra note 26. But see ibid. at 665–7, who argues that Danino’s opinion had little influence over attitudes towards human rights at the bank. 44 Opened for signature 23 May 1969, 1155 UNTS 331 (entered into force 27 January 1980) (‘VCLT’). 45 See Shihata, ‘Governance’, supra note 34, 259–60. 46 Note that the reference for the initial project in 1949 was to codify lex lata: ‘Report by J L Brierly, Special Rapporteur’ [1950](II) Yearbook of the International Law Commission 222, at 225. 47 VCLT art 31(1). 48 VCLT art 32. 38 39 -7- political agendas of its members.49 A safeguard policy focusing on existing obligations assumed by the borrower state under international law, with the state’s theoretical consent, remains consistent with this purpose, especially as safeguards bind only Bank staff and mostly affect the design of projects, which are minimally intrusive to broader questions of state sovereignty. This is especially so given that the approaches to interpreting treaties which form the constitutive instrument of international organisations tend to both favour the functionality of the organisation and to take into account the practice of the organisation itself.50 The continuing legal debates over the scope of the Bank’s mandate exemplify the difficulty of adapting its limited constitutive instruments to changing world circumstances and evolving understandings of development effectiveness. The Bank’s mission has evolved over its 60 years of existence from a narrowly defined mission of post-war reconstruction to a broadly defined concept of poverty reduction that includes both material poverty and the broader idea of ‘capabilities’. 51 There is additionally now a significant body of research showing the importance of a number of rights to economic growth and poverty reduction, issues that could not have been on the agenda at the original Bretton Woods conference, 52 while understandings of state sovereignty and the scope of acceptable ‘political interference’ have significantly narrowed since the Bank’s mandate was adopted.53 In light of these changing circumstances, there is at least some argument for allowing consideration of human rights concerns in a non-partisan manner, where they can be shown to be necessary for the effectiveness of the project in promoting poverty reduction.54 Nevertheless, it is still unclear to what extent human rights as freestanding concerns rather than ‘good business decisions’ are permissible considerations. Given that the entire purpose of a safeguard policy is to place constraints on development where it poses risks to given non-economic concerns, and given that the link between observance of rights and economic growth is not always easily ascertained,55 it is necessary to determine the extent to which there are legal bases for a human rights safeguard policy which do not rely on economic impact. Shihata, ‘Political Activities’, supra note 37, at 226–7. See, e.g., Reparation for Injuries Suffered in the Service of the United Nations (Advisory Opinion) ICJ Reports (1949) 174, at 179–84; T. Sato, Evolving Constitutions of International Organizations (1996) at 260, 267–8. See especially the concept of ‘implied powers’: J. Klabbers, An Introduction to International Institutional Law (2002) at 60–81; Darrow, supra note 27. 51 See OP 1.00, supra note 28. 52 See, e.g., D. Kaufmann, ‘Human Rights and Governance: The Empirical Challenge’ in Alston and Robinson, supra note 10, 352. 53 See Dañino, supra note 26, at [17]; Skogly, supra note 27, at 94–9. 54 The Bank’s practice in areas such as post-conflict governance and gender suggests an increasing level of support for such an interpretation, although at present the fact that the ban on political activities is interpreted inconsistently across the Bank lessens the extent to which such practice can be said to have legal effect. For a comprehensive examination of Bank practice, see Skogly, supra note 24; Darrow, supra note 24. 55 Kaufmann, supra note 52, at 352 (commenting on the paucity of existing measurement). 49 50 -8- C. Obligations Incumbent upon the Bank Arguably, such a basis can be found in the Bank’s own obligations as a subject of international law, and in that of its member states. Each Bank arm has legal personality, given their extensive treaty making activities with its borrower states, as well as its relative independence from members, and their grants of jurisdictional immunities by host states.56 While they are not bound by human rights treaties, given that these only have state parties, the Bank is bound by rules of customary international law.57 Where these rules are peremptory norms, these will override the political prohibition in the Articles of Agreement.58 The Bank therefore is bound by at least the very small number of human rights norms which constitute jus cogens, including customary prohibitions on torture, genocide, and racial discrimination,59 regardless of what its Articles of Agreement say, and is obligated at the level of having to ‘respect’ these rules, and possibly to ‘protect’ them where a borrower state may violate them in the context of a Bank project.60 The relative unlikelihood of Bank projects causing breaches of human rights on the scale of such abuses as genocide aside, these may provide a legal basis for safeguard policies protecting jus cogens rights. Certain provisions in the Bank’s relationship agreement with the United Nations may also provide a legal basis for provisions that could be included in a safeguard policy. While this relationship agreement grants the Bank a great degree of independence,61 it has been interpreted to require the Bank to obey Security Council resolutions under arts 41 and 42 of the UN Charter (generally to prevent the Bank from asking states to breach their obligations under the Charter, which prevail over other agreements, rather than as the Bank’s own obligation), 62 as well as, more controversially, those made under General Assembly resolutions under the ‘Uniting for Peace’ resolution.63 It should be noted that this does not extend to General Assembly resolutions generally: indeed, this was the precise justification for the Bank’s actions in regards to the Portugal/South Africa loans controversies.64 56 As per the requirements and salient facts outlined in the Reparations Case, supra note 50, at 178–80. See, e.g., C. F. Amerasinghe, Principles of the Institutional Law of International Organizations (Cambridge University Press, 1996) 240. 58 VCLT art 53. 59 Listed as among the most frequently cited jus cogens norms in International Law Commission, Fragmentation of International Law: Difficulties Arising from the Diversification and Expansion of International Law, A/CN.4/L.702 (13 April 2006) at [33]. 60 Skogly, supra note 27, at 151; Ball, supra note 2, at 352. Note that customary obligations which are not jus cogens also bind the Bank unless treaty obligations override them, which would also allow for any customary obligations consistent with the political prohibition to form the legal basis of human rights obligations. This is likely to be substantially the same as the scope of ‘economic’ activities permitted under the mandate, discussed above Pt III(B), although it is worth noting that customary human rights norms are obligations on and not merely permissions allowed the Bank. 61 Agreement between the United Nations and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 16 UNTS 346 (signed and entered into force 15 November 1947) art IV(3); Agreement between the United Nations and the International Development Association, 394 UNTS 222 (signed and entered into force 27 March 1961) art I. 62 See ibid. art VI, Shihata ‘Political Activities’, supra note 26, at 235. 63 See Shihata, ‘Governance’, supra note 34, at 266. 64 Ibid. at 266–7. 57 -9- Finally, the obligations of borrower countries are also relevant. The Bank has recognised that it can perform a facilitative role in aiding states obligations under human rights treaties, if member states so request.65 An argument can also be made that the Bank can be held responsible for complicity in breaches of international law by borrower states, although this is limited to international law that the Bank itself is bound by, and is therefore of limited applicability to breaches of obligations under human rights treaties.66 The framework surrounding the Bank’s engagement with human rights can therefore be summarised as a requirement under general international law obligations to ‘respect’ human rights under custom and Security Council resolutions, while the Bank’s Articles of Agreement allow for, but do not require, consideration of borrower state obligations at all three levels of respecting, protecting, and fulfilling, if such activities can be characterised as ‘economic’ rather than ‘political’. This framework would appear to support a safeguard policy, provided that such a policy focused on facilitating the treaty obligations of the borrower states; meeting obligations under a limited number of customary norms that are either characterisable as ‘economic’ or could be considered jus cogens; or on following binding declarations made by the Security Council or ‘Uniting for Peace’ resolutions by the General Assembly. 4. Institutional Considerations in the Adoption of a Safeguard Policy A. Appropriateness of Using a Safeguard Policy to Enforce Human Rights In addition to legal limits, certain institutional limits must be considered in designing a safeguard policy. These include concerns about the desirability of having the Bank interpret human rights norms. The Bank has a voting structure that favours its wealthier members, with votes being tied to financial contributions,67 and its President, by custom, always being nominated by the United States. Additionally, it exercises great economic power through control of access to loans over its poorer member states, who are often unable to access other capital markets due to their poor credit ratings.68 There has been longstanding controversy over the Bank’s imposition of policy conditionality in its loans, particularly in light of structural adjustment programs during the 1980s,69 and given that a human rights safeguard policy would likely be incorporated into loan agreements, it may possibly form the basis for inappropriate control over a borrower state’s policy autonomy. 70 There are also concerns that the Bank’s interpretation of its safeguard policies is likely to result in the normative ‘capture’ of human rights standards, particularly given that the Bank’s economic power means that it has greater power to 65 Dañino, supra note 26, [19]. See ‘Draft Articles on the Responsibility of International Organizations’, arts 13, 16, in ‘Report of the International Law Commission on the Work of Its 61 st Session’ [2009] II(2) Yearbook of the International Law Commission 13, at 85, 88. 67 IBRD Articles art V(3)(a), IDA Articles art VI (3)(a). 68 Hence art I of the IDA Articles. 69 See Darrow, supra note 27, at 68–71, 209–10; Skogly, supra note 27, at 16. 70 See M. Thomas, ‘Can the World Bank Enforce Its Own Conditions?: The World Bank and the Enforcement Critique of Conditionality’ (2004) 35 Development and Change 485, at 486. 66 - 10 - enforce its own standards than the human rights related specialised agencies have to enforce theirs.71 Finally, safeguard policies could increase the cost of lending at the Bank, potentially deterring lending that could benefit populations.72 This has been a longstanding concern of the Bank, given the availability of bilateral lending sources that may contain even fewer safeguards than those of the Bank.73 These concerns about costs are partially offset by potential savings from streamlining the Bank’s existing safeguard policies, as well as by the gains in the overall impacts of the loan — ultimately, it is counterproductive to lend in situations if it may be detrimental to the welfare of communities in borrower countries.74 It is also important to note that many high risk projects are not particularly attractive lending prospects, particularly in IDA countries, due to the low creditworthiness of the borrower countries, reducing concerns about the substitutability of less stringently conditioned loans. Given, however, that increases in the cost of lending due to safeguard policies may involve trading off the overall benefits of a project against the interests protected by the safeguard, and that increases in the cost of lending result in increases in the overall indebtedness of borrower countries, cost concerns nonetheless affect the viability of a safeguard policy. B. Effectiveness of a Potential Safeguard Policy at Ensuring Protection of Human Rights in Practice These concerns act in combination with what has been called a ‘culture of approval’ at the Bank.75 The frequent use of lending targets, and the tendency of staff incentives to be structured around the amount lent regardless of the success of the lending project has meant that Bank staff often see safeguards as an obstacle or a box to be checked, and accept partial compliance with safeguards as ‘good enough’.76 In particular, the safeguard policy on indigenous peoples has frequently been violated, especially where the political attitudes in the borrower country towards the identification of who is indigenous conflicts with that of the Bank.77 The pressure to lend also results in perverse incentives to avoid projects which may aid indigenous peoples or the environment, to avoid the requirement to follow safeguard policies.78 Similar problems plague the Bank’s civil society participation initiatives, which are also frequently ignored or only superficially complied with due to perceptions that they obstruct the efficiency of projects.79 The short length of project cycles contributes to this problem: with insufficient time to comprehensively 71 Ball, supra note 2, at 366; Darrow, supra note 27, at 195. See, e.g., World Bank, ‘Enhancing World Bank Support to Middle-Income Countries: Management Action Plan’ (20 April 2004), Ball, supra note 2, at364–5. 73 See Clark, supra note 2. 74 Ball, supra note 2. 75 See,e.g., W. Wapenhans, ‘Effective Implementation: Key to Development Impact’ (1992). 76 Ibid. See also A. Ebrahim and S. Herz, ‘Accountability in Complex Organisations: World Bank Responses to Civil Society’ (2007), at 6–7. Cf Thomas, supra note 70. 77 See World Bank Operations Evaluation Department, ‘Implementation of Operational Directive 4.20 on Indigenous Peoples: An Evaluation of Results’ (10 April 2003) 11, at 41. This review found that only 62% of projects affecting indigenous people applied OD 4.20, the precursor to OP 4.10. See also Sarfaty, ‘Internalization of Indigenous Rights Norms’, supra note 25, at 1805. 78 Sarfaty, ‘Internalization of Indigenous Rights Norms’, supra note 25, at 1814. 79 Ebrahim and Herz, supra note 76, at 5–7. 72 - 11 - evaluate projects or ensure participation, success or failure is often judged by lending quantities and project completion rates.80 The tendency to avoid safeguards also reflects a wider conflict of values between the overall economic benefit of a project and social and environmental concerns, with the latter usually taking precedence due to the Bank’s generally economist-dominated institutional culture and the insufficient training given to Bank staff on how to balance such tradeoffs.81 These concerns are compounded by the relative difficulty of enforcing safeguard policies. While the Inspection Panel represents an important opening for review of safeguard policies, and has taken steps to safeguard its independence, it has no powers of supervision, and relatively limited powers of investigation.82 Particularly where projects are underway, findings of violations may not result in tangible changes. For example, a pipeline project between Chad and Cameroon was continued by Bank management despite clear findings of violations of multiple safeguard policies, although the project was eventually discontinued for loan agreement breaches.83 The heavy reliance on Bank management for many aspects of the Inspection Panel’s fact-finding also leaves it vulnerable to attempts by to obstruct Panel investigations, as happened, for example, in the review of the Albania Integrated Coastal Zone Management Project.84 Further, there have been concerns that the increase in use of Country System Assessments in place of formal safeguard policies will lead to the impairment of Inspection Panel review due to the less precise standards likely to be in use, and therefore the lower likelihood that a breach of policy will be found.85 For example, the Center for International Environmental Law commented in 2005, when the Country Systems approach was first implemented, that the use of ‘equivalent’ borrower systems would compromise Inspection Panel review legally, as the subjective standards in use would be difficult to assess; politically, as the review of a country system would raise questions of ‘inappropriately judging the quality of a country’s legal system’, and institutionally, due to the greater resources required and the lack of additional funding provided to the Inspection Panel.86 These concerns are likely to be magnified if a comprehensive human 80 Ibid. at 6. Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters’, supra note 4, at 669–70, 674. 82 Resolution Establishing the Inspection Panel [23]; Inspection Panel, Chad: Petroleum Development and Pipeline Project (17 July 2002) at 60–3, where the panel commented on governance and human rights implications of the project despite such issues being outside its explicit mandate. See also Clark, supra note 2, at 217–18; L. Polgreen, ‘World Bank Ends Effort to Help Chad Ease Poverty’, New York Times, 10 September 2008. 83 Inspection Panel, Chad: Petroleum Development and Pipeline Project, supra note 82, at 45–64; Inspection Panel, Management Report and Recommendation in Response to the Inspection Panel Investigation Report (21 August 2002) at 17. See also Clark, supra note 2, at 219; A. Clapham, The Human Rights Obligations of Non-State Actors (2006) at 153–5. 84 Inspection Panel, Albania: Integrated Coastal Zone Management and Clean-Up Project (24 November 2008) at 68. 85 See Centre for International Environmental Law, ‘The Use of Country Systems in World Bank Lending: A Summary of the Lessons from the Pilot Projects and Recommendations for a Better Approach’ (2 April 2008). 86 Center for International Environmental Law, ‘Comments on World Bank’s Proposed Country Systems Approach’ (January 2005) at 5. 81 - 12 - rights safeguard policy is introduced: to judge the equivalence of a borrower country’s human rights system to that of a safeguard policy would be especially politically difficult, and the alternative of excluding the possibility of country systems from a human rights policy would not be any easier. Additionally, given the scope and variety of domestic and international human rights obligations, the required resources to effectively enforce a safeguard policy relating to human rights could potentially be enormous, and the Panel’s ability to make evaluations and interpretations of ‘equivalence’ may not be entirely satisfactory without them. Reconciling a comprehensive human rights safeguard policy with the flexibility to use a borrower systems approach would lead to many difficulties unless there were very clear expectations set by the Bank on the type of country system it would consider equivalent. These problems are of particular importance given that outside of the Inspection Panel, opportunities to enforce a human rights policy of any kind are limited. While various other monitoring and evaluation mechanisms exist, such as the Independent Evaluation Group and the Quality Assurance Group, these largely review the overall operations of the Bank rather than particular complaints and, as for the Inspection Panel, responsibility for monitoring further compliance remains with the Bank’s internal processes.87 External dispute mechanisms are difficult to access due to the Bank’s immunities under domestic law and the impracticability of using international dispute settlement mechanisms: affected populations often do not have standing, while states rarely have strong enough, if any, interests in enforcing safeguard policies to justify international litigation.88 5. Safeguard Policy Design While these critiques are persuasive, they indicate the need for careful design of a human rights policy, rather than an indication that one should not be adopted. Many of these critiques are based on the assumption that human rights safeguards would mostly consist of imposed negative proscriptions written by the Bank. An alternative approach to creating a safeguard policy, given the constraints of the Bank, is in fact to incorporate human rights concerns into the goals and benchmarks for evaluating the development success of a project. Broadly speaking, this can be described as a ‘dialogue’ approach to human rights.89 It would consist of a requirement on staff to assess, with broad consultation with both the state and civil society, the legal obligations of the borrower state under both domestic and international law, and to incorporate such obligations during the design stage as objectives for the project such obligations. The success of a project could be measured by regular monitoring and evaluation against these objectives, perhaps through the use of special indicators, with an emphasis on using data which is disaggregated to take into account the most vulnerable groups and to ensure that the least-well off rather than the World Bank, ‘The Independent Evaluation Group (Bank): Terms of Reference’ (2003), available from <http://go.worldbank.org/GU2KYF31B0>. See also Ebrahim and Herz, supra note 76, 9. 88 See, e.g., Statute of the International Court of Justice art 34; Skogly, supra note 27, 186; E. Suzuki and S. Nanwani, ‘Responsibility of International Organizations: The Accountability Mechanisms of Multilateral Development Banks’, 27 Michigan Journal of International Law 177, at 182–4 (2005). 89 J. Agusti-Panareda, ‘Transforming Weakness into Virtue: A Dialogue and Context Based Approach to Human Rights at the World Bank’, 2 Human Rights and Globalization Law Review 23 (2008). 87 - 13 - aggregate are taken as benchmarks. Thus, the success of a particular project would be measured not only in terms of its outputs, but also whether it achieves those outputs without detrimental effects on local populations — in effect, the safeguard policy is used to ensure a more holistic measure of the overall project outcome. To keep the possibility of Inspection Panel review, the OP could explicitly provide for minimum levels of compliance with the goals set between the Bank and the borrower state. More traditional proscriptive obligations could also be included for a limited number of customary norms that constitute the Bank’s own obligations. However, the safeguard would act mostly as a carrot rather than a stick — it would set incentives to respect, protect, and fulfil human rights. Given the weak supervisory powers of the Inspection Panel, a realignment of aims is likely to be more effective than any threat of review in ensuring greater consideration of human rights. The advantage of such an approach is that it builds on the institutional strengths of the Bank, which is still, after all, a lending institution, and not a human rights body. It would fit into the Bank’s current concern with development effectiveness, as well as its current broadly defined conception of poverty. 90 By reorienting the goals of development to include human rights concerns, the Bank builds on an approach that already takes place in certain Bank programs such as the gender program and the Nordic Trust Fund. By integrating with these pre-existing approaches, it also allows the Bank to simultaneously review and improve on its existing initiatives which relate to human rights. While this ‘negotiated benchmark conditionality’ approach can be criticised for reducing the potential of human rights as a tool for transformative change, it has the advantage of being clearly within the Bank’s mandate, and of its ability to build a broad base of support within the Bank which could serve as a springboard for stronger programs.91 Additionally, stricter forms of conditionality for those norms which can be considered jus cogens provide a non-negotiable layer of protection. A vast body of resources exists for the Bank to draw on in the implementation of this model. The Bank could draw on its partnership with the OHCHR, which has developed a number of guiding standards on integrating human rights and development, as well as with development agencies and other multilateral banks (bearing in mind, of course, that many of these bodies have explicit human rights mandates and that their standards may require adaption to be permissible under the Bank’s Articles). 92 The Bank’s key advantage is the breadth and depth of its technical expertise, and is well placed to work with the OHCHR on technical capacity-building in states which are amenable to human rights activities. 93 The Bank could also draw on the work of the Nordic Trust in developing human rights benchmark indicators,94 and the work currently being done on integrating human rights into poverty reduction strategies.95 A human rights policy of the 90 See, e.g., OP 1.00. Sarfaty, ‘Why Culture Matters’, supra note 4, 682–3; Agusti-Panareda, supra note 89, 34. 92 See, e.g., OHCHR, ‘Principles and Guidelines for a Human Rights Approach to Poverty Reduction Strategies’ (2006); OHCHR, ‘Human Rights and Poverty Reduction: A Conceptual Framework’ (2003). 93 Agusti-Panareda, supra note 89, 35–8. 94 McInerney-Lankford and Sano, supra note 7. 95 See, e.g., F. Stewart and M. Wang, ‘Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers within the Human Rights Perspective’ in Alston and Robinson, supra note 10. 91 - 14 - type suggested above could also form part of the Bank’s response to recent suggestions by the Independent Evaluation Group that the Bank should consolidate its social safeguards into one integrated policy.96 Such a model would, however, have to take place in context of broader reforms. It is not the place of this article to attempt to suggest reforms for the entire World Bank. Some of the obstacles outlined in Part IV, such as that of the Bank’s voting structure, are also likely to be intractable. However, a number of smaller, staff level changes could be possible. These include increasing the length of project cycles and readjusting staff incentives along lines of impact rather than lending targets, which tie into existing reviews undertaken to improve compliance with safeguard policies.97 The Bank could also provide greater training and dialogue on how to monitor safeguard compliance and balance the competing concerns of Bank projects. 98 In combination with a safeguard policy, these changes could potentially greatly improve the human rights accountability of the World Bank to those vulnerable to the effects of its projects. 6. Conclusion In light of the recent renewed focus on human rights at the World Bank, it may be an opportune time to attempt to reintroduce a comprehensive human rights safeguard policy. I have attempted to show in this essay that many of the traditional obstacles to an effective safeguard policy can be overcome by a combination of careful design, and by accompanying reforms to the broader evaluation of Bank projects. One obstacle which I have not dealt with is that of political will. It remains to be seen whether a human rights policy would be able to be adopted by the Board, which has historically been deeply divided over the question of human rights.99 It also remains to be seen whether the adoption of a human rights safeguard policy applicable to staff would translate to a greater willingness by member states to engage with even this limited form of human rights conditionality. Nevertheless, critically evaluating the legal and policy justifications for excluding a comprehensive safeguard policy incorporating international human rights law norms is a small but necessary step to building the political will toward its adoption. 96 World Bank Independent Evaluation Group, Safeguards and Sustainability Policies in a Changing World (23 September 2010), at 104. 97 See, e.g., ibid. at 104–5. 98 Sarfarty, ‘Internalization of Indigenous Rights Norms’, supra note 25, at 1803, Safeguards and Sustainability Policies in a Changing World, supra note 96, 31. 99 Sarfarty, ‘Why Culture Matters’ supra note 4, at 665. - 15 -