AAAS Scientific Responsibility, Human Rights and Law Program

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Report on Science and Human Rights

Summer/Fall 2001 Vol XXI, No. 1

The Science and Human Rights Program has received a grant from the Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund for an innovative three-year project to explore and develop the intrinsic connections between environmental protection and human rights. The project rests on the belief that human rights cannot be fully realized today without acknowledging their environmental dimensions, and it builds on work carried out by the Program during the past several years in economic, social and cultural rights.

The project’s goals include: (1) promoting greater awareness of the environmental determinants of existing human rights within both the human rights and environmental communities; (2) preparing resources to assist human rights organizations to incorporate relevant environmental factors into their ongoing monitoring, and environmental advocates to make effective use of human rights approaches and mechanisms; and (3) developing protocols and instruments for monitoring the environmental dimensions of existing human rights.

The project will focus initially on the rights to health, food, water, and a clean and healthy environment. Although the latter two rights do not appear as such in international law, existing human rights are often interpreted to include them. In addition, access to water and to an environment not harmful to health and well-being are written into the Bill of Rights of the 1996 South African Constitution, and the project will address them with special reference to South Africa.