IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/uct/ecriwp/23.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Does Constitutionalizing Economic and Social Rights Promote their Fulfillment?

Author

Listed:
  • Elizabeth Kaletski

    (Ithaca College)

  • Lanse Minkler

    (University of Connecticut)

  • Nishith Prakash

    (University of Connecticut)

  • Susan Randolph

    (University of Connecticut)

Abstract

This paper explores whether constitutional provisions promote fulfillment of economic and social rights. This is accomplished by combining unique data on both enforceable law and directive principles with the Social and Economic Rights Fulfillment Index (SERF Index), which measures government fulfillment of such rights. The results indicate that there is a positive and significant correlation between enforceable law provisions and the right to health and education components of the SERF Index. The strongest relationship appears to be for the right to health component where the inclusion of an enforceable law provision on economic and social rights in the constitution is correlated with an increase in the health component by 9.55, or 13.0%, on average. These results support the idea that constitutional provisions may be one way to improve economic and social rights outcomes.

Suggested Citation

  • Elizabeth Kaletski & Lanse Minkler & Nishith Prakash & Susan Randolph, 2014. "Does Constitutionalizing Economic and Social Rights Promote their Fulfillment?," Economic Rights Working Papers 23, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    • Handle: RePEc:uct:ecriwp:23
    Note: Paper presented at the conference America, Human Rights and the World, Marquette University September 27-29, 2007. The idea for this paper was prompted by a one-day workshop held by the Economic Rights Group at the University of Connecticut entitled Instantiating Economic Rights. I thank ERG members for comments on this version, especially Shareen Hertel, Susan Randolph and Lyle Scruggs. I also thank David Forsythe, Richard Goldstone, Wiktor Osiatynski, and Richard Ashby Wilson for their comments.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://media.economics.uconn.edu/working/23.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Minkler, Lanse & Prakash, Nishith, 2017. "The role of constitutions on poverty: A cross-national investigation," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 563-581.
    2. David L. Richards & K. Chad Clay, 2010. "Measuring Government Effort to Respect Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights," Economic Rights Working Papers 13, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    3. Mwangi S. Kimenyi, 2005. "Economic Rights, Human Development Effort and Institutions," Working papers 2005-40, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    4. Steven C. Poe & Nicolas Rost & Sabine C. Carey, 2006. "Assessing Risk and Opportunity in Conflict Studies," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 50(4), pages 484-507, August.
    5. Susan Randolph & Sakiko Fukuda-Parr & Terra Lawson-Remer, 2009. "Economic and Social Rights Fulfillment Index: Country Scores and Rankings," Working papers 2009-27, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    6. Chris Jeffords & Lanse Minkler, 2016. "Do Constitutions Matter? The Effects of Constitutional Environmental Rights Provisions on Environmental Outcomes," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(2), pages 294-335, May.
    7. Brinks, Daniel M. & Gauri, Varun, 2012. "The law's majestic equality ? the distributive impact of litigating social and economic rights," Policy Research Working Paper Series 5999, The World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Joshua C. Gellers & Christopher Jeffords, 2015. "Procedural Environmental Rights and Environmental Justice: Assessing the Impact of Environmental Constitutionalism," Economic Rights Working Papers 25, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    2. Christopher Jeffords, 2015. "A Panel Data Analysis of the Effects of Constitutional Environmental Rights Provisions on Access to Improved Sanitation Facilities and Water Sources," Economic Rights Working Papers 24, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Susan Randolph & Michelle Prairie & John Stewart, 2009. "Economic Rights in the Land of Plenty: Monitoring State Fulfillment of Economic and Social Rights Obligations in the United States," Economic Rights Working Papers 12, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    2. Jeffords, Chris, 2021. "On the relationship between constitutional environmental human rights and sustainable development outcomes," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    3. Joshua C. Gellers & Christopher Jeffords, 2015. "Procedural Environmental Rights and Environmental Justice: Assessing the Impact of Environmental Constitutionalism," Economic Rights Working Papers 25, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    4. Kodila-Tedika, Oasis & Mulunda Kabange, Martin, 2018. "Constitutional instability and Poverty: Some Empirical Evidence," MPRA Paper 84501, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Chris Jeffords & Lanse Minkler, 2016. "Do Constitutions Matter? The Effects of Constitutional Environmental Rights Provisions on Environmental Outcomes," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(2), pages 294-335, May.
    6. Christopher Jeffords, 2012. "Constitutional Environmental Human Rights in India: Negating a Negating Statement," Economic Rights Working Papers 21, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    7. Alston, Lee J. & Melo, Marcus Andre & Mueller, Bernardo & Pereira, Carlos, 2013. "Changing social contracts: Beliefs and dissipative inclusion in Brazil," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 48-65.
    8. Mwangi S. Kimenyi, 2007. "Institutional Infrastructure to Support 'Super Growth' in Kenya: Governance Thresholds, Reversion Rates and Economic Development," Working papers 2007-32, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    9. Scott Dallman & Anusha Nath & Filip Premik, 2021. "The Effect of Constitutional Provisions on Education Policy and Outcomes," Staff Report 623, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    10. Chris Jeffords & Alexi Thompson, 2016. "An empirical analysis of fatal crimes against environmental and land activists," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(2), pages 827-842.
    11. Aneja, Abhay & Xu, Guo, 2020. "The Costs of Employment Segregation: Evidence from the Federal Government under Wilson," Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, Working Paper Series qt7sw871kr, Institute of Industrial Relations, UC Berkeley.
    12. Christopher Jeffords, 2015. "A Panel Data Analysis of the Effects of Constitutional Environmental Rights Provisions on Access to Improved Sanitation Facilities and Water Sources," Economic Rights Working Papers 24, University of Connecticut, Human Rights Institute.
    13. Alexi Thompson & Christopher Jeffords, 2017. "Virtual Water and an EKC for Water Pollution," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 31(3), pages 1061-1066, February.
    14. Yelda Yucel, 2022. "Capabilities Indicators for Human Rights Cities in Turkey: A Gender-Specific Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 495-522, January.
    15. Carmen Herrero & Ricardo Martínez & Antonio Villar, 2019. "Population Structure and the Human Development Index," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 141(2), pages 731-763, January.
    16. Mardones D., Cristián, 2019. "Short- and long-term ex post evaluation of community-based environmental initiatives in Chile," Revista CEPAL, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL), August.
    17. Minkler, Lanse & Prakash, Nishith, 2017. "The role of constitutions on poverty: A cross-national investigation," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 563-581.
    18. Gauri, Varun, 2013. "Redressing Grievances and Complaints Regarding Basic Service Delivery," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 109-119.
    19. Amani Kahloul & Rim Lahmandi‐Ayed & Hejer Lasram, 2019. "Poverty, competition, democracy, and ownership: A general equilibrium model with vertical preferences," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 21(6), pages 1143-1178, December.
    20. Sara Kahn‐Nisser, 2022. "Contextualizing Donors’ Interests: The United Nations’ Shaming of the United States’ Trade Partners," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 13(1), pages 48-61, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Economic and social rights; Constitutional provisions;

    JEL classification:

    • A13 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Social Values
    • B59 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Current Heterodox Approaches - - - Other
    • P46 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Other Economic Systems - - - Consumer Economics; Health; Education and Training; Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:uct:ecriwp:23. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Mark McConnel (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.humanrights.uconn.edu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.