بهداشت و درمان، حقوق بشر و مدیریت بحران Sanitation, human rights, and disaster management

1. Introduction Sanitation is one of the key challenges of our time. Every day, a lack of adequate sanitation creates immeasurable suffering, primarily through the spread of disease via water, land or insects. Sanitation problems contribute to, and are exacerbated by, disasters. Despite much interesting work being done in other fields, international legal scholars have thus far been remarkably silent on issues of sanitation. A few important exceptions exist, including Keri Ellis and Loretta Feris (2014), Catarina de Albuquerque (2014), Léo Heller (2015) and Inga Winkler (2016). Further, following the recognition by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) of the human right to sanitation as a separate right in 2015, legal attention is likely to increase. International human rights law (IHRL) is recognised as a key component of emerging international law on disaster management (see, e.g., ILC, 2016; IASC, 2011; Sphere Project, 2011; Cedervall Lauta, 2016; Cubie, 2014; da Costa and Pospieszna, 2015; Kälin, 2011). The importance of IHRL was most recently acknowledged in the International Law Commission’s (ILC) Draft Articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters (ILC Draft Articles), adopted by the ILC on second reading in June 2016. Still, while States now have embraced a human rights based approach to disaster management, significant question marks remain as to what these obligations mean in the disaster context. This article addresses this issue by exploring what these obligations mean in relation to sanitation, which in itself is a significantly underexplored aspect of IHRL. A few limitations should be noted. First of all, the analysis in this article is focused on disasters caused by natural and human-made hazards, while excluding armed conflicts. Secondly, although acknowledging the importance of various kinds of actors in relation to sanitation, human rights, and disaster management, the analysis in this article focuses on the obligations of States as the primary duty bearers. Thirdly, the purpose of this article is not to analyse non-legal debates around best practices around sanitation, but rather to tie together aspects of legal instruments and debates so as to illuminate existing legal obligations for States in relation to sanitation and human rights in the disaster management context. Such analysis is vital from an international law perspective, as the lack of clarity and the absence of scholarly engagement around the legal aspects of sanitation leave too much of the fulfilment of needs in the hands of relief or development organisations, while limited attention is paid to existing obligations upon States. Fourthly, this article does not engage with accountability mechanisms and challenges. However, one of the key aspects of accountability is to “clarify the exact rights and obligations at play in disaster settings” (Cubie and Hesselman, 2015), which is a key aim of this article. The next section clarifies the definition of sanitation for the purpose of this paper and introduces the contemporary challenges in relation to sanitation. Section 3 then introduces the relevant human rights framework, in particular, the development and legal status of the human right to sanitation, and the role of sanitation within other relevant rights. Following this, section 4 introduces the role of IHRL within disaster management from the perspective of State obligations, before section 5 explores human rights obligations in relation to sanitation in the different phases of disaster management.