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Transitional Justice Without Social, Economic and Cultural Rights?

The article provides a critical analysis of what it calls the ‘ESC rights thesis’ as advanced by Louise Arbour in a much-noticed paper published in 2007 – the claim that economic, social and cultural rights (such as the right to food, housing, healthcare, education) should be treated as an integral part of, rather than a peripheral diversion from, the transitional justice agenda. In addressing this thesis, the article takes up a series of objections that may be raised against such arguments and asks whether and how these objections may be met or avoided. While sympathising with the idea that ESC rights are integral rather than marginal to the transitional justice project, the article warns against getting wrapped up in a kind of ‘absolutist’ human rights rhetoric that tends to obscure, rather than illuminate, the hard choices of transitional governance and ultimately inhibit the art of compromise and broader dialogue about what is realistically achievable, here and now.