Loads)406 and 90/270 (Display Screen Equipment),407 as well as European Working Time Directive 93/104.408 Both the Framework Directive and the European Working Time Directive make exceptions that are relevant for the armed forces. Art. 2.2 of the Framework Directive states that: This directive shall not be applicable where characteristics peculiar to certain specific public service activities, such as the armed forces or the police, or to certain specific activities in the civil protection services inevitably conflict with it. In that event, the safety and health of workers must be ensured as far as possible in the light of the objectives of this Directive.409 OSCE participating States have also expressed their commitment to strive for the achievement of acceptable working conditions and to ensure that their citizens enjoy employment rights (see Box 17.2). Particularly relevant in this regard is the OSCE Code of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspects of Security, which commits participating States to ensure that military, paramilitary, and security service personnel will be able to enjoy and exercise their human rights and fundamental freedoms, including economic and social rights. Para. 32 of the Code requires participating States to “ensure that military, paramilitary and security forces personnel will be able to enjoy and exercise their human rights and fundamental freedoms as reflected in [O]SCE documents and international law, in conformity with relevant constitutional and legal provisions and with the requirements of service”. Economic, social, and cultural rights are of a different nature than civil and political rights. Civil and political rights are negative rights and generally require governments to refrain from action. Economic, social, and cultural rights, however, constitute positive obligations for governments. In this sense, the negative protection of civil and political rights is much more straightforward, and the question arises as to which legal standard has been violated when economic, social, and cultural rights are infringed. This does not imply that economic, social, and cultural rights are deemed to be non-enforceable. It means, rather, that “many states and many human rights systems have chosen not to enforce them through the judicial process, but to enforce them through other means”.410
406 Council Directive 90/269/EEC of 29 May 1990 on the minimum and safety requirements for the manual handling of loads where there is a risk particularly of back injury to workers (fourth individual Directive within the meaning of Article 16 (1) of Directive 89/391/EEC), available at <http://eur-lex.europa.eu/smartapi/cgi/sga_d oc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc&lg=en&numdoc=31990L0269&model=guichett>. 407 Council Directive 90/270/EEC of 29 May 1990 on the minimum safety and health requirements for work with display screen equipment (fifth individual Directive within the meaning of Article 16 (1) of Directive 89/391/EEC), available at <http://europa.eu.int/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc& lg=EN&numdoc=31990L0270&model=guichett>. 408 Council Directive 93/104/EC of 23 November 1993 concerning certain aspects of the organisation of working time, available at <http://www.incomesdata.co.uk/information/worktimedirective.htm>. 409 Art. 2.2. of Council Directive 89/391/EEC of 12 June 1989 on the introduction of measures to encourage improvements in the safety and health of workers at work, available at <http://eur-lex.europa.eu/smartapi/cgi/ sga_doc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!CELEXnumdoc&lg=en&numdoc=31989L0391&model=guichett>. The European Working Time Directive follows this approach. In Art. 1.3 “Purpose and Scope”, it refers to the Framework Directive by stipulating that: “This Directive shall apply to all sectors of activity, both public and private, within the meaning of Article 2 of Directive 89/391/EEC, without prejudice to Article 17 of this Directive, with the exception of air, rail, road, sea, inland waterway and lake transport, sea fishing, other work at sea and the activities of doctors in training.” Available at <http://www.incomesdata.co.uk/information/worktimedirective.htm>. 410 E. Nii Ashie Kotey, “Some Fallacies About Rights: of Indivisibility, Priorities and Justiciability”, in Report of a Regional Seminar on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Geneva: International Commission of Jurists, 1998).
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