recommend local government reforms. Most have dealt with nomenclatural changes, focusing less on quality. The political parties in power have used local government bodies to consolidate their own power base and, to a large extent, politicised these institutions. Various steps taken in the last 35 years to develop local governance include the introduction of union parishads (UPs) - which are still functional - and the now-defunct upazila parishads. Local governments in the urban areas (municipalities and city corporations) also remain more or less successful. In the 1990s, there were attempts to create more opportunities for women in rural local bodies, but these have been limited.
Bangladesh Framework on Human Rights The Constitution of Bangladesh, reflecting the people's commitment to safeguard human rights, is based on the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Constitution pledges 18 fundamental civil and political rights, including equality before law, the right to life and personal liberty, safeguards in arrest and detention, freedom of assembly, freedom of occupation, protection with respect to trial and punishment, and the right to property.2 In addition, the Constitution also promises to safeguard certain social and economic rights for specific segments of the population and social sectors.3 However, as far as human rights is concerned, Bangladesh has hardly achieved positive results over the last 35 years. Democratic norms and civil liberties have been difficult to establish due to frequent military intervention in state affairs, during which times the Constitution has either been either suspended or tampered with by the regimes in power. As a result, nearly three and a half decades after independence, governance remains ineffective in a volatile political order. There is a lack of political consensus, weak legislative authority, unhealthy modes of political competition, undemocratic political party structures, political and administrative patronage, and weak local governance. There is also a lack of accountability and transparency of political and administrative institutions. All these problems have produced social tension, lack of equal access to natural justice, and abuses of human rights.
The ICHRP Human Rights Framework In recent years, the International Council on Human Rights Policy (ICHRP) has shed light on an important aspect, i.e., assessing decentralised local governance from a human rights perspective. Over the last few decades, decentralisation has been analysed and promoted by disciplines like public administration, sociology, political science, sustainable human development, gender analysis, and poverty reduction approaches (ICHRP, 2005:15-17). Though these are all important mechanisms through which local government can be analysed, the ICHRP suggests that the human rights approach is also very important and can play a complementary role. Human rights and local governance are both essentially concerned with the provision of certain entitlements, including participation in local political processes and access to essential services. Worldwide, existing human rights instruments include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
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Table 1: Human Rights Approach Matrix Principles/Features
Approaches Good Governance Sustainable Development *
Gender Analysis
Capabilities
Human Rights
*
*
*
**
*
Participation
*
Non-discrimination
**
*
Accountability
*
**
*
Rule of law
*
**
*
Transparency/right to information
*
Prioritises poverty reduction
*
Empowerment
**
**
* *
Availability
**
Accessibility
**
**
*
*
*
* *
*
*
Acceptability
*
*
Adaptability
*
*
Legally binding framework
*
Effective remedy
*
Entitlement
*
Indivisibility
*
Recognises future generations’ claims
**
Capacity building Institutional efficiency
* *
Basic needs and services
**
*
*
**
**
* *
*
*: explicit recognition of a principle, **: implicit recognition
(ICESCR). It is the obligation of all states to respect, protect, and fulfil the economic and social rights of its citizens as per the human rights framework, and there are several ways to test the performance of this obligation. One that is increasingly used assesses performance against four essential features or standards. These ask whether services or rights are (i) available, (ii) accessible, (iii) acceptable, and (iv) adapted to context (ICHRP, 2005: 14). The ICHRP does not claim that the human rights framework is the best approach or that its methods are suitable in every circumstance, but it argues that, if combined with other approaches, it can improve the performance of local governments since it draws attention to issues and groups of people to which other approaches give less or insufficient attention. It is easily understood from the above table that the human rights framework scores well compared to other approaches as it accommodates most of the central principles of other approaches as well as highlighting several values that other frameworks do not. The United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has developed tools for measuring whether economic and social rights are being achieved, and whether the process for achieving them is likely to give long-lasting results. They
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