Measurement & Human Rights

Gateways

About the Program

Opportunities


Carr Center > Measurement & Human Rights


Assessing Impact, Measuring Progress

The Measurement and Human Rights Program (MHR) is designed to bring evidence-based policy and programming to the realm of human rights.

The MHR Program, aims to frame the discussion on the role of systematic assessment techniques in human rights work, by addressing some of the most basic and yet most difficult questions in the field:

  • How can we collect solid evidence of human rights violations?
  • How do we measure progress in promoting human rights ?
  • How can organizations assess their own impact more effectively?

The Program has worked with leading academics and practitioners in the human rights field, promoting the systematic use of solid research methodology, data collection, and analysis in formulating human rights policies.

> read more

 

 

MHR Current Activities

New MHR Project

STAT-COM
Measuring States Compliance with International Human Rights Bodies.

Despite an increased demand and burden on these institutions there are very few instruments to monitor states’ compliance the rulings and recommendations handed down by the UN treaty bodies, UN special rapporteurs and regional human rights courts.

>more

 

ISSUE PAPER

Making the Courts Count:
International Human Rights Tribunals and the Problem of Measuring Compliance

Courtney Hillebrecht *

 


MHR Seminar

Developing Evidence Based Child Protection Policy: engaging communities and policymakers in Sierra Leone.

A conversation on how evidence and research can inform policymaking in developing nations, based on the recent activity in Sierra Leone for the United Nations Children's Fund.


MHR Fellows Workshop

Making Courts Count: International Human Rights Tribunals and the Problem of Measuring Compliance

This presentation addresses two critical concerns of international human rights tribunals: 1) Compliance with their rulings, and 2) Measuring the impact that the courts have on domestic politics and the protection of human rights. With MHR Fellow Courtney Hillebrecht.

>more

 

MHR Current activities

Methodological Issues of Qualitative and Quantitative Tools for Measuring Compliance with the Right to Development

 

The Measurement and Human Rights Program , the Program on Human Rights in Development at the Harvard School of Public Health and The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) are hosting a conference of specialists to assess, compare and identify innovative methodological approaches for the development and refinement of tools for measuring compliance with the right to development,

> more

MHR Issue Papers

Quick dissemination pieces intended to stimulate policy discussion on evidence-based policy and programming to the realm of human rights policy.

* MHR Associate Research Fellow 2009

** MHR Associate Research Fellows 2008

Recent Program Areas of Interest: Policy Implementation

Measuring Human Rights in Mexico

EGAP and the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government are working together on a research and policy project on the measurement of human rights and the implementation of the National Program for Human Rights (PNDH) in Mexico.  The collaboration, led by the Measurement and Human Rights Program at the Carr Center and EGAP/Campus Estado de Mexico is being carried out under the cooperative agreement between EGAP and the Harvard Kennedy School. The effort seeks to develop evidence-based tools to guide the role of systematic assessment techniques in human rights work.

> read more

 

 

Recent Program Areas of Interest: Children's Rights

Children Involved in Armed Conflict

There are formidable challenges to implementing programs that aim to reintegrate children formerly associated with armed forces and groups in post-conflict states. Moreover, there are formidable challenges in measuring the effectiveness of such programs.


> read more

MHR

MHR

Children without a State:
Undocumented and Unregistered Children

The impact of inadequate documentation and registration on children is an under-researched but emerging issue in the area of human rights policy and child protection. With the growth of irregular migration and the escalation of concerns regarding global security and anti-terrorism, proof of identity and of legal status and nationality are increasingly key aspects of human security.

> read more

 

Studies on Measuring Human Rights

Human Development Repor 2009

Overcoming barriers:
Human mobility and development

Migration, both within and beyond borders, has become an increasingly prominent theme in domestic and international debates, and is the topic of the 2009 Human Development Report (HDR09).

>read more

------------------------------

HDR 2009 cover
 
ANNOUNCEMENTS

MHR Course

Human rights Policy Analysis: Tools and Practices

 A course addressing major human rights policy challenges and analysis techniques, with a focus on tools and practices in assessing impact and measuring progress.

Updated Syllabus

> read more

Research

MHR Fellows

Associate Research Fellows

Topics:

International Human Rights Tribunals and the Problem of Measuring Compliance Bibliography

 

Overcoming the Guesstimate: Measuring Reintegration after Conflict.

> more


 

A Call for Contributions!
The Measurement & Human Rights Program is currently collecting papers, publications, or any other media by practitioners and academics in the human rights field. The MHR Program is interested primarily in work that details the measuerment, methodology and impact on policy of human rights efforts.

> read more

 

External news

October 5, 2009
HDR 2009
"Overcoming barriers:
Human mobility and development"

Migration, both within and beyond borders, has become an increasingly prominent theme in domestic and international debates, and is the topic of the 2009 Human Development Report (HDR09). 
read more

 

------------------

September 14, 2009

Report of the commission on the measurement of economic performance et social progress

On theadequacy of current measures of economic performance, in particular those based on GDP figures, and relevance of these figures as measures of societal well-being.

>more