Statement of Mission
The Equal Rights Trust is an independent international organisation whose purpose is to combat discrimination and promote equality as a fundamental human right and a basic principle of social justice. Established as a resource centre and a think tank, it focuses on the complex and complementary relationship between different types of discrimination, developing strategies for translating the principles of equality into practice.
The Equal Rights Trust pursues its goals through advocacy, documentation of discriminatory practices, policy research and education. It gives priority to addressing the most serious patterns of discrimination and to providing redress for victims of systemic or multiple discrimination. The Trust is guided by the principles contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and subsequent United Nations covenants and takes these and relevant regional equality standards as the basis of the following types of activity:
- Advocating adoption of comprehensive national anti-discrimination legislation and policies – lacking at present in over 80 percent of the countries in the world;
- Advocating effective enforcement of anti-discrimination law and policies;
- Documenting patterns of discrimination around the world and drawing attention to them;
- Developing the content and improving the protection of the universal human right to equality of treatment and of opportunity through providing expertise;
- Improving the understanding of the importance of non-discrimination, equality and diversity in the context of human rights generally;
- Disseminating of good practices relating to equality across borders and jurisdictions;
- Facilitating public dialogue to broaden consensus on the value of equality.
Despite the fact that most states around the world are parties to human rights treaties that contain the principle and the right of equal treatment, discrimination on forbidden grounds remains a pervasive social evil and source of injustice around the world. The shocking fact that almost sixty years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights most Member States of the United Nations lack any anti-discrimination laws and policies and only a handful have made steps toward comprehensive equality framework defines a stark need for a global thematic organisation that works to change this status quo. The Equal Rights Trust was established with a view to meet this need.
Anti-discrimination advocacy has been pursued to date mainly from the frameworks of numerous single identity agendas, related to gender, race, ethnicity, religion, language, sexual orientation, disability, age, etc. The struggle for equality is enmeshed in identity politics, while the universal approach based on a fundamental and indivisible universal right to equality is neglected, and sometimes dismissed as too abstract or contrary to diversity. This neglect, including the fact that nearly no one in civil society works specifically on discrimination as such, has begun to spell a negative outcome for all victims of discrimination: namely, an underdeveloped right to equality and a very poor public understanding of this right. Although a huge amount of work is being done on facets of discrimination, it will not make good progress while it is so dispersed and fragmented.
The approach of the Equal Rights Trust is to seek a conceptual coherence in the field of equality, and to engage in building bridges of solidarity among advocates of different anti-discrimination causes. It works to generate systemic change in the direction of a stronger culture of equality. While this is a long-term effort, measurable improvement in the level of protection against discrimination and incremental growth of equal opportunity is within reach in many countries. The Trust aims at concrete practical results in the desired direction.
The Need for the Equal Rights Trust
The need for Equal Rights becomes evident when looking closer at the movements driving equality struggles and the obstacles they face. The landscape of the anti-discrimination struggle today is very complex and fragmented, broken down into more or less closed spaces from which other spaces are not perceived as interrelated in their relevance to equality. Many ethnic and religious minority groups struggling to assert their own identity or preserve their own culture stress their difference as a basis of claiming special minority rights, while governments and other central powers purport to represent a neutral and universal agenda, masking the anti-minority bias at the core of mainstream institutions. Equality of treatment and difference/diversity are frequently viewed as opposites whose tension breeds conflict. Regarding the different prohibited grounds of discrimination, many identity based groups have pressed for ground-specific non-discrimination norms, or even norms related to a single identity, whereas very few have advocated comprehensive, multi-ground anti-discrimination law and policy. This has led to a situation where, for example, a disabled ethnic minority woman has to choose the correct pigeonhole in which to put her case, whether on the ground of her race, or gender or disability. With regard to the different sectors of social life, such as the administration of justice, provision of goods and services, education, employment, healthcare, housing, etc., discrepancies in domestic protection create unfair treatment, as discriminatory conduct on a certain ground may be illegal in one sector (usually employment), whereas equivalent conduct in other sectors is tolerated. As a result, domestic laws against discrimination, in the small number of countries where they exist at all, are incomplete, inconsistent, and create tensions among victims due to the different levels of protection for the different grounds or in the different sectors of life. There is little cooperation of NGOs and government agencies across the different “strands” of equality. In recent years, the chaotic and fragmentary nature of anti-discrimination law and policy and the corresponding low efficiency of the struggles for equality have been identified as a matter of concern by numerous advocates.
Apart from the fragmentation problem, but at least in part perpetuated by it, public awareness of the concept of discrimination remains vague and confused even in countries with relatively developed legal protections against discrimination: most policy makers and ordinary people do not understand what conduct or policy amounts to a violation of anti-discrimination provisions and what remedies should be available to victims. The important concept of indirect discrimination is not widely understood, thus diminishing chances of legal redress in cases of disparate impact and systemic discrimination. The case law on discrimination is accordingly still weak and inconsistent, both in international and national jurisdictions.
The Equal Rights Trust works to transform rhetorical complaints of discrimination into efficiently brought claims of enforceable rights. Aware of efforts by other organisations, it tries to complement their work by developing general and applied positions on equality issues from a unified perspective reflecting the universal nature of the principle of non-discrimination inherent in the human rights value system.
The Added Value of the Trust
The added value of the Equal Rights Trust as an independent thematic human rights organsation focusing on equality is that it enables a concerted effort to promote equality law, policy, practice and culture, developing the substantive and procedural aspects of non-discrimination as a legal right, and overcoming the fragmentation problem. In particular, the Equal Rights Trust seeks to ensure compliance with the existing international and regional norms and standards related to discrimination, by promoting the adoption of effective anti-discrimination legislation. It seeks to facilitate the exchange of experience across jurisdictions, through documentation of violations of the right to non-discrimination, and comparative analysis of norms, court decisions, recommendations and good practices.
Working in Partnership The Equal Rights Trust takes care to avoid wasteful duplication of the efforts of other organisations active in the struggle against discrimination. It complements their work through helping frame issues in terms of discrimination, helping them bring strategic cases to court, finding adequate ways of addressing multiple or systemic discriminations cases, and developing understanding about the links between types of discrimination with a view to enhance legal defense against all types. The Trust focuses on building links between different single identity groups fighting discrimination.
The Equal Rights Trust is committed to a holistic, multidimensional approach. It relies on a mutually reinforcing effect between advocacy, documentation, legal and policy research, fostering public dialogue, and capacity building.
The Challenge Ahead
While work on discrimination is worthwhile because discrimination is both unjust and widespread, most of those who have tackled real issues of discrimination recognize how complex it is to remove it. Affirmations of policy, declarations of law, commitments of good will, are not usually enough to make a decisive impact. When change is achieved, it is usually through a laborious process and due to the interaction of clusters of policies. And it takes time. In many cases, explicit forms of discrimination are superceded by increasingly subtle and non-explicit ones, leaving the harms caused by discrimination intact. The Equal Rights Trust takes a pragmatic approach regarding the politics of anti-discrimination work, and the difficulties faced by anyone who engages in it. Progress will be slow; setbacks will occur; and new forms of discrimination will emerge. But the Trust will seek effects that represent steps in the right direction, towards substantive equality, through careful work on the ground, strategic selection of cases and places, political co-operation at local level, and synergy with national organizations.
As a thematic organization, the Equal Rights Trust is not geographically restricted to a particular region. This in itself is a challenge, creating the risk of scattering rather than streamlining resources. Mindful of the risk, the Trust focuses on pivotal thematic issues regarding discrimination and seeks impact in selected countries where it is possible to be a catalyst of change in advancing equality in a measurable and sustainable way. The beneficiaries are both the victims of discrimination, policy makers and decision takers, and the general public.