As defined by the United Nations in the mid 1990s, human security embraces the twin objectives of “freedom from fear” (referring to the threat of violence, crime, and war) and “freedom from want” (referring to economic, health, environmental and other threats to people’s well-being).⁷

In a more radical interpretation, individual human security is defined as superseding the security of the state. Such an approach can legitimise military “humanitarian” intervention where the state is unwilling or unable to guarantee the security of its citizens.⁸

This approach explicitly links economic, social and cultural development to the achievement of political and civil rights. It can provide a useful conceptual framework for conflict-sensitive development. Particularly relevant elements of the approach include:

• holistic approach to poverty: human rights provide a holistic framework for analysing a given poverty situation, which takes account of political factors, insecurity and conflict. Based on the indivisibility of rights, it helps develop strategies that address the economic, political and security dimensions of poverty in a comprehensive manner
• conflict and rights: rights-based development is particularly concerned with poverty that results from inequality and a denial of rights by powerful groups, since this contradicts the principle of universal rights. In violent conflicts, the rights of ordinary people are systematically infringed by the warring parties as well as by all those taking advantage of the conflict to promote their own economic and political interests. The rights-based response aims at enabling people to achieve their rights. This is likely to undermine the power structure on which conflict has been built. On the face of it that should reduce conflict, but there is the risk that it will provoke elites to fight back to retain the power structure that supports them, with the opposite effect. It is thus clear that a rights-based approach needs to be conflict sensitiveparticipation and accountability: a rights-based approach demands that all development actors act accountably and encourage participation. Accountability, participation, inclusion and supporting local capacities also represent preconditions for the peaceful management of conflicts. Enhancement of these qualities in the development context should help strengthen society’s capacity to deal with conflicts in a non-violent manner.