"Rights-based approaches": any new thing under the sun?

Abstract

After infra-structure development, community development, integrated rural development, basic needs, structural adjustment, human development and sustainable development -not to speak of "sustainable human development"- a new "approach" is gaining ground: human rights. The Human Development Report 2000 of the United Nations Development Programme explores this approach while analysing how far its conventional human development approach and the new human rights approach are "harmonious enough" in the sense of complementing rather than undermining each other.