Realizing human rights through government budgets

This publication explores the linkages between obligations under international human rights law and budget policies and processes. It seeks to sensitize government officials to better understand their human rights obligations as they decide budget allocations, implement planned expenditures, and assess the budget's impact on the realization of human rights. And, it aims to provide non-governmental actors with information about the relationship of human rights to budget processes and specific budget decisions, so that they are better able to hold their governments to account. This is especially important for the poorest and most marginalized groups, because they are more dependent on government programmes to realize their rights than those who are better off.