Through the adoption of resolution 27/24, the Human Rights Council requested the High Commissioner for Human Rights prepare a study on “best practices, experiences and challenges and ways to overcome them with regard to the promotion, protection and implementation of the right to participate in public affairs in the context of the existing human rights law with a view to identifying possible elements of principles guiding this implementation”.

Summary

This study identifies challenges to the right to political and public participation and ways to overcome those challenges. It provides examples of best practices and experiences with respect to the implementation of the right to participate in political and public affairs. It also makes recommendations drawn from the contributions received as well as from other available sources.

The study should be read in conjunction with the report on factors that impede equal political participation and steps to overcome those challenges (A/HRC/27/29), which examines the human rights framework and jurisprudence of United Nations human rights mechanisms in relation to participation in political and public affairs.