Social, Economic and Cultural Rights
Should they be Protected in the New Constitution?
What are Social, Economic and Cultural Rights?
“Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” was the slogan of the French Revolution, and some
writers have used the slogan as a rough guide to divide human rights into three
“generations”.
The first generation of human rights, which were the first to be recognised in
international law, are those concerned with “liberty”, i.e. with the right to participate
in political life. Examples of these rights are the rights to personal liberty and the
protection of law, freedom of association and speech, and the right to vote in
elections.
The second generation of rights are those directed at bringing about equal treatment
for all members of society. These rights are also called social, economic and cultural
rights, and they include such rights as:
• the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions
of work, including equal pay for equal work, and protection against
unemployment;
• the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and
periodic holidays with pay;
• the right to education, which should be free at least in the elementary and
fundamental stages;
• the right to housing; and
• the right to social security, including social insurance.
• the right of different cultural groups to maintain their cultural identity and
practices.
The third generation of rights [a broad and rather woolly category] are those directed
at “fraternity”, i.e. at ensuring social harmony. They include:
• the right to a healthy environment, including the right to clean water;
• the right to natural resources;
• group and collective rights;
• the right to self-determination; and
• inter-generational rights.
Here, when we refer to “social, economic and cultural rights” [“SEC rights”] we mean
second-generation rights as well as any third-generation rights which are capable of
being defined reasonably clearly.
Several SEC rights are enunciated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of
1948 and many more in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural
Rights of 1966.
Should SEC Rights be Protected by the New Constitution?
There is a strong moral argument for protecting SEC rights in the Declaration or Bill of
Rights in the our new constitution. Most Zimbabweans face hardship and poverty. To
them, first-generation rights such as freedom of expression and association may be
less important than social and economic rights such as the right to adequate housing
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