Chapter 5 Maximising Resources for ESC Rights through International Assistance and Cooperation 5.1 INTRODUCTION The sweeping effects of globalisation and of the international economic and political order dictate that human rights objectives be incorporated into international assistance and co-operation activities. In the context of ESC rights, the realities of globalisation and structural disadvantages for the poor call for a new paradigm of international assistance and co-operation in which ‘needy’ States have a stronger voice in determining how these efforts are managed. For many poor States, existing national resources and efforts are inadequate to break the vicious cycle of powerlessness, stigmatisation, discrimination, exclusion and material deprivation that characterise situations in which the basic rights of individuals are not always realised.1 It is important to emphasise, however, that this call for international assistance and cooperation, including the transfer of human rights-related resources from wealthy to poorer States, should not be seen as a claim for handouts or charity. Rather, it is an entitlement within an international social and economic order that is sensitive to basic human needs and rights.2 The international assistance and co-operation regime needs to be transformed into a more practical system 1 For example, Magdalena Sepúlveda, Final draft of the guiding principles on extreme poverty and human rights, submitted by the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona, 21st sess, Agenda Item 3, UN Doc A/HRC/21/39 (18 July 2012), 4. 2 Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, 'International Obligations for Economic and Social Rights: The Case of the Millennium Development Goal Eight' in Shareen Hertel and Lanse Minkler (eds), Economic Rights: Conceptual, Measurement, and Policy Issues (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007), 293.