122 THE YALE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW [Vol. 33: 113 advocates worried about commandeering sovereign macroeconomic choice, a minimum content for economic and social rights would seem to reduce (if not eliminate) this risk, in creasing the latitude for st ates to pursue thei r own 43 within the broad human ri ghts “particular form of government,” 44 framework. Thirdly, for commentat ors wishing to intro duce a manageable legal impetus to global redistributive debate s, the minimalist connotations of the minimum core concept signal an acce ptable moderation. Bård-Anders Andreassen and other advo cates from the development field suggested in the 1980s that minimum standards would provide the basis for a more progressive, if restrained, redistribut ion of resources rather than more extensive efforts, thus placating t he self-interest of developed states. 45 These commentators also sought to delimit economic and social entitlements to their barest forms in order to avoid the disruption of pr oduction incentives, which would work against their practical success.46 While the logic of these three arguments continues to ho ld, the first and the second are accompanied by traces of anachronis m. When advocates claim “retrogression” in debates about economi c and social rights, they are more concerned with establishing the deliberateness of the state policy or its causal effect, rather than whet her it has impacted some essential minimum. 47 Similarly, when advocates of the minimum core assert its modesty in relation to states parties’ sovere ign political economic choices, they are usually aware that many policies have been conditioned by in ternational financial institutions rather than the states them selves and that “sov ereignty” is often more respected in the breach.48 43. General Comment No. 3, supra note 1, ¶ 8. 44. Matthew Craven, The Protection of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights under the InterAmerican System of H uman Rights, in THE INTER-AMERICAN SYSTEM OF HUMAN RIGHTS 289, 316 (David J. Harris & Stephen Livingstone eds., 1998). 45. Bård-Anders Andreassen, Tor Skålnes, Alan G. Sm ith & Hugo Stokke, Assessing Human Rights Performance in Developing Countries: The Case for a Minimal Threshold Approach to the Economic and Social R ights, in HUMAN RIGHTS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES, 1987-1988, at 333, 342 (arguing that “a minimalist focus . . . m ay better urge international redistributive effort at least by those states that already have passed well beyond a m inimal level in their own countries”). Although Andreassen et al.’s “m inimum threshold” proposal should not be confused with the “m inimum core” approach, not least because it references society-wide rather than individual levels of enjoyment, similar rationales can be traced to each approach. 46. Id. at 341-42 (warning that “[a]brupt, overam bitious attempts at large scale redistribution might produce disincentives to protec tion and attendant dislocations to the point where the position of the least advantaged might in fact be lowered”). 47. General Comment No. 3, supra note 1, ¶ 9 (noting “deliberately retrogressive m easures . . . would need to be justified by reference to the totality or rights . . . and in th e context of the full use of the maximum available resources”). For the sugg estion that “deliberate” does not suggest a requirement to intentionally reduce the enjoym ent of economic and soci al rights, see O FFICE OF THE U.N. HIGH COMM’R FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS: HANDBOOK FOR NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS INSTITUTIONS, at 28, U.N. Doc. HR/P/PT/12, U.N. Sales No. E.04.XIV.8 (2005). 48. For an empirical study of the universal (if une ven) influence of global exports and trade, as well as transnational production, on national social and econom ic policy, see, for exam ple, GOVERNING GLOBALIZATION: POWER, AUTHORITY AND GLOBAL GOVERNANCE (David Held & Anthony McGrew eds., 2002); see also J AMES M. CYPHER & JAMES L. DIETZ, THE PROCESS OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 516 (2d ed. 2004) (describi ng the rise of structural ad justment lending since 1979 and development of the W orld Bank’s m ission to “guide the econom ic trajectory of entire nations”); and JOSEPH E. STIGLITZ, GLOBALIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS (2002) (providing an account of the role of international institutions in structural economic reform).