prof.mr.dr. Karin Arts

My professorial chair at the International Institute of Social Studies in The Hague (part of Erasmus University Rotterdam) covers the field of International Law and Development. I see and study law as a major factor in processes of development and/or transition, either as an instrument of change or as a vehicle for guarding the status quo. In recent decades, various developments have brought about a situation where national legal orders and processes for tackling development, equity and human rights issues have been exposed increasingly to the sphere, if not the rule, of international law. These developments included a relatively widespread intensification of international cooperation (e.g. through international organizations such as the United Nations or through regional organizations such as the European Union, the African Union or the Organization of American States); economic and social globalization; and growing (and renewed) ideas about interdependence and common responsibility for overcoming major global challenges, such as climate change or pandemics, as well as massive and/or flagrant violations of human rights. Currently, the international legal order is seriously challenged e.g. by biased implementation (e.g. relating to Palestine and Ukraine) and nationalist tendencies. 

My work focuses on the following, interrelated and mutually reinforcing academic fields:

* the role of international law as an instrument of change and/or constraint for realizing, world-wide, equitable development, human rights and climate justice;

* the role of global and regional international organizations for realizing the right to development;

* the contents and implications of (human) rights-based approaches to development;

* the role of global human rights instruments in supporting the institutionalization of specific national action for realizing development, equity and human rights in practice, with special emphasis on the track record of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.