Economic, social and cultural rights are basically those freedoms and privileges that people of a

society requires to live their lives with dignity and respect. These rights include right to earn,
right to food, shelter, clothing, right to health, right to education, right to practice culture and
religion freely and many more. States are under an obligation to respect, protect and fulfill
economic, social and cultural rights. Respect means that states has no legal authority to
interfere with enjoyment of the right, protecting means that the state is obligated to stop other
actors from interfering with the enjoyment of rights lastly fulfill supports the idea that a state is
bound to take such steps that creates ease for the people to enjoy their rights.

All the above mentioned rights are the most basic rights that a person must get to spend his
life. Right to health is a right which cannot be compared to right to sexuality. This is simply
because if a society will not get basic health facilities its mortality rate will get high and people
will not get to a certain age at which they could decide their gender. This example shows that
basic rights, economic, social and cultural rights, are more important than other rights.

ICESCR is the most operative covenant on human rights introduced by the UNHRC and UN
ensures that the states that are party to this covenant must ensure that they are taking
necessary steps towards the granting of economic, social and cultural rights to their people.
Article 1 of ICESCR clearly states “All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue
of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic,
social and cultural development”. This article of ICESCR is supporting the idea that
economic, social and cultural rights are the most basic and by far the most important of all.
The part 1 of ICESCR further elaborates the importance of all these rights and obligates the
state parties to promote the realization of the right of self-determination amongst its
people. According to the many scholars the rights that fall on the other side of the spectrum
are civil and political rights. According to UK human rights commission these rights include,
freedom from torture, fair trial rights, freedom of thought, religion and expression, privacy,
home and family life and equality and non-discrimination. However many scholars argue
that ICCPR falls under the umbrella of ICESCR; which means that economic, social and
cultural rights are basically three main types of the rights and all other rights fall under
them. This argument can be supported through Article 1 of ICESCR which clearly says that
people have right of self-determination and with the help of that they are free to choose
their political status. Then ICCPR talks about freedom of thought, religion and expression
but it can be said that all these rights come under the social rights, similarly home and
family life comes under the social rights (Article 10 ICESCR). This can be said that ICCPR is
only covering the social aspect of ICESCR. Furthermore part iii of the ICESCR covers all the
rights including workplace rights, freedom of expression, food security and social security.
Therefore it can be concluded that economic, social and cultural rights are the umbrella
rights and all other rights fall under these which further supports the idea that these rights
are the most important ones and everyone deserves to enjoy these in today’s worlds.
However third world or developing states have problem in implementing these but UN and
other international bodies are trying hard to convince the states for the implementation of
these basic and most rights.`