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Do Social Rights Affect Social Outcomes?

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  • Christian Bjørnskov

    () (Department of Economics and Business, Aarhus University)

  • Jacob Mchangama

    (Center for Political Studies, Copenhagen, Denmark)

Abstract

While the United Nations and NGOs are pushing for global judicialization of economic, social and cultural rights (ESCRs), little is known of their consequences. We provide evidence of the effects of introducing three types of ESCRs into the constitution: the rights to education, health and social security. Employing a large panel covering annual data from 160 countries in the period 1960-2010, we find no robust evidence of positive effects of ESCRs. We do, however, document adverse medium-term effects on education and inflation.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Bjørnskov & Jacob Mchangama, 2013. "Do Social Rights Affect Social Outcomes?," Economics Working Papers 2013-18, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    • Handle: RePEc:aah:aarhec:2013-18
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    Cited by:

    1. Romain Espinosa, 2016. "State provision of constitutional goods," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 1-40, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Human rights; human development; constitutional political economy;

    JEL classification:

    • K19 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Other
    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

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