The status of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas in international law

Abstract

In 2021, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP or Declaration) celebrates its third anniversary. Since its adoption by the United Nations General Assembly (GA) in 2018, the UNDROP has inspired a growing load of academic and nonacademic research. This research has analysed almost every aspect of the UNDROP, from questioning the reasons behind its adoption, to its ostensible recognition of a right to participate in the management of natural resources, as well as the controversial affirmation of peasants’ right to plant genetic resources
in international human rights law. In particular, there is a growing focus and attention on the UNDROP’s status in general international law, no doubt prompted by the over-eager opinionists and authors who immediately after the adoption of the Declaration held that some of the fundamental rights and freedoms encompassed therein already constitute part of general international law. The anxiety over whether aspects and issues of the UNDROP are binding or not is clear and evident, yet little attention is granted by the authors and opinionists of this interpretation to the limitations of general international law and the unrealistic expectations such a claim produces in peasants, other rural workers and their representatives. Given the scrutiny the Declaration has attracted, this work approaches some of the most noteworthy issues and themes arising from the international legal literature on the UNDROP of the past three years, in order to reflect on the meaning of the UNDROP’s third anniversary.