Child care policy and gender equality in Ireland
lovechrist2000
HumanRightsPolicyandLaw-Assignment2.pptxAssignment 2 - Option A
3000 word essay on an applied human rights and social policy topic with a focus on Ireland. This essay is +/- 10 percent, and excluding referencing and bibliography.
For example evaluating a Shadow Report to a human rights treaty body.
You will require –
The Government’s State party's report
A Shadow Report of a NGO or CSO
The human rights committee’s Concluding observations
Then,
Identify one key issue within the Government Government’s State party’s Report
Identify and detail how an NGO or CSO’s Shadow Report addresses the same issue
Identify and detail the recommendations and comments from human rights committee’s Concluding observations
Provide context for the issue using other social policy insights in Ireland.
The essay will focus around the technique of using human rights shadow Reports by Irish Civil Society actors to address gaps in Irish Social Policy.
Applied essay 60% of your final grade.
Assessment submitted via turnitin link on our moodle page
| Background What are human rights What is the work of the United Nations, and the various bodies and councils, including the human rights council? What is the role and work of the committee on Economic Social and Cultural Rights? What are shadow reports and why are they relevant? | 400 words |
| Overview of your study of shadow reports What area are you interested in and why? What countries are you going to evaluate? What is the social policy context What is the main issue and why is this human rights issues important? | 500 words |
| Evaluation What is the government saying on the issue? What is a NGO or CSO shadow report saying? Analysis of this interaction, gaps, differences between the reports What is the Committee’s Concluding observations saying and recommending? | 1500 words |
| Analysis, recommendations & Conclusion Your assessment and evaluation of this process How might these human rights insights change Irish policy? | 600 words |
| Bibliography Appendices |
Accessing the reports on the web
Access the website of the Office of the High Commissioner of human rights https://www.ohchr.org/EN/pages/home.aspx
Select the country and view the Reporting Status
Then select the Convention of Economic Social and Cultural Rights
You will need to look for the State Party reports, info from the NGO’s (Shadow Reports) and the Concluding observations
Next steps ….
Examine or identify an issue you would like to evaluate, and try and identify where that issue is addressed in the human rights monitoring bodies.
Get in touch with your lecturer and discuss your topic that you want to address.
Identify -
The Government’s State party's report
A Shadow Report of a NGO or CSO
The human rights committee’s Concluding observations
Additional material that will contextualise the issue.
Guidelines for writing your 3000 word Policy Brief
Policy Briefs are used by policy-makers - and those wishing to influence policy-making - so as to clearly, logically and persuasively outline a case for the development of a policy or ways in which a policy idea may need to be modified. Additionally, Policy Briefs can be developed to resist or reject a policy idea.
The Policy Brief should be structured as follows:
Title
Executive
summary
Context and importance of the problem
Critique of policy options
Policy recommendations
Concluding remarks
Bibliography Appendices
Guidelines for writing your 3000 word Policy Brief
Title
It should not be too long, but should try to capture the reader – look at the titles of some published policy papers to get some ideas.
Executive Summary
It is important to write an executive summary, as sometimes this is the only thing that a busy Minister or civil servant will read. It only needs to be one to two paragraphs and is a very short summary of the information you will outline in the rest of the brief. It usually includes:
A clear statement of the purpose of the Policy Brief
A brief description of the policy problem
A very brief summary of your suggested policy alternatives and recommendations
Guidelines for writing your 3000 word Policy Brief
Context and importance of the problem
Here you are convincing the reader that a problem exists and that the Government needs to take a particular action on the issue. In this section, you are providing background information on the policy problem. Things you may like to include are:
1) What is the policy problem?
2) When and how did interest in the problem arise?
3) What is the legal, political and social context of the problem?
4) Why does the Government need to look at this policy issue?
5) How does it affect society, or who is affected by the problem?
6) What is wrong with the current approach?
Guidelines for writing your 3000 word Policy Brief
Critique of policy options
In this section, you outline what you think are the policy options or policy alternatives and your preferred policy option.
You need to outline the different possible options and which you believe is the most effective in solving the problem.
You will get some ideas of different policy alternatives from your research and it is important to mention that there are different opinions on the issue
Policy Recommendations
In this section you are stating the course of action that you believe the Government needs to take. This is an important part of the brief, and along with the executive summary is sometimes the only part that Ministers and decisions-makers read.
Recommendations are usually numbered and they can be broken down into different headings or sections.
You may like to make recommendations on what the Government needs to do to move the issue further. Is any additional information (cost, research, public sentiment etc) required before new legislation can be enacted?
State any limitations to your chosen policy option.
Concluding Remarks
Only three or four sentences are needed. Here you can sum up the benefit of your approach to particular groups or society as a whole.
