Content
Part 1
Human rights during health crises... 1
1 'Human rights against human arbitrariness': pandemics in a human rights historical perspective... 3
2 Human rights-based versus populist responses to the pandemic... 19
3 Human rights in times of pandemics: necessity and proportionality... 35
4 COVID-19 risk communication: the right to information and participation... 52
Part 2
Vulnerability and inequality... 65
5 The human (rights) costs of inequality: snapshots from a pandemic... 67
6 Racial justice to the forefront: do Black lives matter in international law?... 82
7 COVID-19 and violence against women: unprecedented impacts and suggestions for mitigation... 100
8 COVID-19 and disability: a war of two paradigms... 116
9 Life and death in prisons... 133
10 Seizing opportunities to promote the protection of the rights of all migrants... 150
Part 3
Cornerstones for social cohesion... 171
11 A paradigm shift for the Sustainable Development Goals?... 173
12 The human rights to food: lessons learned toward food systems transformation... 191
13 COVID-19 and the human rights to water and sanitation... 209
14 Land rights in crisis... 225
15 How the pandemic has impacted the various layers of the global garment supply chain... 238
16 Campaigning for both innovation and equitable access to COVID-19 medicines... 257
17 Is COVID-19 frustrating or facilitating sustainability transformations? An assessment from a human rights law perspective... 274
Conclusion... 291
18 The post-crisis human rights agenda... 293

This timely collection brings together original explorations of the COVID-19 pandemic and its wide-ranging, global effects on human rights.

The contributors argue that a human rights perspective is necessary to understand the pervasive consequences of the crisis, while focusing attention on those being left behind and providing a necessary framework for the effort to 'build back better'. Expert contributors to this volume address interconnections between the COVID-19 crisis and human rights to equality and non-discrimination, including historical responses to pandemics, populism and authoritarianism, and the rights to health, information, water and the environment. Highlighting the dangerous potential for derogations from human rights, authors further scrutinize the human rights compliance of new legislation and policies in relation to issues such as privacy, protection of persons with disabilities, freedom of expression, and access to medicines. Acknowledging the pandemic as a defining moment for human rights, the volume proposes a post-crisis human rights agenda to engage civil society and government at all levels in concrete measures to roll back increasing inequality.

With rich examples, new thinking, and provocative analyses of human rights, COVID-19, pandemics, crises, and inequality, this book will be of key interest to scholars, students, and practitioners in all areas of human rights, global governance, and public health, as well as others who are ready to embark on an exploration of these complex challenges.