Analysis of the right to adequate food: a social and political human right

Abstract

This article analyzes the United Nations accepted distinction of human rights proclaimed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which resulted in two international covenants on human rights. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights recognizes the right to adequate food as a social and not a political right, assuming that it must occur progressively rather than immediately. In order to verify the pertinence of overcoming the thesisof progressiveness we initially rescue its origins, starting from the analysis of United Nations documents; we proceed with a critical analysis of State obligations, under the United Nations,  to guarantee the right to adequate food, based on references that denounce the hierarchization of rights. To expose the difficulty in reconciling human rights indivisibility, reinforced at the International Conference of Human Rights (Teheran 1968), with International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights advocating for the progressiveness for the fulfillment of the right to adequate food, we took as example the concrete case of the Brazilian population nutritional profile. The double aspect of the right to adequate food is recognized, both as a social right and a political right; the right to be free from hunger depends on respecting the right of access to adequate food; and it is necessary to claim its immediate fulfillment. The foundation for this defense can be no other than human dignity affirmed in Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a principle that admits no gradation and cannot be divided.