The (In)effectiveness of UN Human Rights Treaty Body Recommendations

The actual domestic impact of the reporting process under UN human rights treaties on the ground has hardly been studied. This article attempts to fill this gap by examining the effectiveness of the recommendations of the UN human rights treaty bodies in the Netherlands, New Zealand and Finland. The aim of this article is to gather insights in the factors that contribute to the effectiveness of the recommendations by focusing on the differences between the six main UN human rights treaties and treaty bodies and variations among the three countries. While factors related to the defective design and limited legitimacy of the treaty body system inhibit the effectiveness of the recommendations, several domestic factors have at times positively affected the recommendations' effectiveness, particularly the mobilisation of domestic actors.