draft Convention and was comprised of representatives from government and civil
society participating together equally and without distinction.^22 The Working Group’s
product emphatically reflected the real-life experiences of persons with disabilities and
became the working text of the Ad Hoc Committee and the basis for the eventual
Convention.^23 The Convention truly enshrined the slogan of the international disability
movement, “nothing about us without us.”^24
The CRPD is a hybrid convention, containing civil and political rights as well as
economic, social and cultural rights. The Convention does not lay out a hierarchy of
rights, and many of the individual articles contain both categories of rights.^25 State
Parties are obligated to guarantee civil and political rights upon ratification of the
Convention, but it is acknowledged that State Parties may not be in a position to
guarantee economic, social and cultural rights immediately.
The standard of implementation for economic, social, and cultural rights is "progressive
realization" to the maximum of a State's available resources.^26 This means that those
rights must be progressively implemented. Two important elements of implementation
of those rights are immediately binding, however. First, governments must ensure that
those rights are applied on a non-discriminatory basis and, governments must
undertake concrete steps to implement those rights.^27
II. Optional Protocol and Monitoring
(^22) See UN Enable, Ad Hoc Committee on a Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on the
protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities, online
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/adhoccom.htm. 23
24 Ibid.^
“ Nothing about Us without Us? Recognizing the Rights of People with Disabilities” UN CHRONICLE,
2004, online http://www.un.org/Pubs/chronicle/2004/issue4/0404pl0.html. 25
26 Supra^ note 2 at 330.^
27 Supra note 1, Article 4(2).^
Ibid.