33) Human rights skills.

Human rights require not just knowledge, but the right attitudes and skills. Many of these are not inherent in people; however, they can be developed and refined over time, at both the individual and professional levels. An attitude is the manner of behaving, feeling or thinking that demonstrates a person’s disposition or opinion. The attitude of an architect, planner, designer, engineer, landscape designer, or developer can benefit or damage the urban environment, and can greatly affect the upgrading of social and commercial services and related facilities, the improvement of urban and regional transport networks, and the preservation of the architectural and cultural heritage in urban areas. Furthermore, the quality of any human-rights-based solution will empower communities’ efforts to counteract the functional obsolescence and future sustainability of their urban structure.

Honoring human rights requires consultation, dialogue, creativity rather than coercion, force, repression, and exclusion. Architects must therefore acquire the relevant skills for building consensus around issues relating to the right to housing and human-rights architecture. Support-based strategies that recognize the role of the informal sector in the creation of housing must be developed and implemented. In the final analysis, the full realization of the right to adequate housing depends on the extent of attitudes, skills, awareness, and actions taken toward this end. Together, planners and architects working toward this goal should explore the potential of space as a platform for social, economic, and environmentally inclusive development.

Human-rights architecture requires compliance with the principals of human rights, and necessitates working with respect for these basic principles, such as the inclusion of the humanitarian imperative, neutrality, independence, and impartiality.

From community mobilization to design of re-blocking plans and the upgraded of houses to negotiations with city government around building regulations and provision of infrastructure and basic services, every project starts with an assessment of how design and planned activities, including those of operational partners, adhere to or violate these core principles. It is up to all professionals involved at every step of the process to ensure that all activities are in line with the core principles of human rights. Planners should inform all actors, regardless of their function, about the core principles and how they can demonstrate them in their work, such as through the Human Rights Architecture code of conduct.