CONCLUSION Rights which, once functioning, will be empowered to adjudicate over the rights enshrined in the African Charter.13 Later in the same year, the African Commision adopted a resolution on economic, social and cultural rights in Africa suggesting we can anticipate increased focus on these rights in the future work of the Commission.14 Giving effect to ESC rights at home The nature of international and regional human rights’ obligations requires that states give effect to these rights. This includes recognizing the rights at the national level by ensuring that they can be invoked before domestic courts and tribunals. It also means that administrative and other authorities take account of the rights in all their decision-making processes. Giving effect to ESC rights requires that remedies are available to aggrieved individuals or groups and that systems are in place to ensure governmental accountability.15 The allocation of resources must be decided taking due account of intra-state regional disparities and the particular needs of marginalized and economically disadvantaged groups. These must include minorities, indigenous peoples and women members of those communities, determined through the use of data disaggregated on multiple grounds such as age, ethnicity 16 and gender.17 Collecting data that allows for informed policy and expenditure can also play a critical role in diffusing any potential tensions or resentment between minorities or indigenous peoples and other poor and marginalized people in the allocation of resources. The increasingly detailed guidance offered by the elaboration of human rights standards and the subsequent implementation of positive obligations aimed at securing the rights of minorities and indigenous peoples has much to offer in terms of conflict prevention and sustainable development. Just as the economic development of the state must be considered in light of its obligations to respect the cultural rights of minorities,18 so must all actions at the national and international levels be consistent with the entrenched rights of minorities and indigenous peoples. By facilitating an awareness and understanding of ESC rights, mechanisms for their enforcement, and favoured methods of advocacy, it is hoped this guide provides a step in that direction. Notes 1 See for example, Stavenhagen, R., Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of Indigenous Peoples, UN doc. A/59/258, 2004, para. 32; and, Lennox, C., Minority Rights and Development: Overcoming Exclusion, Discrimination and Poverty, London, Minority Rights Group International, 2002, as submitted to the UN Working Group on Minorities, UN doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/AC.5/2002/WP.6. 97