A/HRC/30/49 47. The right to the city was specifically laid down in the World Charter for the Right to the City (2005);21 a wide range of organizations and networks, including UNESCO and UN–HABITAT, participated in the preparation of this important document. The charter defines the right to the city as the equitable use of cities according to principles of sustainability, democracy, equity and social justice. It is a collective right of urban inhabitants that confers upon them the legitimate right to action and organization, based on respect of their differences, cultural expressions and practices, with the objective of exercising their right to self-determination and attaining an adequate standard of living. The right to the city is interdependent with other internationally recognized human rights, including civil, political, economic, social, cultural and environmental rights, as defined in international human rights treaties. 48. The concept of “the rights of the city” has emerged during the past decades as an alternative to the withdrawal of central and state governments’ responsibilities and resources in the globalized market. Many cities are increasingly subordinated to central decision-making institutions, public budgets and investment, whereas municipalities have to fend for themselves and/or compete over resources for development and services, often without the authority to levy revenues or participate effectively in decisions affecting allocations. In such cases, local authorities face the prospect of resorting to the privatization of public goods and services – with their typically harmful economic consequences for the poor – and/or to seek fiscal support from the private financial market. The concept may refer to the administrative, political and economic rights of the local governments in relation to national/federal authorities, and to the presence and role of local authorities visà-vis the international and multilateral institutions (United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, etc.). 49. The concept of “human rights in the city”, developed mainly in the European Charter for the Safeguarding of Human Rights in the City and Global Charter-Agenda for Human Rights in the City,22 implies the commitment to: respect, protect and fulfil all internationally recognized human rights at the local level; give priority attention to marginalized groups and populations living under vulnerable conditions; and mainstream a human rights approach to local policies (not just the implementation of human rights programmes). 50. Meanwhile, best practices include policy initiatives that also recognize the validity of the approach to establish a “human rights habitat”, with its more-embracing concept of the rural-urban continuum, and the conscious recognition that the same rights of city dwellers apply equally to other inhabitants of the periphery of urban centers, as well as those in more distant regions. One example of this appellation is the First Civic Forum of Nairobi declaring its city a “human rights habitat” (2002). This initiative emerged with the support of the local Mazingira Institute, with its environmental programme and scope. Also, the Habitat International Coalition and its Housing and Land Rights Network have worked over the past decade to promote and develop the definition of “the right to the city”. 21 22 Full text available from http://portal.unesco.org, http://www.urbanreinventors.net/3/wsf.pdf and www.hic-net.org. The charter was drafted by the United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG) Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy and Human Rights. It was discussed and approved by elected representatives, experts and representatives of civil society from all over the world in 2011. 13