Description
This article examines the impact of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Sub-Saharan Africa through its regional and stand-alone offices. In recent years, host countries like Uganda have increasingly questioned OHCHR’s effectiveness and withdrawn support, citing their capacity to manage human rights independently. Despite OHCHR’s decades-long presence, its impact at the ground level remains underexplored. Acknowledging OHCHR’s non-random selective office placement, this study proposes an empirical framework for analyzing its decision-making and operational processes. Using a novel hand-collected sample including the universe of OHCHR's local and region offices openings and closures from 2000 to 2022, I document that they are often established in stable, less violent countries with lower human rights and democracy records, with stand-alone offices frequently located in resource-rich, economically underdeveloped nations.
Although human rights scores appear to decline following office openings, this pattern reflects selection bias rather than actual deterioration. Once this issue is properly controlled for, data reveal that regional offices improve local human rights conditions, while stand-alone offices show no significant impact. These findings contribute to the debate on OHCHR’s strategic challenges and effectiveness.
