Guarantees of Non-Repetition and the Right to Health: Review of the Law and Evolving Practice of Judicial and Semi-Judicial Bodies at Global and Regional Levels

The purpose of this thesis is to analyse the concept of guarantees of non-repetition (GNR) in international law and to consider how to apply GNR in violations of the right to health. GNR are, together with compensation, restitution and satisfaction, forms of reparation. Although international tribunals and UN bodies have increasingly made use of this form of reparation, there is no clarity about both the legal status of the obligation to provide GNR, and the scope and reach of this obligation. Moreover, as economic, social and cultural rights (ESCR) are often targeted with the claim that their redress requires complex and expensive forms of reparation, there is a lack of clarity as to whether GNR are applicable to this type of rights and, if they are, how so. This thesis aims to make a twofold contribution to the literature. On the one hand it aims to unpack the elements of the duty of states to provide GNR in international law, whilst on the other, it aims to show a practical application of this form of remedy in a particular ESCR: the right to health. It is argued in this thesis that the obligation to provide GNR has been increasingly recognised in public international law and international human rights law. This thesis will also argue that GNR are best granted in cases of large-scale, gross and serious violations of human rights and when there is a risk of repetition. It will also argue that GNR are equally applicable to all civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights; and that there is nothing in either the nature or the concept of the right to health that prevents the application of GNR to the redress of violations to the this right.