ABSTRACT
If participation is to be more than a token strategy, it must have legal consequences for decisions being made. One means of achieving this is the encourage a voluntary agreement that can be binding in law, akin to a collective agreement. The application of free, prior, and informed consent provides participants with a strong right to affect subsequent decisions in that decisions that restrict their rights will be impossible without their agreement. Where this does not apply, authoritative bodies indicate that participants’ views should be taken into account, sometimes on the basis of equality, but do not indicate how to measure when this has been adequately achieved. However, the State is required to monitor data on rights, including the extent to which they are adequately realised, the resources available to achieve them, and how a specific right would manifest itself with regard to the cultural requirements of particular communities. These data can be gathered through participation, and where this is the case, it will have an impact on the subsequent human rights obligations.
