citizens of the states Parties the access, under general conditions of equality, to the
public service of their country.
117. This civil right was denied to Mr. Guevara, whose standing as a citizen was
diminished by the mere fact of being disabled, although his political rights remained
intact.
118. As indicated by the World Health Organization, the fulfillment of development
prospects requires the emancipation of people with disabilities by eliminating the
obstacles (barriers) that prevent them from participating in the community. This
includes the opportunity to perform work with dignity.76
119. Thus, the state, as the public space par excellence for the realization of
citizenship, has enhanced duties to guarantee insertion of these persons and prevent
any impingement of this guarantee.
120. Now, while in the case of Guachalá Chimbo v. Ecuador, this Court has already
recognized that states are obliged to act to prevent third parties from maintaining or
fostering discriminatory situations in relation to persons with disabilities,77 this
obligation is even more tangible when the state itself is the employer, as in the
present case, since under this circumstance—as has been said—it is the vertical
dimension of the law (directly the authorities of the state signatory to the Convention)
that is in question. There is no room for a defense based on the autonomy of the will
of the state in this public sphere.
121. In addition, as stated in the OAS Charter, one of the aspects of the right to
work is that the performance of work confers dignity on those who do it. In the case
of persons with disabilities, given the challenges for insertion into and affirmation in
public life, this becomes even more relevant, such that any denial of access to or
permanence in a job is liable to have adverse effects that are even more serious in
the emotional and psychological sphere of the individual. In this regard, I would recall
the statement of Mr. Guevara Díaz’s brother to which I referred earlier, in which he
recounted in detail the serious impacts suffered by the victim after he was dismissed
from the Ministry of Finance.
122. Another aspect of the case sub judice that should be highlighted is that it helps
to illustrate the fallacy of the rationale of the distinction—in terms of cost
dependency—between civil and political rights, on the one hand, and ESCER, on the
other, based on a supposed free negative dimension of the former and a costly
positive dimension of the latter.
123. As I have already stated, every human right—whether or not it classifies as
a—entails costs for the state and requires, to some degree, that permanent
institutions and bureaucracies be maintained for it to be effective. All of them depend,
at a minimum, on the vigilance and supervision of institutions that involve public
spending, such as the judiciary, the police, and institutions like the public defender's
office to guarantee access to justice.
124. The artificiality of this distinction—which is foundational to the thinking of
those who maintain that social rights are mere programs of action, without immediate
efficacy or justiciability—was approached with masterly clarity by professors Cass
Sunstein and Stephen Holmes, who more than 20 years ago highlighted the
76
Cf. WHO, World Report on Disability, 2011, p. 5.
Cf. Case of Guachalá Chimbo et al. v. Ecuador. Merits, Reparations, and Costs. Judgment of March
26, 2021. Series C No. 423, para. 80.
77
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