Regardless of this feature of international human rights law, the trend of dissociating inter-related obligations continues and can be illustrated by typical descriptions of only one side of the coin: • • human rights may be defined only as safeguards against abuse of government’s power, which leads to restricting human rights to protections against torture, summary executions or disappearances. The corollary is an erroneous perception that human rights can be secured without governmental funding because the only requirement is that governments refrain from abusing their power. Such a perception is based on silence about the cost of a well-trained, professional and wellpaid police which is necessary to prevent abuses of power. The underlying vision of the government as an enemy leads to demands for a small government, opposition to taxation or governmental intervention in the free market, thus clashing against the postulated role of the government in eradicating poverty, protecting the rights of the child, or eliminating gender discrimination. the right to education may be defined in terms of access to free-of-charge schooling at all levels – from the nursery to post-graduate studies – which increases its cost beyond the reach of many governments. The underlying idea is that having a right means that the government should fund and deliver whatever service is associated with such a right. It is easily shown as a misinterpretation taking the right to marry as example – nobody would argue that having a right to marry means that the government has to furnish a spouse to whoever wants one. Rather, having the right to marry entails corresponding governmental obligations to regulate the age of marriage (by prohibiting child marriage), to secure that women have a right to marry (by ensuring that they are not sold and purchased), that spouses have equal rights (starting from the outlawing of polygamy), or that people who marry are not penalized by having their taxation raised. 1. Availability Ensuring that primary schools are available for all children necessitates a considerable investment, which is amplified by post-compulsory education and universities. While the state is not the only investor, international human rights law obliges it to be the investor of last resort so as to ensure that primary schools are available for all school-age children. In Africa children of primary-school age constitute close to onethird of the population and the majority is living in rural areas. Making primary education available to dispersed rural communities, some of whom may be nomadic, illustrates the scope of the challenge. The current global priority for primary education has focused attention away from secondary and tertiary education, and thus from governmental obligations in this area. This issues will be discussed in Primer No. 7. Ensuring that education is available revolves rarely, if ever, only around funding. Freedom of parents and communities to Right to Education Primers No. 3 17