of trafficking cases, though, State authorization or control is either non-existent or difficult to establish. There is, however, an alternative basis upon which States may be held responsible in the context of human rights violations, known as the standard of “due diligence”. now widely accepted.118 A failure on the part of the State to protect (including from private interference), respect, promote or fulfil its human rights obligations – owed to every person within its jurisdiction – is something that is directly attributable to the State and, therefore, sufficient to trigger its international legal responsibility. 2.3. THE DUE DILIGENCE STANDARD Under the standard of “due diligence”, a State is obliged to exercise a measure of care in preventing and responding to acts by private entities that interfere with established rights. Failure to prevent an anticipated human rights abuse by a private individual or entity will therefore invoke the responsibility of the State. Similarly, legal responsibility will arise when the State fails to remedy abuses or violations of international human rights law, not only because access to remedies is of itself an established right (see discussion of Principle 17 and related guidelines), but also because failure by the State to provide remedies in cases involving non-State interference with rights is a breach of the standard of due diligence. In other words, liability arises where the State could have made the situation better for the victim but failed to do so. Under the standard of “due diligence”, the State is not held responsible for the acts of others, but it is held responsible for its own failure to prevent, investigate, prosecute or compensate for the commission of the act. International human rights law imposes a wide range of obligations on the State which go well beyond the simple obligation “not to traffic”. These are commonly identified as obligations to protect, to respect, to promote and to fulfil. Examples can be found in many human rights treaties.117 The four-level typology of a State’s obligations with respect to human rights (to respect, protect, promote and fulfil) is even if the person/entity exceeds authority or contravenes instructions: Draft articles on State responsibility, articles 5 and 7. The conduct of a person/entity can also be attributed to the State if they are acting under the instructions of, or under the direction or control of, the State (article 8); or if the State acknowledges and adopts the conduct as its own (article 11). See, for example, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, article 6 (1) (“Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law”); European Convention on Human Rights, article 1 (“The High Contracting parties shall secure to everyone in their jurisdiction the rights and obligations defined in Section I”); American Convention on Human Rights, article 1 (“The States Parties to this Convention undertake to respect the rights and freedoms recognized herein and to ensure to all persons subject to their jurisdiction the free and full exercise of those rights and freedoms”); African Charter, article 18 (3) (“The State shall ensure the elimination of every discrimination against women and also ensure the protection of the rights of the woman and the child”) (emphases added). The “due diligence” standard has a long history in the law of State responsibility for injury to aliens.119 It entered international human rights law through a landmark decision of the InterAmerican Court of Human Rights in 1988, the 117 See Asbjorn Eide, “Economic, social and cultural rights as human rights” in Asbjorn Eide, Catarina Krause and Allan Rosas (eds.), Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights: A Textbook (1995), pp. 21-40. For an application of the methodology, see Social and Economic Rights Action Center (SERAC) and the Center for Economic and Social Rights (CESR) v. Nigeria, African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, Comm. No. 155/96 (2002). 118 Malcolm Shaw, International Law (2003), pp. 721724; Dinah Shelton, “ Private violations, public wrongs and the responsibilities of States”, Fordham International Law Journal, vol. 13 (1989), p.1. 119 COMMENTARY 77