Toward an African Theory of Human Rights Interdependence: Evidence from Nigerian Constitutional Jurisprudence and Civil Society Practice

This doctoral research generates an original African theory of human rights interdependence, grounded in Nigerian constitutional jurisprudence and civil society rights practice, arguing that the doctrinal separation of civil-political rights from economic-social-cultural rights and collective peoples' rights is epistemologically and normatively inadequate to capture the integrated human rights realities of Nigerian and broader African experience. While the indivisibility and interdependence of human rights is formally affirmed in the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action (1993), global human rights practice continues to replicate hierarchies that subordinate social rights and collective rights. The research advances the thesis that Nigerian jurisprudence, combined with the African Charter's holistic rights model, provides distinctive empirical and normative material for constructing a theoretically robust African interdependence doctrine. A theoretical-empirical methodology is employed, combining original theory construction through engagement with Mutua's African rights conception, Nussbaum's capabilities approach, and African Ubuntu philosophy with systematic empirical analysis of Nigerian court decisions and civil society strategic litigation that demonstrate cross-rights interdependence. Five interdependence clusters are analyzed in depth: the right to life and social protection rights, freedom of expression and development rights, fair trial rights and access to water, bodily integrity rights and reproductive health rights, and political participation rights and the right to development. An original African Human Rights Interdependence Theory (AHRIT) is developed, with doctrinal and advocacy implications for Nigerian and regional human rights practice. Keywords: human rights interdependence, African theory, Nigerian jurisprudence, civil society, indivisibility.