Human Rights: Cost of Implementation - Report Example

HUMAN RIGHTS Renowned French Philosopher and human rights intellectual of eighteenth century, Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) has declared the very fact in his book “The Social Contract” that man was born free, but everywhere he is in chains. By this statement, he simply indicates the injustices, inequalities and bounds humans have to face during the course of their life. Hence, he stands for the preservation and implication of the human rights, which portray the need, popularity and universality of human rights. Human rights simply refer to the basic privileges and civil liberties every man must enjoy while living as a member of a human society as well as the part of the culture. Looking into the history of cultures and civilizations at large, it becomes evident that humans have always been the lovers of freedom of thought and action since their arrival on the Earth. All the wars, battles and conflicts are mere the outcome of the suppression and oppression committed on the poor, weak and helpless strata by the influential minority of a social establishment since ever. It is therefore, the religious leaders, philosophers and intellectuals devoted their lives for the elimination of tyranny and observance of social justice for all human beings without discrimination. Human Rights Cost of Implementation: Human rights activists have to tolerate lots of opposition and sufferings while combating with the violation of the human rights. One of the most startling hurdles on the way of implementing human rights is the division of society into groups and communities, where every group not only tries to prove itself as the superior one, but also it aims to implement its own policies over others, putting their freedom and survival in grave jeopardy. Social groups are not only divided into divergent religious, ethnic, cultural and racial groups, but also distribution of a society is based on age, gender and socioeconomic status too. When we think of castes and classes, Davis notes, and of social stratification in general, we have in mind the groups which occupy different positions in the social order and enjoy different amounts of prestige. Hence, positions based on sex, age and kinship do not form part of the system of stratification. On the other hand, the positions that are socially prohibited from being combined in the same legal family viz. different caste and class positions constitute what we call stratification. (1969: 364) Social inequalities are found in all fields of life and in all the institutions prevailing in a society. In this pretext identity politics and human rights movements came into existence. Identity politics refers to any political movement raised for maintaining the rights that are not accepted by the majority groups of a society due to some contradictory communal reasons. In other words, the concept denotes to such socio political activities that are based on the mutual experiences of injustice and inequalities of some specific social groups. Human rights activists have to make hardest efforts for winning equal human rights for the masses. Identity politics focuses on the security and uplift of the rights of a specific group or community that has been undergoing trials owing to the ethnicity or political ideas. This group or stratum of society contains its own characteristics, which may be based on caste, class, community, race, sexual orientation, gender and socioeconomic status etc. Some of the identity political groups include gay and homosexual rights groups, Marxists, Feminists, pro-Nazists, Maoists, black nationalists etc, which keep long record of struggle for their cause. The Feminist perspective theory also came into existence as the reaction of the suppression of women rights. The idea of division of labor on the basis of gender gave birth to feminism. It was a strong voice against the prevailing inequalities between men and women in respect of social status, division of power as well as work and gender discrimination. The theorists who brought the significance of women’s participation in the social construction programs to the limelight were declared as rebels and then liberals and Marxists. With the passage of time, these theorists got the title of Feminists. Eminent feminist writer Dorothy Allison, who raised a strong voice against child molestation and violence against the poor stratum of society, has very courageously submitted the sensitive case before the world and brought to the limelight how small girls especially from the lower stratum of society, experience improper environment quite harmful for their neuro-cognitive development due to manhandling, maltreatment and unjust behavior of their family members, teachers, neighbors and other community members since their childhood. Though the feminist perspective and movement for feminist liberty and equality got popularity during the second half of twentieth century, the struggle to win equal status for women had started by the end of eighteenth century. Nineteenth century witnessed imperative development in this regard. The share of women in social construction was not acknowledged, although they worked in fields, in hospitals, teaching institutes and other professions. Still the male domination was oppressive and tyrannical. At first, Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815-1902) in 19th century and Emma Goldman in the beginning of 20th century raised her voice in the United States for the women rights. Other feminist theorists including Patricia Hill Collins and others launched campaign for their rights in the later half of 20th century and demanded that women too should have been the same rights as had been delegated to men. Historically, radical feminism started with the assumption that the sexes are adversarially poised, that men have power over women, and that society and its various social relationships can be best understood in terms of their relationship to that situation (Eisenstein 1983). Renowned feminist and social activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton presented the case of equal status for women in the Declaration of Sentiments in 1848 in New York, which is considered as the first organized meeting held for the demand and implication of women rights. The opening part of the Declaration submitted to state that since Almighty God, the Creator, has made both the genders on equal foundations, neither the male stratum nor the government had any right to subjugate women stratum by imposing restrictions on them on the one hand, and imply prejudiced behavior towards the members of delicate sex on the other. Government had no power to make or implement any laws that could destroy women rights or challenge their equal status bestowed upon them through Divine Law. Men should not enjoy absolute authority by depriving the women from their liberty as well as the freedom of speech, action, behavior, writing and seeking happiness and pleasure within the legal bounds. If any stratum of society, including the individuals at the helm of the government even, attempts to challenge any just and true rights related to a particular group or community of society, it is the obligation of every member of society to strive for the elimination of such banishments. Stanton looked for the overthrow of a form of government involved in any type of conspiracy to obliterate women rights, and suggestion toppling of such government by force in the name of liberty and equality. PART II/Q 2 A: In your view, why should I believe in, and respect, human rights? Moreover, why should I believe that other people have human rights, and why should I respect them? Answer: It is the ethical and moral obligation of every human to believe in human rights, and condemn the violation of it. By critically examining the social norms, moral values, cultural traditions, prevailing laws and existing cult in various parts of the globe, it becomes evident that the basic motive behind the introduction, articulation and imposition of all such norms, values and mores was just to protect human rights and condemn their violation with an iron hand. It is social norms and statues of law that seriously regulate deviancy and perversion existing in the society. Since all the developments being made, in human societies, are designed on the foundations of fulfilling human requirements, why the society should ignore the first and foremost human need i.e. the protection of human sentiments, feelings, life, honor and property of all human beings without discrimination. When we go through the literature produced by the African Americans, we come to know how much necessary is the protection of human rights. The works of those writers remind us the ere when discrimination on the basis of race, religion, ethnicity and gender was the order of the day and the women and African blacks were looked down upon. Slavery was in vogue all over the globe, particularly in the USA and the European nations also brought the poor and helpless Africans for their services. Each and every type of pains and sufferings were inflicted upon the black slaves, who were unable to raise even a single voice of protest against their cruel and ruthless American and European masters. Women and the blacks had to make a long and exhaustive struggle to win their freedom and rights on equal foundations. They produced protest literature, organized demonstrations, articulated social movements and arranged demonstrations for the protection of their rights. The literature produced by the African American writers and poets, gave birth to the famous Harlem Renaissance Movement. The motive behind these writers was not mere expressing of their grief; rather, the aims of such writing material appeared as receiving additional gains out of the so-called miseries their previous generations suffered for decades. During nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the White Anglo Saxon Population (WASP) was reluctant to accept the equal status for Blacks at all. The writers played the most significant role in this regards. Great writers like Malcolm X, Margaret Drabble, Toni Morrison and others performed their ethical obligations in this regard. If humans remain violating human rights and are unable to respect the human rights of others, social conflict situation may take dominant place in the society, which may put the unity of the nation at stake. All the terrorists groups existing in the world are also the outcome of prejudiced behavior of the western world towards the third world; the extremists of those countries choose the path of destruction and turmoil in utter despair and disappointment. Al Qaeda is the true example of it. The West devised many schemes and laid the foundation of the UNO for its own purpose. The western countries have got a strong platform to rule over others. Any group or nation, opposing these schemes, including Iran, Cuba, North Korea, Vietnam, Venezuela and other, is declared terrorist one. It is therefore, it has become empirically true that though the foundation of the UNO was laid on the name of the safety and protection of human rights, yet the West always strived to exploit the term by giving way to its own culture, civilization, norms and values in the Third World so that the subjects follow and imitate the patterns of the west thinking them true, modern, advance and progressive. It is actually suppression of cultural values and freedom in the name of human rights and modernization. They are introducing violence of old imperialism by backing the social movements to fish in troubled waters. Anghie (2005) discusses the European colonial race in different parts of the world. He has defined the term “periphery”, where he means the boundary line of interests drawn between the Europeans and non-Europeans by the developed countries. The phrases like uncivilized, developing, poor, third world and like----all depict the Western concepts of peripheries for the non-European nations. There is division of civilized and uncivilized nations, where the west considers itself the civilized one. The USA’s campaign against terrorism is also the part of obtaining more sovereignty over the uncivilized societies of developing countries. Anghie declares his findings as ‘an alternative history of sovereignty.’ The historians start writing history of International Law from the Peace of Westphalia, whereas Anghie seeks its roots in sixteenth to nineteenth centuries colonialism, where European imperialism and the rest of the globe were in serious conflict commenced by the formers to enslave the latter. The author challenges the authority, validity, universality and impartiality of the international law by declaring it the protector of the benefits of the European nations at large. Al Qaeda is not a new threat to the imperialism, nor it is against any type of technological advancements or modernism; on the contrary it is anxious to capture the resources of the world at large in the name of ethnicity as well as religion. The Islamic Revolution of Iran (1979) was also appeared in the reaction of the exploitative Imperialistic political system prevailing under the monarchical rule of Muhammad Reza Shah Pehelvi (1941—1979) in the country. The revolution cracked Capitalistic nuisance from Iranian society by changing the very scenario of the country’s political and economic systems, and serves as the cresset to show the path of glory and light to the seekers of truthfulness and social justice. Being one of the most significant incidents of the second half of twentieth century, the Iranian revolution not only influenced the Iranian state by turning it from Monarchy into an Islamic Republic, but also left its indelible imprints on the international politics and strategies. Many of the Eastern and Western countries including the Middle East, the USSR, Europe and the USA had to revise their foreign policies and new friendships and rivalries came into existence in the wake of the great revolution. Though, the contemporary US society observes racial discrimination, which is particularly prominent in the health, education and job sectors, where minority groups undergo prejudiced behaviour due to limited and inferior facilities, yet the constitution provides equal human rights facilities to all its individuals without discrimination. BIBLIOGRAPHY Allison, Dorothy. Survival is Least of My Desires. An Extract from “Skin: Talking About Sex, Class & Literature. Firebrand Books, 2005. Chowdhury, Najma. Redefining Politics: Patterns of Women’s Political Engagement from a Global Perspective." Women and Politics Worldwide. New Haven: Yale University Press. 1994 Davis, Kinsley. (1969) Human Society Collier-Macmillan International Editions. The Macmillan Publishing Company New York pp 364-368 Eisenstein, H. Radical Feminism, Humanism And Womens Studies. Volume 14. 1983 Stanton, Elizabeth Cady. Declaration of Sentiments and Resolution: 1848 Read More