PHM-Exch> Food for a trump card thought

[Claudio Schuftan]

Human Rights Reader 217



*VALUES, POLITICS, DEMOCRACY AND HUMAN RIGHTS.*



1. In this day and age, if one looks at the political spectrum in rich
countries, *value politics* overshadow and outdo *class politics.* As a
consequence, in most of these countries, ethics and (class) politics are
arbitrarily delinked*. Then, in an attempt to be consequent with their
ethical values, some of their governments have felt inclined to integrate
human rights (HR) language into their policies and, sometimes, into their
budgets and their diplomacy…and *less often so into their foreign aid.*

*: Typical examples of this ethics/politics split come to the fore when
asking: 1) Are poor and minority communities and groups neglected?  or are
they oppressed?, and  2) Is empowerment a soft or a core issue in HR work?
[It is indispensable]. (FAO)



2. But regarding this ‘being consequent’, key underlying questions still
remain:

-Has/is the HR framework really become/ing a trans-national common culture?
[No. Not yet…], and

-Can the latter occur when the reality is that the values and the issues
pertaining to HR are depoliticized, and when diplomatic relations between
states are grounded in settings and played-out in situations of unequal *
power?  [Probably not]. ***

**: Paraphrasing Herbert Marcuse, we can say that in the rich countries, the
status of HR and the institutional violence that underlies ongoing HR
violations in poor countries are often seen with a ‘repressive tolerance’.
[Actually, in too many countries (with rich countries governments’
connivance), smiling dictators do believe that modernization, repression and
HR violations belong together…].



3. As a result, there is no clear (class) political direction in the rich
countries that decisively and convincingly puts the redressal of worldwide
HR violations at the center. No doubt there are many value arguments tossed,
but pragmatic, structural HR-violations-redressing-alternatives ‘somehow’
seem not to be proposed --much less alternatives in which the victims of HR
*violations are given a voice in the decision-making.****

***: Let’s call a spade a spade, attending ad-hoc participatory events is
not the same as having an equal voice and much less as having an influence.
Both achieving an equal voice and translating it into influence require
political action, i.e., it takes political consciousness and motivation plus
a political engagement to achieve changes in the HR arena.



4. [Not being proposed and not being put in place are, for example, a legal
system oriented towards HR for claim holders to hold duty bearers
accountable; an accessible HR learning system and complaint mechanisms that
reach the general population; and a HR training program for judges, lawyers,
law enforcement personnel and legislators].



5. Actually, in HR work, you need the hunger-for-global-facts of a
journalist, the depth-and-moral-courage of an ethicist and the
pragmatic-cold-analytical-head of a political scientist who can rationalize
the significance of  the unfair and the unjust in every-day life. But
beware: by wearing these different hats you cannot confine yourself only to
name, blame and shame; you need to do something about it! This, for
instance, means that, when existing policies and HR violations are
criticized, it is expected that you propose (an) alternative(s).



6. So, in these times of dire financial crisis, together with others I ask:

-Is it so hard, to resurrect class politics as part of a push for a more
direct (and not just representative) democracy? (Camapania 2007 por el
Derecho a la Salud en Uruguay, diciembre 2008).

-Isn’t direct democracy the desirable delivery system for human rights...
where people learn to belong in dignity and in community with others? (S.
Koenig), and

-Is something of the like of literally thousands of local-level HR
assessment, analysis and action processes and groups possible? (Gonoshastya
Kendra)



7. All the above reinforces what this Reader has repeatedly been saying,
namely that what is deemed ‘worth embarking-on’ and what brings about
‘effective’
change depends on what one’s values *and* politics are.

Ideology is simply not dead; it remains the trump card. Politics is not just
a moral drama. It is the democratic currency through which, in HR work, we
should express our creative anger.



Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City

cschuftan at phmovement.org
[All Readers can be found in
www.humaninfo.org/aviva<http://www.humaninfo.org/aviva%20%20under%20No.%2069>
under No. 69]


__________________

In part adapted from Five Germanys I have known, F. Stern, Farrar, Strauss
and Giroux, New York, 2006 and D+C, Vol. 35, No.11, November 2008.
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