Paper/Proposal Title
Indivisible Human Rights and the End(s) of the State
Location
River Campus - Room M2265
Start Date
10-4-2013 9:30 AM
Abstract
Central to the rhetoric of human rights indivisibility is a belief in the fundamental equality of importance of state duties and responsibilities for the protection, promotion and fulfillment of all human rights, but especially for economic and social rights. The rhetoric of indivisible human rights has a long history, dating back at least to the initial division of the draft human rights Covenants into separate treaties in the early 1950s. Despite its appeal, the rhetoric of indivisibility has not achieved its long sought-after goal—to banish forever the beliefs or practices that perpetuate the idea that economic and social rights are different (for some, this means less important than) than civil and political rights. Significant questions and debates persist. This paper will explore, conceptually and historically, an account of indivisibility that emphasizes differentiated state obligations rather than the indivisibility of rights, which often overemphasizes the justiciability of economic and social rights, placing an undue burden on “violations approaches” to solve problems of poverty, illiteracy, and access to other productive resources. This standard account of duties-from-rights assumes that the fundamental end of the state is simply to protect rights, which reflects a classical liberal conception of rights and of human rights. However, in the realm of economic and social rights, this leaves us with a stripped down account of state duties, which would presumably be limited to social provisioning of bare minimums, and no more. Certainly economic and social rights envision something much more robust than subsistence. Instead, this paper will argue that the sole, fundamental end of the modern state is not the protection of rights, but rather fostering an environment that enables the emergence, protection, and promotion of individual autonomy and self-determination that the Universal Declaration envisions. In meeting this end, the state has many different kinds of obligations, one of which is to respect, protect and promote rights. But it has other responsibilities that may not arise directly from rights claims of individuals, but nevertheless are necessary for individuals to secure their welfare, autonomy, and self-determination. Many of those obligations have a direct bearing on the enjoyment of what we know as economic and social rights. But while the protection and promotion of human rights are critical tools and provide significant guidelines for the state, human rights are, in most cases, means to the achievement of this greater end, rather than ends in and of themselves. If the ideal of the modern state is bound up with the ideal of the autonomous, self-determining human being who is not just capable, but able to live a self-made life, then we will need to reconsider what duties the state has with respect to what we know as “economic and social rights” that will support and not violate the principle of individual self-determination. After exploring a variety of discourses surrounding the indivisibility of human rights, the paper turns to a conceptual examination of the notion of welfare and individual self-determination, and what state duties and responsibilities are entailed in fostering the environment necessary for self-determination to be protected and promoted. The third section of the paper will argue that there is historical evidence in support of this reading of state obligations for promoting welfare-as-self-determination, in particular in the antecedents to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but they chose the language of rights to articulate those duties. The paper will conclude with a brief examination of the larger implications of state duties for protecting rights and fostering welfare and self-determination.
Indivisible Human Rights and the End(s) of the State
River Campus - Room M2265
Central to the rhetoric of human rights indivisibility is a belief in the fundamental equality of importance of state duties and responsibilities for the protection, promotion and fulfillment of all human rights, but especially for economic and social rights. The rhetoric of indivisible human rights has a long history, dating back at least to the initial division of the draft human rights Covenants into separate treaties in the early 1950s. Despite its appeal, the rhetoric of indivisibility has not achieved its long sought-after goal—to banish forever the beliefs or practices that perpetuate the idea that economic and social rights are different (for some, this means less important than) than civil and political rights. Significant questions and debates persist. This paper will explore, conceptually and historically, an account of indivisibility that emphasizes differentiated state obligations rather than the indivisibility of rights, which often overemphasizes the justiciability of economic and social rights, placing an undue burden on “violations approaches” to solve problems of poverty, illiteracy, and access to other productive resources. This standard account of duties-from-rights assumes that the fundamental end of the state is simply to protect rights, which reflects a classical liberal conception of rights and of human rights. However, in the realm of economic and social rights, this leaves us with a stripped down account of state duties, which would presumably be limited to social provisioning of bare minimums, and no more. Certainly economic and social rights envision something much more robust than subsistence. Instead, this paper will argue that the sole, fundamental end of the modern state is not the protection of rights, but rather fostering an environment that enables the emergence, protection, and promotion of individual autonomy and self-determination that the Universal Declaration envisions. In meeting this end, the state has many different kinds of obligations, one of which is to respect, protect and promote rights. But it has other responsibilities that may not arise directly from rights claims of individuals, but nevertheless are necessary for individuals to secure their welfare, autonomy, and self-determination. Many of those obligations have a direct bearing on the enjoyment of what we know as economic and social rights. But while the protection and promotion of human rights are critical tools and provide significant guidelines for the state, human rights are, in most cases, means to the achievement of this greater end, rather than ends in and of themselves. If the ideal of the modern state is bound up with the ideal of the autonomous, self-determining human being who is not just capable, but able to live a self-made life, then we will need to reconsider what duties the state has with respect to what we know as “economic and social rights” that will support and not violate the principle of individual self-determination. After exploring a variety of discourses surrounding the indivisibility of human rights, the paper turns to a conceptual examination of the notion of welfare and individual self-determination, and what state duties and responsibilities are entailed in fostering the environment necessary for self-determination to be protected and promoted. The third section of the paper will argue that there is historical evidence in support of this reading of state obligations for promoting welfare-as-self-determination, in particular in the antecedents to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but they chose the language of rights to articulate those duties. The paper will conclude with a brief examination of the larger implications of state duties for protecting rights and fostering welfare and self-determination.
Comments
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