Abstract
Citizens of ASEAN states appear to be increasingly involved, through Information Communication Technologies (ICTs), in pushing for greater openness and accountability of their political leaders and public institutions. In particular, ICTs afford citizens of ASEAN States and like-minded counterparts around the world in the human rights community to push for greater accountability of ASEAN’s human rights institutions. With the adoption of the ASEAN Charter in 2007, ASEAN states embarked on a process of crafting a regional ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR), eighteen years after the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna, Austria. While the World Conference had reaffirmed the universality of human rights, ASEAN states have moved grudgingly and gradually, egged on by greater global concern for human rights and by the pressures of globalization, towards the protection of human rights. The Terms of Reference (TORs) of the AICHR, adopted in July 2009 and favouring promotion rather than protection of human rights did not provide for an institutionalised role for the media. Subsequent drafting by AICHR of a proposed ASEAN Human Rights Declaration (AHRD) has excluded mainstream news media and civil society organizations (CSOs) from the process. In the absence of reporting and substantive reporting by most mainstream media in the region civil society, most importantly the new ICT based media, has played a vital role in seeking to advance the protection of human rights. This includes scrutiny of the specific rights that will be included in the forthcoming AHRD to ensure that international human rights standards are upheld and that ASEAN states honour their existing commitments under international instruments. The new media-environment provides a platform for a multitude of actors to disseminate human rights related information, to document human rights abuses and thereby enhance the protection of human rights in the region.
Highlights
As the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) nurtures its recently created ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR), what role has the media played in its creation and subsequent deliberations? How have the region’s media and the new media in particular fared in engaging with AICHR, if at all? What is the role of the new media in advancing the protection of human rights in the region? The potential of the new media, and Internet in particular, to enhance political freedom was not lost on the repressive ruling regime in Myanmar amidst the “Saffron Revolution” in 2007, during which it shut down the Internet in the country as it controlled the nation’s two internet service providers (ISPs)
While it can not be argued that the Internet was instrumental in changing the domestic political order, research suggests that the so-called “Saffron revolution” was partly Internet driven and evidenced a complex relationship “between eyewitnesses within the country and a networked public sphere of bloggers, student activists, and governments around the globe.”22 Prior to this crisis the regime was initially slow to respond to the challenge of Internet sites that emerged in the 1990s – such as seasia-l and BurmaNet, the latter funded by the Soros Foundation - that disseminated consolidated human rights information on Myanmar
The Cha-Am Hua Hin Declaration on the Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights issued during the ASEAN Summit in Thailand, 23-25 October 2009, recognised that the TORs of the AICHR “shall be reviewed every five years” after its entry into force “to strengthen the mandate and functions of the AICHR” and “in order to further develop mechanisms on both the protection and promotion of human rights.”
Summary
As the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) nurtures its recently created ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR), what role has the media played in its creation and subsequent deliberations? How have the region’s media. Kate Allen of Amnesty noted at that time, that the Internet had become a “new frontier in the struggle for human rights.” The crack down by governments through restrictive laws, regulations and censorship serves in Southeast Asia and globally, to unnaturally preserve the monopoly of mainstream media organizations, which are able to thrive despite serious financial pressures and declining readership. While it can not be argued that the Internet was instrumental in changing the domestic political order, research suggests that the so-called “Saffron revolution” was partly Internet driven and evidenced a complex relationship “between eyewitnesses within the country and a networked public sphere of bloggers, student activists, and governments around the globe.” Prior to this crisis the regime was initially slow to respond to the challenge of Internet sites that emerged in the 1990s – such as seasia-l and BurmaNet, the latter funded by the Soros Foundation - that disseminated consolidated human rights information on Myanmar. Rudolph and Lim found some correlation, between the Internet’s decentralised structure and the long term inability of central authorities to instrumentalize this technology towards their own political purposes. In some cases, such as Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines, while there was a vibrant press organizations, the media tended to be either quiescent or an active participant in the nation-building processes of many of the young ASEAN states. In Malaysia, Loo has noted that one of the limitations on the democratizing effect of the new media can be a citizenry not yet culturally disposed to such interaction through the Internet. Ironically, greater transparency and openness may have resulted more from the Asian financial crisis of 1997, which exposed intra-state corruption and cronyism. For Simon Tay, democracy is a part of the future of Southeast Asia and the media, as part of civil society, is a factor in the new system of governance. With the adoption of the TORs of the AICHR, Southeast Asia seemed to be warming up to this prospect
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