What Is a Human Rights Claim?

Abstract

The problem of the universal boatperson reemerged in 1975 as an enormous phenomenon of migrants taking to the sea (sometimes referred to as the Southeast Asian “exodus”). Could hundreds of thousands of “boat people” simply be ignored or “maltreated to any extent”? Granted, many of them suffered horrific experiences. As writer Jonathan Schell described, “when the North Vietnamese took control of the South, in 1975, they created conditions such that tens of thousands of people preferred to escape into the South China Sea in boats, most of which never arrived in any destination.” According to UNHCR numbers, 200,000–400,000 Southeast Asian boat people died at sea. Others suffered starvation, rape, or police brutality. This, however, does not eliminate the triumph of a great number of others who survived, resettled in communities far away from home, and eventually gained access to newfound citizenships. They were sometimes able to transform a struggle for a life worth living into the freedom of participation in a political community of equals. With their actions, these people demonstrated what it means to make a human rights claim. The Southeast Asian refugee crisis began well after the framing of the 1951 Refugee Convention. The United States had already committed to Convention-based refugee protection with its accession to the 1967 Protocol. And the application of the Convention was expanded; with few exceptions, state signatories recognized that it applied regardless of the geographic limitation that had initially limited it to refugees from Europe. The ICCPR and the ICESR have also already been framed (1966), each of which promised to protect human rights – potentially the world over. Yet the rights that international instruments conferred upon humans remained largely unenforceable. How, then, did the plight of the Vietnamese “boat people” come to be perceived as “a story of hope and positive human achievement”? Legal frameworks that were put in place back then are today upheld as exemplary responses to maritime migrant and refugee flows. The United States evacuated significant numbers of people thought to be in danger in the 1970s. As an adversary in the Vietnam War, it had deep interests to protect its local allies and supporters. These operations, however, fell short of the needs of enormous numbers of displaced people. Initially, neighboring countries hosted refugees.