Human Rights Conditions Research Articles

Where you stand depends on where you sit: The effect of status and evaluative identities on human rights perception

What shapes an individual’s perception of domestic human rights conditions? Although scholars have begun to examine public perception of human rights in recent years, existing literature has not adequately considered that one’s perception of human rights conditions is closely tied to one’s lived experiences within society. We argue that individuals’ perceptions of domestic human rights conditions are shaped by their relative socio-economic status within their society (status identity) and their self-assessment of well-being (evaluative identity). Using data from the World Value Survey Wave 7 (2017–2022), we find that individuals who are at a relatively higher standing in society are more likely to have a positive perception of domestic human rights conditions. This article contributes to the literature on human rights perceptions and improves our understanding of individuals’ assessment of human rights. The article also has important policy implications for international institutions and nongovernmental organizations aiming to improve human rights situations. An example is to potentially differentiate strategies among different segments of the population for more effective advocacy and to create favorable public opinion toward human rights causes.

Human rights and corruption: Problems and potential of individualizing a systemic problem

Abstract This article examines the advantages and challenges of a deliberate legal-political strategy that addresses corruption at an individual, rather than systemic, level. Empirical research has highlighted the correlations between the extent and nature of corruption and the level of human rights enjoyment. In response to these observations, anti-corruption and human rights policy agendas have been converging at the international and regional levels. However, framing corruption as a human rights violation that incurs international state responsibility poses conceptual difficulties. Additionally, the risks and benefits of this convergence need to be assessed. This article concludes that the human rights approach provides significant added value, outweighing its limitations. Yet, it remains an open question whether human rights are the appropriate normative framework for denouncing and combating corruption. The article suggests that the human rights perspective, by opening up new avenues for monitoring and litigation, effectively supplements the criminal law approach. It argues for a more balanced integration of corruption concerns within human rights frameworks, with equal emphasis on human rights considerations in all anti-corruption monitoring schemes. Such integration would likely foster a positive feedback loop, where anti-corruption efforts enhance human rights conditions, while certain human rights facilitate the fight against corruption.

Rights in China: Myths, Abuses, and Politics

This article presents a sociological perspective on understanding rights in China, examining the interplay between multiple myths of rights, rights abuses, and the politics of rights within various social and physical spaces. It highlights competing myths of rights held by the state, ordinary citizens, rights activists, and legal professionals. The article examines how rights abuses contribute to rights consciousness and mobilization across different human rights domains in a repressive political context. By analyzing the politics of rights in interconnected spaces, such as the street, the legal system, the global arena, and cyberspace, it emphasizes the importance of continuous engagement between domestic and overseas actors in shaping China's human rights future. The article encourages social science researchers to thoroughly examine the myths, abuses, and politics of rights before making normative judgments about China's human rights conditions.

Scandinavia and the 1968 International Year for Human Rights

ABSTRACT The article explores the Scandinavian countries’ contributions to the United Nations’ 1968 International Year for Human Rights (IYHR) based on archival research in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. It traces how the three countries launched national campaigns to commemorate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and participated in the International Human Rights Conference in Tehran. This engagement with the IYHR occurred at a time when the Scandinavian countries were elevating human rights concerns in their diplomacy as part of a new foreign policy activism. The article demonstrates that the commemoration campaigns spawned numerous activities to raise awareness of human rights issues and spurred reflection on the state of human rights at home and abroad. At the Tehran conference, the Scandinavian countries failed to strengthen international protection of human rights as the concerns of Global South countries dominated the agenda. The analysis confirms two general aspects of the Scandinavian approach to human rights: their emphasis on mutual coordination and their preference for robust civil society involvement. The article concludes that the comprehensive national commemoration campaigns facilitated broad civil society engagement with human rights, but that the IYHR did not transform Scandinavian human rights policies.

HUMAN RIGHT TO NATIONALITY OF THE ROHINGYA REFUGEES AND THE BANGALEES IN BANGLADESH

The study contains the human rights condition of the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh in general as well as their human right to nationality in the country in particular. It also contains, on a comparative approach, the human right to nationality of the Bangalees in Bangladesh. Data are collected from both primary and secondary sources and they are analysed systematically for reaching a solution to the problem of nationality of both the peoples, Rohingya and Bangalee. The study wants to create public opinion for the redress of the Rohingya refugees who were compelled to flee to Bangladesh from Myanmar by the government as well as the military of Myanmar.It shows that the right to nationality of the ethnic/cultural and linguistic majority ‘Bangalee’ people of Bangladesh was kept aloof from them for more than three decades. The study explores the governmental and foreign aids to help them sustain, transfer of many of them from Cox’s Bazar to BhasanChar of Noakhali district, and geopolitical issues surrounding the Rohingyas in Myanmar and Bangladesh. It unveils the legal issue relating to nationality and citizenship of the Bangalees as well as the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, which is seldom addressed by lawyers and general readers. It shows the distinction between nationality and citizenship and makes some suggestions to overcome the problem of nationality and citizenship identities of the Bangalees and Rohingyas in Bangladesh as well as in Myanmar.

New Constitution in Nepal: Fundamental Freedoms and Educational Rights Provisions, and Implications for Dalits’ Schooling

ABSTRACT When Nepal promulgated a new constitution in 2015, discourse around the ‘New Nepal’, post-monarchical rule, was powerful; the new constitution was perceived as a landmark text to provide a clear vision for New Nepal’s overall development. The poor state of Dalits’ human rights and educational realities were widely cited as critical issues requiring attention and expedited intervention during the constitution-writing process. Almost a decade later, however, no outstanding progress is evident regarding the overall development of the historically marginalized Dalits. This paper aims to interrogate the perpetuation of the dominant ideology, as the basis for the marginalization of people lacking power, in the new constitution’s fundamental and educational provisions by exploring its marginalizing semantic elements. We selected these semantic elements or linguistic categories through reading the new constitution. Our analyses expect to unfold the link between Dalits’ poor state of human rights and educational experiences and the provisions of the new constitution. This study helps expose the roots of inequality, exclusion, and social injustice by appraising policies of public interest in situations where human rights violations, illiteracy, and poverty have distressed the lives of marginalized people, as well as encouraging research on the problems faced by extremely vulnerable population like Dalits, who are not only marginalized in their place of birth but also in the diaspora.

Investigating the Inclusion of Human Rights Education in Pakistani Elite Schools: A Qualitative Content Analysis of History Textbooks

Pakistani educational system is broadly divided into public and private sectors. Due to specific financial and administrative issues, the public sector has failed to produce social capital that could serve as an advocate of human rights. However, elite schools in the private sector are better equipped to educate their students on human rights. Through qualitative content analysis, the present study explores the status of human rights in history textbooks taught in elite schools from grade 6 to O-levels and the International Baccalaureate (I.B.) Middle Years Programme (MYP). It was observed that the human rights issues in Pakistan remained part of the null curriculum in the books published for Pakistani students. In the I.B. books, human rights issues were discussed at the global level, leaving elite students ignorant and oblivious to the state of human rights in Pakistan. It is suggested that human rights should be transformed from abstract and generalized statements to absolute and concrete reality, first stemming from local society and then advancing to a global community.

Understanding the Determinants of ICC Involvement: Legal Mandate and Power Politics

Abstract What explains the initiation and escalation of International Criminal Court (ICC) involvement in a situation? In light of growing charges of bias against the court, understanding the determinants of ICC involvement is critically important. Building upon research on bounded discretion at international courts, we argue that two potentially competing forces influence the court. While prioritizing impartiality should lead the court to target perpetrators of the gravest violations of human rights in states with domestic impunity, prioritizing powerful states’ interests suggests that the court may avoid involvement in powerful states and those with close ties to powerful countries. We test these arguments using original data on ICC involvement and a novel estimator that accounts for the sequential nature of ICC activity. We find that the court acts more in accordance with the legal mandate when initiating preliminary examinations, but power politics play a more dominant role at the formal investigation stage. These findings have several implications for academic and policy work on both the ICC and international courts more generally.

"Human Rights in Nigerian Correctional Institutions: The Place of Social Workers"

Issues on human rights especially in correctional institutions have become the focus of international programs, policy makers, the general populace, researchers and conferences aimed at ensuring effective monitoring of its abuses. Human rights protect the essential attributes of human beings: needs, capacities and interests that if guaranteed respect their dignity as persons and if violated results in lives of desperation and diminishment. This study examines human rights in Nigeria correctional institutions. It also identified the roles of social workers in challenging injustice and ensuring that the rights of offenders are upheld. Worried by the state of human rights in our correctional institutions, the paper attempts to investigate the inmates’ rights, human rights and correctional practices and seeks to proffer ways by which social workers can enhance human rights in correctional institutions. Secondary source of data collection was utilized in the study. Documents from international and national agencies as well as textbooks and journal articles were employed. Furthermore, the paper recommends creation of awareness on the services of social workers in enhancing human rights in correctional institutions.

Daniel Billy et al v Australia (Torres Strait Islanders Petition): Climate change inaction as a human rights violation

AbstractThis case note analyses in detail the decision of the United Nations Human Rights Committee (HRComm) in Daniel Billy et al v Australia. The decision concerned a communication brought by members of an indigenous peoples' group from the Torres Strait Islands in the state of Queensland, Australia. The applicants claimed that their human rights had been violated as a result of the State's failure to take mitigation and adaptation measures to combat the effects of climate change. The HRComm's finding of a violation of the applicants' human rights deserves a closer look, as it has broader implications for future climate change‐related human rights litigation. While the HRComm missed the opportunity to consider the State's human rights obligations concerning climate change mitigation, this decision represents an important milestone in climate change litigation, as it confirms a State's obligation to protect a community from adverse climate change effects and recognises the specific vulnerabilities of indigenous peoples and their cultures to its impacts.

Examining the effects of democratic backsliding on human rights conditions

What is the link between democratic backsliding and human rights? Existing literature has focused almost exclusively on the effect of increasing democratic features on improvements in human rights. In contrast, we know less regarding the impact of decreasing democracy (i.e., democratic backsliding) on a state’s human rights conditions. With the growing influence of antidemocratic movements in many democracies recently, it is imperative that we explore the relationship between democratic backsliding and human rights conditions. We suspect that democratic backsliding has a substantial negative impact on human rights conditions. We posit that countries experiencing a period of democratic backsliding will also experience human rights violations to a greater degree. Additionally, we maintain that the scale of the backsliding matters, wherein states experiencing more democratic backsliding also experience more substantial reductions in human rights conditions. In testing these assertions, we find strong empirical support using a range of data sources and model specifications.

A Historical Overview of Legislative Measures to Criminalise Same-Sex Relations in Selected African Countries

Same-sex relations are illegal in thirty-two African countries. In some of those countries, offenders are punishable by death. This contribution provides a historical overview of the legislative measures aimed at the criminalisation of same-sex relations in selected African countries, namely Uganda, Kenya, Nigeria, Botswana and South Africa, and examines its correlation with human rights protection and the rule of law. The legislative measures adopted in these countries originated with colonial influences that introduced anti-same-sex laws there during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The remnants of these colonial-era laws have persisted, shaping the legal landscape and societal attitudes towards LGBTQIA+ communities. Some countries have upheld and reinforced existing laws, often invoking cultural or religious values to justify the criminalisation. Others have made strides towards decriminalisation or have taken steps to protect the rights of LGBTQIA+ individuals, reflecting a dynamic interplay between tradition, human rights and legal development. The study also looks at the state of human rights and the rule of law in these countries. The correlation between anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation, human rights and the rule of law then becomes a focal point, emphasising the poor record of human rights protection in countries that have criminalised same-sex relations as opposed to countries that have decriminalised such relations. Ultimately, this contribution offers critical insight into the evolving legal landscapes of the selected African countries regarding same-sex relations. It underscores the relationship between anti-LGBTQIA+ laws, human rights and the rule of law.

THE NEW UZBEKISTAN WHERE HUMAN RIGHTS ARE APPRECIATED

In this article, the author presented his research results on the state of human rights in New Uzbekistan. It is known that one of the democratic and humane features of any country is determined by the attitude towards people, how human rights and freedoms are protected. That is why many countries, in the course of historical development, have created their own system of human rights laws.

Do Bilateral Relations Affect the Treatment of Migrant Workers? A Study of Nepal

Unfair treatment of migrant workers is a major problem in the migrant governance system. Migrants often endure harsh working conditions, poor wages, and in some cases, untimely deaths. This brings the question, "What can countries do about the poor treatment of their people in destination countries?” This research analyzes the role of bilateral relationships between countries and concludes whether stronger bilateral relations affect the condition of migrant workers in destination countries. The hypothesis is that bilateral relations do not matter but the destination country's domestic human rights condition is a bigger determinant of migrant treatment. The case studies of Malaysia and Japan in relation to Nepal through a series of quantitative and qualitative analysis however disproves the hypothesis and shows that bilateral relations do matter in determining the treatment of migrant workers.

Of One’s Own Making: Leadership Legitimation Strategy and Human Rights

Why do states and their agents abuse citizens? Traditional explanations focus on contentious politics, the presence of institutions, and international pressures. Despite this, accounts dissecting the state and its agents in this context of abuse remain largely theoretic in nature. This article offers a breakthrough for within-the-state accounts of human rights abuses by focusing on state leaders and their relationship to broader government institutions and function. We posit that personalist leaders have fundamentally different relationship with institutions that foster human rights respect, arguing that leaders relying on their own merits and qualities are less likely to either activate or manipulate institutions of accountability for human rights abuses. Using data from 1991 to 2019, we show that the presence of leaders legitimizing themselves within personalist framing can worsen human rights conditions.

COMMENTARY – THE STATE OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN SOUTH AFRICA APPROACHING 30 YEARS OF POST‐APARTHEID DEMOCRACY

As South Africa approaches 30 years of democracy, it is important to pause to reflect and analyze the trajectory of human rights since the fall of the apartheid regime and the advent of multiracial democracy. Although there was a large global movement against apartheid, this movement's vigilance for human rights in South Africa quickly declined and dissolved with the advent of South African democracy. There is little critical engagement with South Africa's contemporary human rights record and policies by global human rights activists, nongovernmental organizations, and civil society and still less active campaigning in defense of the human rights of South Africans, especially South Africa's most vulnerable and disadvantaged black majority. The energy that was summoned to protest apartheid and to boycott it never returned since the advent of democracy. This commentary explores the current state of human rights in South Africa, their prospects, and challenges to their respect, protection, and fulfillment.

Notas sobre o surgimento do fundamentalismo religioso na América Central e sua relação com os direitos humanos

This paper presents the historical context of the 1980s in Central America to understand the social, economic, political, and human rights conditions that this region was experiencing, in which neo-Pentecontalism emerged as an expression of religious fundamentalism. This was not a native manifestation of these societies but rather a phenomenon that originated in the United States as part of a political project aimed at addressing the situation in the Central American region during that time. It was a period marked by political and military conflicts, primarily in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, whose attention and consequences led to the involvement of the other countries in the area. In the course of these struggles, Christian groups also engaged. They sympathized with the Latin American Theology of Liberation, whose central message was the option for the poor. This led them to support political movements of liberation striving to transform the capitalist socio-economic structure. This demonstrates that the religious element, which had historically aligned with dominant political and economic entities, broke with that tradition but, this time, through a small sector. In light of this, the United States made the decision to promote and introduce religious fundamentalism to Central America in order to halt revolutionary political projects. Understanding the context in which neo-Pentecostalism arises allows for a comprehension of its relationship with or opposition to human rights-related issues.

Depictions of Expectation Versus Reality in Noviolet Bulawayo’s We Need New Names

In the post-colonial era, Zimbabwe experienced a period of political and economic upheavals with a political regime whose ideology of socialism regimented Zimbabweans under an authoritarian state. In 1999, the opposition to President Mugabe and the ZANU-PF government grew considerably after the mid-1990s in part due to the worsening economic and human rights conditions brought about by the seizure of farmlands owned by white farmers and economic sanctions imposed by the Western countries in response. This economic upheaval was, and is still the cardinal reason why the citizens of Zimbabwe have almost not been a priority in the former regime, leading to their migration to seemingly better-off countries. No Violet Bulawayo is one such Zimbabwean who has left her motherland and now lives in America. In her novel, We Need New Names, she beautifully elaborates how the non-prioritized state of citizens in Zimbabwe is responsible for the huge number of immigrants who have left Zimbabwe and continue to leave, with hope as beautiful as a rainbow high up on their minds that maybe, just maybe, in a land far away from home, life can meaningfully reward their dreams which ironically, their mother country has so painfully failed to help them achieve.

The politics of human rights trade sanctions: evidence from the African Growth and Opportunity Act

Scholars contend that embedding human rights conditionality in trade agreements can improve human rights. We argue that human rights interests may collide with trade, investment, and security interests. We examine these claims in the context of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a unilateral trade preference program with robust human rights conditions, created in 2000 by the United States for up to 49 potentially eligible sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) states. US decisions to terminate AGOA beneficiary status are determined strongly by US trade, investment, and security interests. The country’s human rights record, including state-sponsored killings and other violations of physical integrity rights, has a less consistent and weaker effect.

THE HUMAN RIGHTS IN INDONESIA AS SEEN THROUGH VARIOUS ASPECTS OF LEGAL AND CUSTOM LIFE

The purpose of this research is to analyze Human Rights in Indonesia from a Legal Perspective and a Customary Life Perspective. Based on Indonesian law and the way of life in each region, regional regulations are established to protect inhabitants' human rights. This research was carried out using normative methods with research through a literature study. As a guarantee of the notion of equality among all humans, HAM, or human rights, is a fundamental value that must be safeguarded and maintained. It is not just in Indonesia but anywhere else in the world. Right now, there is an imbalance between the respect for human rights and how those rights are put into practice. In spite of these circumstances, Indonesian conversation and debate are nonetheless highly fascinating. With regard to human rights, in particular. In order to examine human rights in relation to various legal and customary aspects of life in Indonesia, this research was conducted utilizing the literature review technique. The findings of this research describe the state of human rights in light of Indonesia's legislative and cultural traditions. The issue of indigenous peoples has indeed become one of the strongest issues in international development. Indigenous peoples are a community group that must receive attention in mitigation and adaptation efforts.