Use Of Human Rights Research Articles

The philosophical implications of research on the social representations of human rights

The aim of this article is to show how human rights can be the object of another politics than the one Marcel Gauchet denounces as an “egalitarian ethnocentrism” and regards as grounding a “democratic counter-productivity”. Drawing upon the research developed by Willem Doise and his colleagues, we show that human rights, when they become social representations, rather than generating a society of undifferentiated individuals, allow the individual and collective differences to position themselves around a common stake. In this sense, the construction of shared social representations is an essential condition for the democratization process in our societies. We show how the use of human rights in the context of the French quarrel over the Muslim hijab has contributed to a gradual transformation of human rights into practical and representational matrices for the development of a truly democratic debate. Finally, the article addresses the need to reflect upon the conditions allowing the establishment of these social representations.

Toward a Post-Katrina Framework: Social Work as Human Rights and Capabilities

In this essay the author discusses the responses of social systems to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. The events revealed a hidden poverty, racism and sexism exist in America. The author proposes making use of human rights and capabilities discourse as a way to frame such global social problems, social welfare policies and social work practice in a post-Katrina environment. Implications for social work policy, practice and education are offered.

Die symbolische Kraft der Menschenrechte

The article deals with ,,The Symbolic Force of Human Rights“. Firstly, it restricts the meaning of the term ,,symbolic“ and of the expression ,,symbolic force“. Secondly, it discusses two matters: (1) a semantic matter, concerning the meaning of human rights; and (2) a pragmatic matter, related to utterance of human rights' holders. The article emphasizes that it is not about ,,eternal“ rights, but rather a legal-political construction and conquest of modernity. Based on such assumptions, the author goes to the core of his argument, characterizing the symbolic force of human rights as ambivalent: on one hand, it serves for the generalized affirmation and accomplishment of rights related to legal inclusion in conditions of structural dissension; on the other hand, it acts as a manner of political manipulation, whether to conceal circumstances involving lack of rights or, more abruptly, to give cause to political oppression. In this regard, the article focuses, firstly, on the symbolic force of human rights at the level of National States, and then within the international and worldwide context. Finally, the author states a brief critique concerning the rhetorical use of human rights by the nowadays' unique superpower, the United States of America.

La fuerza simbólica de los derechos humanos

Los derechos humanos son construcciones y conquistas político-jurídicas de la modernidad que responden de un lado a las demandas sociales de autonomía de las diversas esferas de comunicación (se trataría de evitar la represión de la autonomía jurídica o política por un código empíricamente más fuerte, en nuestros días, el económico) y de otro a la demanda en las condiciones de disenso estructural propias de la sociedad moderna (estatal e internacional) de inclusión de personas y grupos. Sin embargo, los derechos humanos enfrentan diversas paradojas. De ellas, las que se refieren a su positivización y a su internacionalización son las aquí abordadas. En este ámbito de problemas, la fuerza simbólica de los derechos humanos aparece como ambivalente: por un lado, lleva a la afirmación y realización generalizada de los derechos; por otro lado, actúa como forma de manipulación política encubriendo situaciones de falta de derechos o, de forma todavía más grave, posibilitando la opresión política y con ella violaciones escandalosas de los mismos. El uso retórico de los derechos humanos por Estados Unidos de América merece una aproximación crítica en cuanto que pone de manifiesto cómo la fuerza simbólica negativa contradice y pone en riesgo la propia afirmación simbólica y el logro de los derechos humanos en la sociedad mundial compleja y heterogénea del presente.

Bigger or Better? The Role of Human Rights and Democracy in Determining Membership of the European Institutions

AbstractThis article traces the development of the role of human rights and democracy in determining admission to three European organizations: the Council of Europe, NATO and the EU. Despite the different functions that each organization performs, they have all assumed that prospective members must comply with human rights and democratic conditions. This is evident in both the organizations' constituent instruments and related membership documents, and also in the recent admission practice of the three organizations. But the membership practice also indicates that since their establishment the organizations have not always applied these conditions rigorously – thus there is a tension between the organizations' desire for homogenous universality (getting better) and heterogeneous universality (getting bigger). The admission practice also reveals a number of problems with the use of human rights and democratic criteria, including inconsistencies in the application of the criteria between applicants and existing members of the same organization, and inconsistencies in the application of the shared criteria across the three organizations. In the end, the development of the common membership criteria of human rights and democracy highlights both a degree of flexibility in admission decisions, as well as a progressive change in the functions of each organization.

Human rights: common meaning and differences in positioning

Human rights are defined as normative social representations embedded in institutional juridical definitions. Research findings show that human rights can be studied as normative social representations implying a degree of common understanding across cultures together with organized differences within and between cultures. Important factors in modulating individual positioning in the realm of human rights are experiences of social conflict and injustice, beliefs about the efficiency of various social actors to have rights enforced and attitudes of liberalism or collectivism. On the other hand, an ethnocentric use of human rights is well documented and has been experimentally studied. Generally, concerns about these rights expressed by citizens of Western countries become much stronger when non-Western countries are involved, whereas violations of these rights in their own country are often not severely condemned.

Beyond the Metaphor:

Using Northern Ireland as a case study, this article explores the relationship between human rights and criminological discourses concerning paramilitary abuses. The article begins with a critical introduction to peacemaking criminology. It then explores four overlapping styles of interventions designed to mitigate paramilitary violence. These include, attempts to hold paramilitaries accountable through humanitarian law; the use of human rights as a rhetorical base for claimsmaking; attempts to encourage the internalization of human rights discourses through a process of political osmosis; and interventions which have been guided primarily by criminological concerns. The article concludes by suggesting a schema for a `new' version of peacemaking criminology that intersects with and builds upon the human rights paradigm in transforming political or ethnic conflicts.

Limiting Indigenous Autonomy in Chiapas, Mexico: The State Government's Use of Human Rights

* Shannon Speed is a doctoral candidate in anthropology at the University of California, Davis, and a research affiliate at the Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropologia Social del Sureste (CIESAS-Sureste) in Chiapas, She conducted research for this article with support from the Social Science Research Council-MacArthur Foundation Program on International Peace and Security in a Changing World. ** Jane F. Collier received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from Tulane University in 1970. Her research was supported by the National Science Foundation, Mapping Interlegality in Chiapas, Mexico. She has done research on customary law in Chiapas since the 1960s and published Law and Social Change in Zincantan in 1973 (Stanford University Press). She also co-edited History and Power in the Study of Law (Cornell University Press, 1988). She is Professor of Anthropology, Emerita, Stanford University. We are grateful for the comments and suggestions of Araceli Burguete, George A. Collier, Susan Coutin, Miguel Angel de los Santos, Aida Hernandez, Xochitl Leyva, Saba Mahmood, Bill Maurer, Sally Merry, Jan Rus, Rachel Sieder, Teresa Sierra, and participants in the internal seminar at CIESAS-Sureste. 1. Mary Robinson made this statement at a press conference held in Geneva, Switzerland. Because La Jornada is published in Spanish, the headline actually read: Los derechos humanos no deben ser otra forma de colonialismo. The text of the article later reported the full sentence from which this clause was extracted: No es, de ninguna manera, la imposici6n de valores de Occidente, porque los derechos humanos no deben ser otra forma de colonialismo.

Les ONG colombiennes de défense des droits de l'homme face aux violences

The Colombian Human Rights Watch NGO Confronted with the Violence Although Colombia is not experiencing a military-rule or an open civil war, it is a country with one of the highest rate of human rights violations in the world. The intensification of the conflict and the generalization of violence have been coupled with the spread of human rights rhetoric. But, the concrete results of the discourse on human rights have been quite limited. They have been converted into strategic tools by the protagonists of the conflict. The analysis of the use of human rights by NGOs during the last twenty years shows that they had and continue to have difficulties in creating a space for reflection and action concerning human rights which escapes the dynamic of the conflict itself. In order to achieve this goal, these organizations should begin with a much clearer definition of human rights and restore their ethical dimension in their actions. In that way, they could contribute to the reconstruction of politics in Colombia.

Derogation of Human Rights in Emergency Situations

Since Mr. Carter became President of the United States, there bas been a revival in the use of human rights as a weapon in international politics. More and more western countries have stated that they are contemplating measuring the aid they give to members of the developing world in proportion to the extent to which the latter conform to basic humanitarian standards or improve their own record in relation to observance of human rights. In addition, there have been calls for the cancellation of visits by politicians, academics, and artistic performers; for non-participation in international athletic contests — a western adaptation of the African ban of the Montreal Olympic Games because of New Zealand’s participation while the latter’s athletes were not barred from competing in South Africa; for non-participation in technical and scientific conferences; and for the breaking of town-twinning arrangements. This attitude has been fed somewhat by reason of the activities of “Helsinki watchers,” who contend that this or that country, and particularly the Soviet Union, is not living up to its human rights obligations as embodied in the Helsinki Agreement.