Ideological (Mis)Use of Human Rights - David Chandler
Ideological (Mis)Use of Human Rights - David Chandler
Ideological (Mis)Use of Human Rights - David Chandler
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famines and natural disasters could be better addressed<br />
by long-term developmental approaches rather than<br />
short-term palliative ones (see further <strong>Chandler</strong>, 2001).<br />
It now appeared that humanitarian NGOs were dutybound<br />
to intervene in much more direct and lasting<br />
ways. However, this approach <strong>of</strong> solidarity and education<br />
and training meant that the relationship between<br />
NGOs and their benefi ciaries changed from one <strong>of</strong><br />
charity between ostensible equals to one <strong>of</strong> dependency<br />
and empowerment. Th e humanitarian NGOs shift ed<br />
from a traditional liberal rights-based approach <strong>of</strong><br />
equality to an ethico-political approach <strong>of</strong> human rights<br />
that facilitated the inequality <strong>of</strong> treatment. Th is has<br />
resulted in humanitarian NGOs opposing the provision<br />
<strong>of</strong> aid in cases where it was felt human rights outcomes<br />
could be undermined (Leader, 1998; Fox, 2001).<br />
By the end <strong>of</strong> the Cold War, the discourse <strong>of</strong> humanitarian<br />
universalism had become a highly interventionist<br />
one, transformed through the modern discourse <strong>of</strong><br />
human rights values and assumptions. Once the barriers<br />
to state actors intervening were diminished, this<br />
discourse was increasingly taken over by leading states<br />
and international institutions and NGOs boomed in<br />
numbers and authority as new frameworks <strong>of</strong> intervention<br />
were instituted. According to Mark Duffi eld, the<br />
‘petty sovereignty’ <strong>of</strong> NGOs—their increasing assumption<br />
<strong>of</strong> political, decision-making powers in regions<br />
intervened in—was ‘governmentalized’ in the 1990s:<br />
integrated within a growing web <strong>of</strong> interventionist<br />
institutions and practices associated with external<br />
intervention and regulation (Duffi eld, 2007).<br />
<strong>Human</strong> <strong>Rights</strong> and International Law<br />
<strong>Human</strong> rights claims, the ethico-juridical claims <strong>of</strong> a<br />
non-constituted legal subject—the human—tend to<br />
confl ict with formal international legal frameworks,<br />
which necessarily operate on the basis <strong>of</strong> constituted<br />
legal subjects—sovereign states. Over the course <strong>of</strong> the<br />
1990s and the early 2000s the understanding <strong>of</strong> this<br />
confl ict has changed. Key to the changing nature <strong>of</strong> the<br />
discussion <strong>of</strong> human rights and international law have<br />
been debates on the redefi nition <strong>of</strong> the meaning and<br />
relevance <strong>of</strong> the legal subject in international law, i.e.<br />
the meaning <strong>of</strong> sovereignty.<br />
Th e discussion <strong>of</strong> the meaning <strong>of</strong> sovereignty refl ects<br />
the discussions <strong>of</strong> neutrality and universality, high-<br />
IDEOLOGICAL (MIS)USE OF HUMAN RIGHTS 121<br />
lighted in the previous subsection. Th e universal essence<br />
<strong>of</strong> sovereign equality was not the power or capacity <strong>of</strong><br />
states, which clearly varied tremendously. Th e quality <strong>of</strong><br />
equality was that <strong>of</strong> moral and political autonomy, the<br />
equality <strong>of</strong> the right <strong>of</strong> self-government. Since the end<br />
<strong>of</strong> the Cold War, this framework <strong>of</strong> sovereign equality<br />
has been challenged through the framework <strong>of</strong> human<br />
rights, which asserts that formal juridical frameworks<br />
are inadequate to address the needs <strong>of</strong> people living in<br />
many states where governments are held to be ‘unable<br />
or unwilling’ to protect their rights (ICISS, 2001).<br />
At the most basic level, sovereign autonomy or selfgovernment<br />
is seen as increasingly problematic on its<br />
own terms. Th e possession <strong>of</strong> formal democracy is no<br />
longer seen as adequate to safeguard the rights and interests<br />
<strong>of</strong> individuals. Many commentators follow Fareed<br />
Zakaria in his view <strong>of</strong> the post-Cold War rise <strong>of</strong> ‘illiberal<br />
democracies’ (Zakaria, 2003). Democracy without<br />
liberal cultures and frameworks <strong>of</strong> rights protections<br />
is held to be as likely to be a license for tyranny as for<br />
freedom. In order to prevent the ‘tyranny <strong>of</strong> the majority’<br />
or the arbitrariness <strong>of</strong> democratic mandates (Mill,<br />
1972, p. 73; Guinier, 1994), international human rights<br />
enforcements have been increasingly demanded as part<br />
<strong>of</strong> the agenda <strong>of</strong> ‘good governance’ and the ‘rule <strong>of</strong> law’.<br />
Th ere is also a second approach <strong>of</strong> human rights advocacy<br />
that undermines the rights <strong>of</strong> sovereignty, not on<br />
the basis <strong>of</strong> the problems <strong>of</strong> the formal political framework<br />
<strong>of</strong> citizenship rights, but on the basis <strong>of</strong> economic<br />
and social provisions. Th is is the discourse <strong>of</strong> the ‘failed’<br />
or ‘failing’ state, where it is asserted that problems with<br />
social welfare provision or with economic development<br />
indicate that many post-colonial states need external<br />
assistance to enhance their ‘functional’ sovereignty (see<br />
Ghani et al., 2005). Here the ethico-juridical framework<br />
<strong>of</strong> human rights redefi nes sovereignty on the basis <strong>of</strong><br />
social and economic capacities, creating a sliding scale<br />
<strong>of</strong> sovereignty and marginalizing the importance <strong>of</strong> a<br />
juridical framework based on autonomy and sovereign<br />
equality.<br />
Critical commentators are increasingly suggesting<br />
that human rights approaches have succeeded in<br />
redefi ning sovereignty so that it lacks any distinct legal<br />
meaning and that, in this way, external intervention is<br />
no longer seen as confl icting with or as undermining<br />
<strong>of</strong> sovereignty. Mark Duffi eld suggests that sovereignty<br />
has been redefi ned in terms <strong>of</strong> the biopolitical—based<br />
on the needs <strong>of</strong> the population rather than the needs<br />
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