From poverty to power - Oxfam-Québec

I HAVE RIGHTS, THEREFORE I AMThe highest manifestation of life consists in this: that a being governsits own actions.ST THOMAS AQUINAS, THIRTEENTH CENTURYAn old development saying runs: ‘If you give a man a fish, you feedhim for a day. If you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.’Fine and good, except that, as the case study on the fishing communitiesof Tikamgarh on page 146 shows, he must have rights to fish the pondin the first place. Moreover, as a village leader from Cambodia pointsout,‘A man is just as likely to be a woman’. She adds:That woman already knows how to fish. She would like her riverleft alone by illegal logging companies or fish poachers. She wouldprefer that her government not build huge dams with the help of theAsian Development Bank, dams that have damaged her livelihood.She would prefer that the police not violently evict communities tomake way for the dam. She doesn’t want charity. She would likerespect for her basic rights. 5Feeling that one has a right to something is much more powerful thansimply needing or wanting it. It implies that someone else has a dutyto respond. Rights are long-term guarantees, a set of structural claimsor entitlements that enable people, particularly the most vulnerableand excluded in society, to make demands on those in power, who areknown in the jargon as ‘duty-bearers’. These duty-bearers in turn have23