essay human rights.pdf

Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 Do we live in a cosmopolitan age? Introduction Every person is born and becomes a member of a society in this world. Then the states, 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> through administrative procedures, enable us to receive a social status, which could be citizen, denizens or illegal immigrant. Throughout our lives we can be subject to displacement from our countries by war, civil conflicts, natural catastrophes and poverty, we can voluntarily decide to relocate for economic, social and cultural reasons and we can reunify with our families in other states. Regardless of the state of origin and the state of final destination, we will all be reclassified under different immigration statuses, which will give entitlements to different levels of protection and rights. From this emerged a civil stratification where our entitlements are dependent on our statuses. Being granted human rights and protection is dependent on the country of origin and the entry status. Throughout this essay I will try to give an introduction to the cosmopolitan vision in a chronological order, explain in the context of the European Union how a cosmopolitan order can be institutionalized and look at some arguments against cosmopolitanism. Cosmopolitanism was firstly constructed in ancient Greece1 and referred to as a concept of people being the citizens of the world not limited to their own communities and memberships, having a universal aspiration. Kant Kant reintroduced the concept in the pre-modern world in his ‘Perpetual Peace’2. Written in 1795 the essays concentrate on conditions that states have to satisfy in order to promote peace. One of these conditions and essay is ‘The Law of Worlds Citizenship Shall be Limited to Conditions of Hospitality’. Hospitality in his vision is not a social virtue or philanthropy by a right that people universally have, not to be treated like enemies on foreign territory as a new cosmopolitan order. He further claims that people 1 2 Diogenes Laertius, Life of Diogenes the Cynic. Emmanuel Kant, Perpetual Peace, Cosimo Classics Philosophy, 2002, pp 17-20. 1|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 cannot be refused temporary stay if the refusal will promote their destruction, but fails to award any right to women which in his opinion are ‘auxiliaries of the commonwealth’ and other groups that fail to enjoy full citizenship rights. He believed that the earth is in our common possession and we should all equally enjoy its resources, but then with that exact idea European colonisers invaded areas of this world, proving itself against 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> the cosmopolitan vision. His foundation for granting the right to hospitality to all people universally based on their common nature and is closely related to Turners3 post modern theory of granting human rights based on sympathy and humans body frailty. Hannah Arendt In the context of the Second World War and of 100 million people4 being displaced and in a state of limbo between being grated civil and political rights and denaturalisation or as a recognised minority, Hanna Arendt believed that the nation states even if having a democratic form of government can be oppressive to those groups that have been politically excluded. She noticed that the Jews situation in the Second World War they were not given a basic right to have rights, for which she found a justification and fulfilment in a political community. She observed that the only moment individuals realise they need human rights and their importance is when they lose them in effect of the exclusion from the political community5, exclusion which disables them from fulfilling their human rights. Both Kant and Arendt discuss the right to have basic rights from a philosophical perspective of normative cosmopolitanism. Benhabib After year of development after the Second World War the United System emerged with a strong human right ideal at its heart, developing international instruments and committees to monitor their implementation and realisation. In this context Benhabib 3 Turner, 1993, p 501. Arendt, 1951, p 270. 5 Arendt, 1979, p 279. 4 2|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 realises that states are relentless to apply universal human rights for asylum seekers and foreigners as it conflicts with the national sovereignty and the privileges of citizenship. The latter she sees as being as disaggregating at least in the European Union under the pressure of the communitarian interests. The former instead has an exclusion effect for those groups that are drawn to Europe for its wealth. This is accelerated by a nationalism phenomenon which tries to attribute democratic legitimacy to more than 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> subjects of law but authors. She picks on the well known French ‘scarf affair’ in which multicultural life cannot coexist with citizenship requirements. The struggle between nationalist groups and multicultural, diverse communities and their claim for human rights are let on all fronts in Europe, starting with the UK where the British National Party and even the Labour party let campaigns to give certain entitlements exclusively to British people. Roma community is another unhappy example inside Europe of nomad group originally from Eastern and Central Europe trapped between poverty and illegality, living without protection and without access to social welfare systems, moved from Western countries to their original ones in sometimes hostile manners6. Beck and the European7 Cosmopolitanism Beck observed that the first step to the cosmopolitanisation of Europe was introduced by the Nuremberg Trials and the Chapters of International Military Tribunals, also the creation of the International Court of Hague prosecuting crimes against humanity. This for him entangled a responsibility beyond nation states context for two reasons: the victims would not have to be within national borders and the fact that the violation is not against a specific nation, enlarging the applicability to all humans8. Europe has been in a process of unifying and facilitating the same human rights standards within the international and regional sphere, both systems having a cosmopolitan effect on nation states. Internationally, through the United Nation Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 as a starting point and continuing with the International Covenants for Civil and Political Rights and for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights both 1966, and a series of other instruments protecting the rights of 6 Guardian, 21 June 2009. European states throughout this essay refer only to European Union members. 8 Beck, 2007, pp 169-171. 7 3|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 women9, of the child10, of refugees11 and anti-discrimination12, facilitated by the implementation of treaty monitoring bodies dealing with states and individual complaints. Regionally, with the formation of the Council of Europe and the ratification of The European Declaration of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms 1950, furthermore, all European states are conditioned to be members of this declaration 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> and subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights (1953). Still considering the regional level worth considering the context in which this community was formed for the purpose of understanding why an institutionalised form of cosmopolitanism could be present here. The European community started as a trade treaty in the 1950 with the Treaty of Rome, but since then due to continuous enlargement and development of a complex system of administrative bodies which share the basic powers of legislation, execution and judiciary, constitutional changes made by Maastricht Treaty, Amsterdam Treaty and Lisbon Treaty, a transformative process which was not predicted emerged. All European states are conditioned before joining the EU to be members of the Council of Europe and the ECHR, furthermore to respect and protect human rights within the national borders. As a consequence all member states have incorporated in various forms the conventional rights into domestic legislation, such as the Human Right Act 1998 in the UK. European law not only acts as an international instrument being implemented horizontally to all member states13, but also vertically regulating the very basis of our lives. Today in any of the EU’s members 50% of all national decisions are European decisions14. Nowadays, EU not only enables people to trade freely, but to travel15 and work in the country of their choice, process which led to millions of people inside the community living in other countries inside the EU. Only this mobility of the population led to the increased requirement to harmonise of the national legislatures of member states. Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women 1979 Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989 11 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees 1951. 12 International Covenant on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination 1966. 13 Morris, 2002, p 15. 14 Beck, 2007, p 174. 15 1 billion trips within Europe every year according to EUROSTAT Tourism Statistics. 9 10 4|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 For Beck, the nation without a state is the beginning of the cosmopolitan process in Europe. It started with the first and second World Wars when millions of people found themselves displaced, stateless, and belonging to nothing. The imperialistic rule crushed under the new legal order of the nation states, but from the beginning this socialpolitical organization was doomed to collapse because the new formation were administrating areas with huge minorities, as in Poland’s example where 40% were of 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> German origin, Yugoslavia, Bosnia-Herzegovina. The fall of colonialism in 1960's and the waves of immigration from ex-colonies, the fall of the Soviet Union and the economic migration all accelerated the creation of a diverse Europe and as catalyst to the emerging institutionalized cosmopolitanism. Furthermore, globalization, the technological evolution, climate change issues, mobility and the interdependency in all policies at EU lever are factors that only aid the cosmopolitan realism. For him states in Europe are in a process of Europeanizing of national interests, fact that proves his theory of a cosmopolitan Europe. Beck realised that only a different model would work for Europe because of its diversity and long historical rivalries, any other alternative such as federalism or con-federalism, multi-government, one state solution, or the American melting pot, would all endanger the present situation. For him cosmopolitanism means embracing our differences and finding a way to implement human rights in that context16. Stan Van Hooft Stan Van Hooft is presenting his vision of what nation state means for a layperson in a world in which cosmopolitanism would be more than a ‘thin’ concept. For him one’s country refers either to a purely administrative notion or to a community bound17. He distinguished between two emotional affiliations that are considered to go against the cosmopolitanism concept: patriotism and nationalism. He acknowledged that we create bounds from the moment we are born with our family, later in life with our community and our country, we will always have this feeling of belonging, and we become 16 17 Beck, 2007, pp 171-175. Stan Van Hooft, 2009, p37. 5|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 eventually patriotic. But he, like Nussbaum18, sees this capacity of belonging something greater, an ability to adhere to the humanity, understand from within the community what social justice and human rights protection entail. Unlike other writers he sees in nationalism a fanaticism, an enlarged patriotism, and ideology circulated by upper classes in Europe in the pre-modern and modern to colonise. Nationalism19 as an inflated emotional state for him only degenerates into chauvinism and militias, and 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> prioritizing national interests over global responsibilities. For him cosmopolitanism relies in the individual’s capacity to embrace humanity, which is primarily developed into our families and our communities and our affiliation to that will only serve as a starting point. Lydia Morris Nationalism is not the only case test for cosmopolitanism. Lydia Morris focused on the immigration regulation and in particular the problem of asylum seekers in the UK. She observed in the context of immigration regulation the paradoxes Benhabib pointed in a more general discussion about international human rights obligation and the national welfare. In this context she observed that ‘within this system, different legal statuses have differing associated rights, reflecting the ‘desirability’ or otherwise of varied categories of migrant, as rights become implicated in a system designed to attract or repel prospective arrivals.’20 Conflicting interests the economic welfare and the cosmopolitan position ended in certain groups losing their right to claim rights, such as asylum seekers ‘late claimers’21. This continuous struggle over of all immigrants to recourse to social funds and be granted more rights questions the triumph of the human dignity over the status ranking of the humanity22, making normative and institutional cosmopolitanism even in Europe a matter of negotiation23. Conclusions: Do we live in a cosmopolitan age? Nussbaum, 1996, p 1. Stan Van Hooft, 2009, p38-43. 20 Morris, 2009, p 218. 21 Morris,2009, p 223. 22 Morris, 2009, 232 23 Morris, 2009, 233 18 19 6|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 If this is a European question then the answer is that managing to create a supra structure to administrate different nations, ethnicities without destroying their essence, melting the very best of it, diluting the state borders without civil conflicts and making landmark decision and implementing policies like a confederation, but preserving the national state institution, is in fact the very essence of cosmopolitan realism and it happens in Europe today. Furthermore, judging from the fact that access to human 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> rights protection and equal treatment at least for the European citizens are granted upon arrival and social funding, could underline the cosmopolitan trend, diluting the citizenship institution. Nevertheless, the European situation is unique as there will be required to have a supra structure internationally which could be the United Nations system. However, not all countries adopt a democratic system, embrace cultural differences, respect all religious beliefs and afford to implement human rights protection. International human rights obligations are of voluntary nature and their execution falls on the signatory state. In addition, states can make reservation or op-out to certain obligations. In international law national sovereignty overrides global interests and responsibility. Another drawback to cosmopolitanism is that fact that there will always be groups excluded from protection or groups that will have to qualify, like asylum seekers, stateless and clandestine immigrants. These groups are victims of displacements from their home countries without possibility to return without endangering their lives. Most of the times, they risk their lives to land in a country where they could claim protection. At the expense of liberalising the internal market and harmonising the rights within, Europe, has transformed into a fortress, regulating immigration in accordance with the welfare interests. The cosmopolitan question is not an issue that European civil societies consider when having to share their economical benefit with other groups and they always rely on the national sovereignty, subsequently to allow entry upon satisfying preset requirements. The bureaucratic machinery sometimes is human dignity blind24. Cosmopolitan vision is still doubtful because human rights lack of a universal justification and because of the limitations and qualification associated to each right. I 24 R v SSHD ex parte Zardasht [2004] EWHC 91, R v SSHD ex parte Limbuela [2004] EWHC 219 7|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 will use the case of the prohibition of torture which is considered a fundamental right included in most human rights instruments. Although absolute victims have to pass a threshold of what the courts will classify torture, anything that was below would be degrading and inhuman treatment, aspect firstly mentioned in Ireland v the UK 25and registering an ongoing progress and interpretation. 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> In conclusion, having regard to the development of cosmopolitan vision and evolution from a normative ideal to an institutionalised version with the European Union as example, its major obstacles in patriotism, national sovereignty and welfare and immigration regulation, we can definitely say we live in a multicultural extremely mobile era. Our territorial vision of citizenship had changed tremendously due to waves of immigration and people’s ability to travel freely. Human rights although a concept still relatively new to humanity but is widely recognised as having a constitutional value for the welfare of our global community. I incline to believe that only some countries enjoy human rights fulfilment and protection, and their national interests will always outlaw the others rights. Yes, we can travel from Krakow to Lisbon without any immigration requirement, but we cannot say the same thing about travelling from Ciudad de Mexico to New York. Cosmopolitan vision is an ideal we can only hope to attain and human rights education can only lead the way to its realisation. 25 (1978) 2EHRR 25 8|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 Bibliography • Hanna Arendt, Stateless People, Contemporary Jewish Record, 1945. • Hanna Arendt, Burden of Our Time, Secker and Warburg, 1951. • Bryan S. Turner, Outline of a Theory of Human Rights, British Sociology Journal, 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> Volume 27, 1993. • Emmanuel Kant, Perpetual Peace, Cosimo Classics Philosophy, 2002. • Lydia Morris, Managing Migration, Routledge, 2002. • Bhikhu Parekh, Cosmopolitanism and Global Citizenship, Review of International Studies, 2003. • Ulrich Beck and Natan Sznaider, Unpacking Cosmopolitanism for the Social Science: a Research Agenda, The British Journal of Sociology, Volume 57, Issue 1, 2006. • Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others, Cambridge University Press, 2007. • Ulrich Beck, Cosmopolitan Vision, Polity Press, 2007. • Stan Van Hooft, Cosmopolitanism: A Philosophy for Global Ethics, Acumen, 2009. • Lydia Morris, An Emergent Cosmopolitan Paradigm? Asylum, Welfare and Human Rights, The British Journal of Sociology, Volume 60, Issue 2, 2009. Electronic Sources • EUROSTAT Statistics Database Website http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/statistics/search_database • EUROSTAT Tourism Statistics Website http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Tourism_statis tics • Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre Statistics Website http://www.internaldisplacement.org/8025708F004CE90B/(httpPages)/22FB1D4E2B196DAA8025 70BB005E787C?OpenDocument&count=1000 • The United Nations Refugee Agency Website and Statistics Iraqis, Afghans and Somalis top list of asylum seekers in industrialized world, 21 October 2009 9|Page Human Rights and Sociology Coursework January 20, 2010 http://www.unhcr.org/4adf24079.html Asylum Levels and Trends in Industrialized Countries First Half 2009, 21 October 2009 http://www.unhcr.org/4adebca49.html • Boston Review Website Martha Nussbaum, Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism, 1996. 19/01/10-20:06:43 <hu200-5_09a1_0802885_0602286a0fc40890bbef3bfa5055e8df7901c885> http://bostonreview.net/BR19.5/nussbaum.html • The Guardian Website Article on Roma community, 21 June 2009. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/21/race-northern-irelandromanian-gypsies 10 | P a g e