Human rights is the doxa of modern era, it is "presumed to be self-evident truth that define the space of the conceivable."1 Therefore, there is a need to learn more and understand human rights better through its origins and history. This essay gives a critical analyses of different views of the origins of human rights using Alston three categories: linear progress narrative, precise timeframe theory and the new revisionist.
The linear progress narrative promotes a picture of constant existence of human rights from ancient times to now, "The ancients sketched out the fundamentals of a universal ethics that the moderns would further elaborate."2 International law scholars of this view such as Paul Gordon Lauren and Micheline R. Ishay use religious ideals such as Hinduism defence of ecosystem and encouragement in both Islam and Christianity as "humanistic elements that anticipated our modern conception of rights."3 To further prove existence of the universal rights ideas, Lauren relies on many philosophers around the world such as Mo Zi, Chinese philosopher who wrote of all embracing respect all around the world4 nearly 24 centuries ago or Islamic philosopher Abu Al Farabi, in the 10th century who wrote of a moral society where all people had rights and lived in charity.5 This view point is based on the idea of continuity and inevitable progress of human rights.
However, this view point has been criticised by many international law scholars who believe the linear progressive narrative "leap from one historical moment to another with little if any attempt to demonstrate causality, probe lines of transmission, or explain the political economy involved."6 As Lynn Hunt and Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann put it, there is a risk that history of human rights would become the same as the history of the entire world if we were to incorporate any kind of fight for rights and privileges into it. Thus presenting an unbelievable and unpersuasive origins for the modern conception of human rights, changing the past to suit their narratives.
Scholars who belong to the precise timeframe theory view, pinpoint a specific historical event which they believe it was the starting point of human rights. For instance, in her Book, Inventing Human Rights: A History, Lynn Hunt states that human right were invented by the Enlightenment and the democratic revolutions that took place during that era. There are many scholars that belong to this category. All purposing different timeframes for human rights. Writers such as John Headly focused on, French and American revolutions have been brought forward, as well. Although, by far the most common starting point of human rights is the United Nations Charter of 1945 and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948.
Critics have rejected the attempt to pinpoint the emergence of human rights. "According to this myth, there arose… a new island, this absolute beginning called the individualist doctrine of human rights. Pure, smooth round healthy and naked."7 It is difficult to disregard the sense that each
argument is chosen with the benefit of hindsight and crafted to fit the author's narrative. Alston writes "the existence of these highly plausible theories suggests that the attempt to identify a single origin is a flawed approach."8
The new revisionist approach, presented in Moyn's book the last Utopia, 9 is an account of historical and political developments of the current prominence of human rights. Moyn argues that the modern human right prevailed due to the realization that UN's government centric approach on human right post World War II was a failure, so was the attempt to change Soviet Union and wider ‘Eastern Bloc, based on grand political visions, such as socialism. Therefore, both approaches were replaced by human right's allegedly neutral and anti-political ideal. Human rights is a new aspect that is meant to change old political currents beyond recognition. Moyn present a narrow test of what can constitute as a human rights movement. Writing that, there needs to be a transnational movement, a global reach and a prescription for a particular ideology of world order.
It is worthwhile to consider Alston's own argument with regards to the origins of human rights. He bases his argument on the fact that human rights is not a single idea, therefore seeking for one particular element that suddenly brought to life a coherent body of human rights, as historians have tried to do, is not realistic. He acknowledges the discontinuities along the way, but ultimately believes they do not amount to a "situation in which the wheel needs to be reinvented each time…We are looking at a continuum, albeit not a linear one."10
Human right consists of many aspects and ideas that cannot be reduced to a specific variable, therefore, much like "most historical realities the very notion of a Starting-point remains singularly elusive."11 It is not simply possible to reduce human rights to a period of time or movement when it was birthed. Human rights is so complex that examining the evolution of a single element will ultimately be fruitless. Therefore, each different approach ultimately has something to offer, but no one single account is going to have all the answers and thus invalidate alternative interpretations.
Endnotes
1. Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann, Human Rights in the Twentieth Century, (Cambridge University Press,2010), p 3
2. Micheline R. Ishay, The history of Human rights from ancient times to the globalization era, (University of California Press, 2004). P 47
3. Ibid 5
4. Mo Zi as cited in Henry Maspero, La chine antique, (Paris: PUF,1924) p 254
5. Sultanhussein Tabandeh, A Muslim commentary on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (London, Goulding,1970) p.5.
6. Alston, P, Does the past matter? On the origins of human rights, (2013) 126(7) Harvard Law Review, 2043 (review of a book by Martinez)
7. Blandine Kriegel, the state and the rule of law 33, (Marc A Lepain & Jeffrey c. Cohen trans., 19950).
8. Alston, P, Does the past matter? On the origins of human rights, (2013) 126(7) Harvard Law Review, 2043 (review of a book by Martinez) p 2066
9. Samuel Moyn, The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010)
10. Alston, P, Does the past matter? On the origins of human rights, (2013) 126(7) Harvard Law Review, 2043 (review of a book by Martinez) p 2079
11. Marc Blochi, The Historian's Craft 29-30 (Peter Putnam trans., Manchester Univ. Press 1954).
Comentários