The global promotion of gender equality—A propaganda approach

This paper proposes a new way of measuring progress in international politics, an approach that focuses on the symbolic and ideological work of international organizations. Although such a strategy is not entirely new to the study of International Relations, it has not been a common, accessible way of assessing how well international organizations work to effect change. The more famous methods have been legalistic—investigations of how international organizations have created new international law in the issue-areas under investigation¹—and bureaucratic—studies of how international organizations create machinery to deal with the problems². But in a world where domestic and international discourse is more mediated than ever before by television, radio, the Internet, newspapers, and other means of mass communication, the argument here is that propaganda is a third arena that must be taken into account when exploring the work of international organizations. The international organization in question here is the United Nations, and the issue-area examined is gender equality, a topic that is also variously described as “women's rights,” “women's issues”, or the “women's movement”. The paper explains first why the topic of the UN and women's rights is important, I then examine the propaganda role of the UN in the struggle for gender equality, and the paper concludes with a critical analysis of the UN's propaganda work in relation to this issue.     

A comparative view of indigenous citizenship issues

Following the Wik decision it is being suggested that Australia ought now to revisit the translation of special legal norms formulated in international law with respect to the human rights of indigenous citizens. These have previously underpinned developments in both Australia and Scandinavia with respect to indigenous people. Recent Australian developments, particularly the struggle over indigenous property rights, exemplify the argument of O'Neill (1997) in the first volume of Citizenship Studies, which points to the absorption of civic autonomy by market sovereignty. O'Neill is correct to suggest that the dominance of market sovereignty reduces the political participation of those incapable of the competitive struggle for private affluence and that this has a squalid dimension. Central to this is the denial of the notion of community and dominance of the market. This dominance has obscured the significance of the Australian High Court's recognition of aboriginal land rights in Mabo. The decision put the incorrect application of terra nullius—or no man's land—to Australia to rights. It made it possible for the nation to contemplate indigenous sovereignty consequent upon the recognition of native title property rights. Australia's translation of those rights with the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth) looked to international law for its rationale. The rights of the Sami people have been developed in Scandinavia largely with reference to the evolution of international law on indigenous peoples. As we approach 2000, Australia cannot continue to ignore the special legal norms in international law relating to citizenship of indigenous peoples. International law informs attempts by indigenous people in modern times to regain some of what they lost in the past.     

Are There Universal Collective Rights?

The first part of the paper focuses on the current debate over the universality of human rights. After conceptually distinguishing between different types of universality, it employs Sen’s definition that the claim of a universal value is the one that people anywhere may have reason to see as valuable. When applied to human rights, this standard implies “thin” (relative, contingent) universality, which might be operationally worked-out as in Donnelly’s three-tiered scheme of concepts–conceptions–implementations. The second part is devoted to collective rights, which have recently become a new topic of the human rights debate. This part provides the basis of political–philosophical justification and legal–theoretical conceptualization of collective rights, as rights directly vested in collective entities. The third part dwells on the problem of universality of collective rights. It differentiates between the three main collective entities in international law—peoples, minorities, and indigenous peoples—and investigates whether certain rights vested in these collectives might, according to Sen’s standard, acquire the status of the universal ones. After determining that some rights are, in principle, plausible candidates for such a status in international law, this paper concludes by taking notice of a number of the open issues that still need to be settled, primarily by the cooperative endeavor of international legal scholars and legal theorists.     

Splitting the difference: Partnering with non-governmental organizations to manage HIV/AIDS epidemics in Australia and Thailand

Conclusions Australia and Thailand have made great progress in partnering with NGOs to respond to HIV/AIDS through the protection of human rights. Unquestionably, the Australian experience is more advanced. However, it is important to note that Australia’s political institutions and traditions were able to empower and accept an NGO movement of this nature almost from the start of disease identification.Thailand did not have this advantage, having only moved toward political institutions that are open to public opinion and civil society’s input within the last 15 years. In spite of their varied histories, both countries eventually traveled down similar paths. In Australia, HIV/AIDS NGOs moved rapidly forward from being standard-setting, fact-finding, and advocacy organizations to becoming capable of creating new HIV/AIDS umbrella organizations and influencing existing governmental organizations on HIV/AIDS human rights issues. Indeed, by the close of the 1980s, NGOs had established themselves firmly in all of these roles. The fact that Australia still struggles with addressing an emerging epidemic among indigenous people is more a sign that the movement has thus far been incomplete than that it is faltering or ineffective. Additionally, now that NGOs are actively working through AFAO on behalf of indigenous peoples, it is likely that there will finally be more movement on human rights and H1V/AIDS issues for this group. However, sex tourism and the illegal trafficking of women and children for purposes of prostitution continue to require ongoing proactive management by the partnership before they become a serious epidemic threat. Thailand’s situation is somewhat different from that of Australia. The HIV/AIDS NGO community has grown since the epidemic exploded in the 1990s, but the organizations themselves continue to have limited power, While they have been an important voice in human rights standard-setting, fact-finding and advocacy regarding HIV/AIDS, they remain unable to fully influence the governmental organizations that ultimately make and implement human rights policies in these areas. As the NGO experience in general is new to Thai politics, continuing human rights abuses are a sign of the miles left to travel on this road rather than an indicator that the road needs to be abandoned. Regardless of their differing experiences with creating HIV/AIDS partnerships, it is impossible to say that either effort has failed to use this mechanism successfully to at least begin seriously addressing HIV/AIDS human rights issues. What can be said is that each partnership can be placed at a differing point on a continuum of effectiveness that ultimately concludes with a fully integrated partnership capable of fundamentally influencing a country’s HIV/AIDS human rights policies on an ongoing basis.     

Korea's technological development

Abstract

Indigenous peoples’ rights, including the right to self-determination, are increasingly codified in international law and policy and disseminated globally by international organizations. These norms mark a profound change in the ideals of citizenship promoted by the international community, away from linguistically and institutionally homogenous citizenship in centralized states to group-differentiated citizenship in decentralized, multi-level and multi-lingual states that use local and regional autonomy for the accommodation of indigenous peoples. Essential to realizing these norms is the devolution of some degree of autonomy to sub-central state units substantially controlled by indigenous communities. Because the transfer of powers to indigenous peoples is crucial to their accommodation, protection and participation in modern states, and because decentralization programs are an important component of reform agendas in most developing countries, it is important to understand how these emerging norms are integrated into real-world decentralization processes.

This article analyzes the application of the World Bank's safeguards policy for indigenous peoples within the institution's support to decentralization reform in Cambodia. The analysis demonstrates that under certain circumstances, the policy not only fails to translate into effective protection but leads to outcomes diametrically opposed to its objectives. In its current design, Bank support to decentralization contributes to the marginalization of indigenous peoples in Cambodia and undermines the institutional, cultural and natural resources upon which their empowerment and participation depends. In environments in which full compliance might be unrealistic to accomplish by individual projects, safeguard obligations lead to a strategy on the part of Bank projects of avoiding geographical and policy areas that are likely to trigger the safeguards policy, in order to reduce projects’ vulnerability to non-compliance claims. The article discusses how more effective application of the safeguards policy might be achieved and how strategies for the empowerment of indigenous peoples can more effectively draw on decentralization frameworks.     

Indigenization of the Holocaust and the Tehran Holocaust Conference: Iranian Aberration or Third World Trend?

It is understandable that Iran’s December 2006 hosting of an international conference casting doubts on the historicity of the Holocaust would raise questions about treatments of the Shoah elsewhere in the Third World. In fact, indigenization the Holocaust—the manifold ways in which serious scholars, activists, and writers from Asia, Africa, and Latin America have come to incorporate the Holocaust in their intellectual work—has been positive overall. Within the framework of intellectual globalization, much of the Third World intelligentsia has come to include this most Western of human rights violations within the framework of their own cultures and histories. Although some of the indigenization of the Holocaust is political and instrumental, the deviant variant expressed at the Tehran Holocaust conference is atypical. Governmental respect for the memory of victims of genocide should be considered as an emerging human right.     

On the creation of indigenous subjects in the Russian Federation

For many of Russia's poorest people, and especially for the officially recognized ‘indigenous small-numbered peoples’, neoliberal reforms following the collapse of the Soviet Union represented a major retrenchment in ‘social citizenship’ as defined by T.H. Marshall. However, some reforms also promised increased civil, political and cultural citizenship rights, which Russia's indigenous peoples have sought to realize through new legislation and appeals to international agreements regarding the rights of indigenous peoples. But with Russia's current economic and political course geared towards maximizing revenues from the extraction and sale of natural resources, Russia's indigenous peoples have been frustrated in their efforts to realize these citizenship rights, particularly in their attempts to assert rights to land and resources through legal means. This paper draws on case studies from southern Siberia to discuss first how Russia's identity politics and an international focus on indigenous peoples have combined to create indigenous subjects in the Russian Federation, and second how the anticipated transition from indigenous subjects to indigenous citizens has for the most part failed to materialize.     

Politicization as a strategy for recognition and enforcement of human rights in Kenya

Drawing from recent advocacy efforts on the right to education in Kenya, this article argues that linking human rights to local political struggles is a useful way of ensuring their realization. Human rights are legal and moral but their realization is a political project. The form that this project takes will differ from context to context. While paying due regard to the remarkable contribution of international human rights regimes and transnational advocacy of the last fifty years in providing the world with a powerful legal and moral vocabulary of rights, this article suggests that this vocabulary risks losing its edge unless those working in the field of human rights recognize the necessity of local politics. The article examines the activities of the Kenyan human rights movement and its strategic linking of access to basic education with repression of political freedoms. I would like to thank participants at the May 9–10, 2003 “Rights in Africa” conference at North-wester University, Illinois, for their comments on an earlier draft of this paper.     

Making meaning of violence: Human rights and historical memory of the conflict in El Salvador

Human rights narratives about victimization run the risk of depoliticizing the acts of violence that created victims. In many communities in El Salvador, grassroots memory narratives have not suppressed victims' participation in the revolutionary movement before and during the country's civil war. Quite the contrary, one of the key reasons Salvadoran survivors identify for doing memory work is preserving revolutionary ideals — not to preserve the accounting of abuses, as is familiar in international human rights circles, but rather to relate the underlying reasons why so many risked so much. There is reason to believe this is different than other countries in postconflict Latin America. This may be the result of the relative weakness of postconflict accountability efforts and a reality that may give victims less perceived incentive to frame their life histories in ways that intersect with dominant human rights tropes. It may also pose a challenge as legal accountability efforts accelerate in the years ahead.     

Two Diasporas: Overseas Chinese and Non-resident Indians in Their Homelands’ Political Economy

This paper, through a comparative study of the roles Chinese and Indian diasporas in the United States play in the political economy of their respective homelands, explores the relationship between the diaspora and homeland development and how this dynamic relationship contributes to economic growth and foreign relations of the homelands. The author argues that the roles of Indian and Chinese diasporas in their respective homelands’ development consistently reflect, and are heavily influenced by, their homelands’ economic development strategies as well as political history and culture. The author also argues that the impact of the diaspora on the foreign relations of their homelands is conditional upon the state of bilateral relations between their homeland and the country of residence. This study raises issues for future research, such as the relationship between the diaspora and regime type of the homeland. The author concludes by suggesting that since activities of overseas Chinese and non-resident Indians provide a unique perspective in the comparative study of Chinese and Indian political economy, the two diasporas warrant more scholarly and policy attention. Zhiqun Zhu, Ph.D. is currently Assistant Professor and Chair of International Political Economy and Diplomacy at the University of Bridgeport, Connecticut. He is the author of US-China Relations in the 21 ^st Century: Power Transition and Peace (Routledge, 2006). His research and teaching interests include international political economy, East Asian politics, and US-China relations. He wishes to thank panelists at the 102^nd annual conference of the American Political Science Association in Philadelphia for their helpful comments. He also wants to acknowledge Dr. Dave Benjamin’s useful suggestions and editorial assistance.     

Conservation and community-based development through ecotourism in the temperate rainforest of southern Chile

General assessments of ecotourism and community-led development offer conflicting views of these strategies’ potential. Appraisals of successful projects add to the available knowledge that policy makers can use to improve decision-making. The Mapu Lahual Network of Indigenous Parks (RML), an ecotourism development and conservation project in the 10th Region of southern Chile, covers 45,000 ha within the territories of eight indigenous communities, in a part of southern Chile that national and international conservation organizations consider a high priority for ecological conservation. Elected leaders of the indigenous communities established the RML in 2000 with technical assistance from public agencies and financial assistance from national and environmental organizations. The RML’s primary purpose is to increase and diversify per-capita incomes in a way that preserves the area’s environment and culture by establishing tourism based on a system of parks, trails, campgrounds, and local services. This paper appraises the RML with respect to the common interest of the relevant local, national, and international communities. The policy sciences provide a contextual basis for practical recommendations that will help participants build on the project’s strengths and correct its weaknesses. The RML initiative provides a model of a development process that has been constructively supported by members of public agencies and conservation organizations. The strategies employed in the RML could be diffused and adapted in other contexts.

Indigenous Rights, Global Governance, and State Sovereignty

This article discusses indigenous rights within the context of global governance. I begin by defining the terms ??global governance?? and ??indigenous peoples?? and summarizing the rights that are most important to indigenous peoples. The bulk of this article studies the global governance of indigenous rights in three areas. The first example is the creation of the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. A second example involves violations of indigenous rights brought before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. A third case looks at a relatively new international regime created by indigenous peoples themselves??the Inuit Circumpolar Council. I conclude by using theories of sovereignty to assess the relative successes and failures of indigenous efforts to secure their rights.     

Indigenous peoples and non-ferrous metals mining in the Philippines

Abstract

The Philippines is a developing country well endowed with mineral resources. In recent years, the government has made substantial efforts to encourage the exploitation of these resources. This mining-based development paradigm has come into conflict with the indigenous peoples of this nation. This conflict has entailed disputes between the mining industry and indigenous peoples about the validity of the Philippines indigenous peoples rights legislation and alleged human rights abuses on the behalf of the mining industry. The Philippines strong civil society has assisted the indigenous peoples in regard to this conflict. Possible solutions to this conflict are examined.     

Sex Trafficking: Trends,Challenges, and the Limitations of International Law

The passage of the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children in 2000 marked the first global effort to address human trafficking in 50 years. Since the passage of the UN Protocol international organizations, non-governmental organizations, and individual states have devoted significant resources to eliminating human trafficking. This article critically examines the impact of these efforts with reference to the trends, political, and empirical challenges in data collection and the limitations of international law. I argue that current international law disproportionately addresses the criminal prosecution of traffickers at the expense of trafficking victims’ human rights, and has therefore not yet reached its full potential in the fight against human sex trafficking.     

Civil society and the contemporary threat to religious freedom in Bangladesh

ABSTRACT

Against the international backdrop of rising religious tensions, this article explores contemporary civil society views on religious freedom in Bangladesh. It uses critical frame analysis of the corpus of civil society organizations’ (CSOs) submissions to the United Nations’ third cycle Universal Periodic Review (UPR), 2013–18. It provides a timely assessment of Bangladesh’s fulfilment of international obligations on religious freedom, and shows how the politicization of religion and the resultant conflict between ‘secularism’ and ‘extremism’ have been fuelling inter-communal tensions and religious intolerance. In particular, CSOs’ UPR submissions present powerful accounts of the principal human rights pathology affecting the country today, religious-based violence. This is accompanied by a narrative of police malpractice, judicial failings, discrimination, oppression and incitement. A further key finding is ‘situated knowledge’ or first-hand accounts of legal restrictions and government repression of civil society organizations. Consonant with the classical work of liberal theorists, we argue that unprecedented importance now attaches to safeguarding civil society criticality in order to defend religious freedom and uphold human rights in the Republic.     

The West Divided? A Snapshot of Human Rights and Transatlantic Relations at the United Nations

Based mostly on extensive interviews with diplomats and human rights activists, this article questions the claim advanced by the German philosopher Jürgen Habermas that current transatlantic relations can be described in terms of a “Divided West.” We examine the scope and depth of shared understandings between key actors in the United States, Germany, and Canada with regard to the definition, monitoring, and implementation of international human rights and to the reform of human rights-related mechanisms within the broader context of current UN reforms. While we do find differences between US, German, and Canadian perspectives, we argue that the meaning attributed to these differences by diplomats and nongovernmental organizations does not justify the polarizing discourse of the Divided West. In addition, we argue that this discourse tends to obfuscate other important trends in the human rights world such as the growing assertiveness of non-Western powers.     

Legal Invisibility and the Revolution: Statelessness in Egypt

Recent political turmoil has focused international attention on Egypt, yet there is little awareness of the country’s stateless populations—those who lack legal nationality to any state—or the challenges they face. Individuals in situations of protracted statelessness are denied their right to a nationality, resulting in an array of additional rights violations. Such violations include denied freedom of movement, equality before the law, and access to economic and social rights. Drawing from two years’ of fieldwork data, this study highlights the plight of those who are unable to achieve legal status in a country with harsh punishments for illegal presence, entry, and exit. It also evaluates potential solutions for eliminating statelessness in Egypt and protecting the rights of stateless populations. As Egypt seeks to move beyond revolution, it is vital that the government addresses the pervasive and systemic inequalities that deny individuals their right to a nationality.     

Sovereignty,Human Rights,and Responsibility: Changes in China’s Response to International Humanitarian Crises

The question of whether human rights are above sovereignty has dominated China’s human rights discourse. Relying on a sovereignty-human rights spectrum, this article reviews China’s behaviors, particularly its participation in the UN Security Council, in managing the three major international humanitarian crises in the post-Cold War era—Rwanda, Kosovo, and Darfur, and finds that there have been impressive changes in China’s response to the crises. Yet, a content analysis of China’s official discourse on human rights finds that China’s attitudes towards sovereignty and human rights have not changed much. Drawing on constructivist international relations theory, this article attempts to explain the paradox. It is argued that the international discourse on the “responsibility to protect” has brought about changes in international norms regarding violations of human rights and humanitarian law, and that, having undergone in recent years an identity change from a defensive power of bitterness and insecurity to a rising power aspiring to take more responsibility, China is more concerned about its national image and more receptive to international norms, which has led to the changes in its response to international humanitarian crises.     

Feminism and bureaucratic discourse∗

Abstract

The globalization of markets is calling national employment and social legislation increasingly into question, so that not only the international trade union organizations but also the Clinton Administration are calling for workers’ rights to be embodied in trade agreements. This paper deals with both the fundamental question of whether international labor standards serve a useful purpose and the more specific question of whether trade agreements are a suitable way of enforcing minimum standards. It will argue that international standards can plausibly be justified in terms of development theory. Core labor rights, furthermore, enjoy universal acceptance. A social clause can help in enforcing these rights. The procedures for negotiating social clauses and for implementing them as proposed by the international trade union movement do not lend themselves to protectionism.     

Managing Chinese Bureaucrats: An Institutional Economics Perspective

Conventional analysis of government typically focuses on 'politics', that is, interests, conflicts or personalities. But governing a country is not only a task of successfully governing its people but also an administrative task of managing subordinate officials. This is a very relevant issue in a country such as China, with a massive bureaucracy. The top 'managers' of the country – some 30 national leaders – make policies but also manage a large number of bureaucratic personnel. As in business organizations, control problems occur when subordinates have different interests from those of the organization and when the behavior of subordinates is imperfectly monitored. Control mechanisms are designed to minimize such problems by either aligning interests or improving information. This article uses this framework to explain a wide variety of administrative phenomena in Chinese government organizations.