The myth of western opposition to economic, social, and cultural rights? A reply to whelan and donnelly

Human Rights Quarterly

Volumn 31, Issue 1, 2009, Pages 221-238

  Kirkup, Alex ^a   Evans, Tony ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ECONOMIC CONDITIONS; HUMAN RIGHTS; POLITICAL ECONOMY; WAR;

EID: 68149157320     PISSN: 02750392     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/hrq.0.0063     Document Type: Article

References (85)

1. Daniel J. Whelan & Jack Donnelly, The West, Economic and Social Rights, and the Global Human Rights Regime: Setting the Record Straight, 29 HUM. RTS. Q. 908 (Abstract) (2007).
2. Id. at 947.
3. Id. at 910.
4. Id. at 917.
5. Id. at 919.
6. On this concept, see STEPHEN GILL & DAVID LAW, THE GLOBAL POLITICAL ECONOMY: PERSPECTIVES, POBLEMS AND POLICIES (1988); ROBERT GILPIN, GLOBAL POLITICAL ECONOMY: UNDERSTANDING THE INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ORDER (2001); JOHN RAVENHILL, GLOBAL POLITICAL ECONOMY (2D ED. 2008).
7. MICHAEL BARKUN, LAW WITHOUT SANCTIONS: ORDER IN PRIMITIVE SOCIETIES AND THE WORLD COMMUNITY 102 (1968).
8. Oscar Schachter, The Obligation to Implement the Covenant in Domestic Law, in THE INTERNATIONAL BILL OF RIGHTS: THE COVENANT ON CIVIL AND POLITICAL RIGHTS (Louis Henkin ed., 1981).
9. This view is most explicit in R. J. VINCENT, HUMAN RIGHTS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS (1986).
10. For the argument that human rights norms are now settled, see MERVYN FROST, ETHICS IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS: A CONSTITUTIVE THEORY (1996). For the argument that ideas of human rights remain in flux, see Mustapha Kamal Pasha & David L. Blaney, Elusive Paradise: The Promise and Perils of Global Civil Society, 23 ALTERNATIVES 417 (1998).
11. See also MAKAU MUTUA, HUMAN RIGHTS: A POLITICAL AND CULTURAL CRITIQUE (2002).
12. For arguments against this view, see Mutua, supra note 10; Pasha & Blaney, supra note 10.
13. Neil Stammers, A Critique of Social Approaches to Human Rights, 17 HUM. RTS. Q. 488, 488 (1995).
14. Id.
15. Neil Stammers, Human Rights and Power, 41 POL. STUD. 70 (1993).
16. KARL MARX, GRUNDRISSE: FOUNDATI ONS OF THE CRITIQUE OF POLITICAL ECONOMY 652 (S. Ryazanskaya trans., 1973).
17. See ERIC J. HOBSBAWM, AGE OF EXTREMES: THE SHORT TWENTIETH CENTURY, 1914-1991 chs. 3, 4 (1994);
18. PHILIP MCMICHAEL, DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIAL CHANGE: A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE Ch. 1 (3d ed. 2004);
19. KARL POLANYI, THE GREAT TRANSFORMATION ch.2 (1957).
20. See BENJAMIN J. COHEN, THE BRETTON WOODS SYSTEM (2002), available at http://www.polsci. ucsb.edu/faculty/cohen/inpress/bretton.html.
21. TONY EVANS, US HEGEMONY AND THE PROJECT OF UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS (1996).
22. Whelan & Donnelly, supra note 1, at 909.
23. KARL MARX & FRIEDRICH ENGELS, THE GERMAN IDEOLOGY 78-81 (Lawrence & Wishart 1965) (1947).
24. "Entitlement" is the preferred term of Caroline Thomas. See Caroline Thomas, International Financial Institutions and Social and Economic Human Rights: An Exploration, in HUMAN RIGHTS FIFTY YEARS ON: A REAPPRAISAL 161 (Tony Evans ed., 1998); CAROLINE THOMAS, GLOBAL GOVERNANCE, DEVELOPMENT AND HUMAN SECURITY: THE CHALLENGE OF POVERTY AND INEQUALITY (2000).
25. Franklin D. Roosevelt, The Annual Message to Congress, January 6, 1941, in PUBLIC PAPERS AND ADDRESSES OF FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT 672 (1941).
26. Id.
27. Official Records of the United Nations, U.N. ESCOR, 11th Session (1950); Official Records of the United Nations, U.N. ESCOR, Comm'n on Human Rights, 6th Session, (1950).
28. Id.
29. Summary Record of the 288th Meeting of the Third Committee, U.N. GAOR, Third Committee, 5th Sess. (1950).
30. See, e.g., Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt from William Ransom, 4 May 1946, Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
31. Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt enclosing the report and recommendations of the ABA's Committee on the United Nations, Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 5487. This Report also argued that the United States must make it clear that the Covenant would not be self-executing, that a federal clause must be included, that no international court of human rights could be tolerated, and that any complaints system would exclude individual petitions.
32. See Frank E. Holman, Giving America Away, VITAL SPEECHES OF THE DAY, VOL. XVI 748-53 (1951); The Greatest Threat to American Heritage, VITAL SPEECHES OF THE DAY, VOL. XXIV 711-17 (1953). For a detailed analysis of the role of the ABA during the creation of the human rights regime, see DUANE TANANBAUM, THE BRICKER AMENDMENT CONTROVERSY: A TEST OF E ISENHOWER'S POLITICAL LEADERSHIP (1988).
33. For example, representatives of the ABA were frequently allowed to question witnesses, a privilege usually reserved for members of the Committee. Furthermore, the timing of meeting was arranged to ensure that an ABA representative could testify after all those opposed to the amendment had completed their evidence, and the Chair of the Committee invited the ABA representative to sit at his table during proceedings.
34. The Dumbarton Oaks Conversation, reprinted in ROYAL INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, UNITED NATIONS DOCUMENTS: 1941-45, at 92-104 (1946).
35. See, e.g., US reaction to USSR proposals to include the right to work, in U.S. DEP'T OF STATE, FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES 1945, VOL. I, GENERAL: THE UNITED NATIONS 532 (1967).
36. See also Memorandum of Conversation between Mrs. Roosevelt, Senator Austin, Mr. ROSS, Mr. Winslow and Mr. Hendricks, 3 July 1947, Roosevelt Library Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
37. See Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
38. For a contemporary account of the development of the Bricker Amendment, see George A. Finch, The Need to Restrain the Treaty-Making Power of the United States Within Constitutional Limits, 48 AM. J. INT'L L. 57 (1954).
39. Natalie Hevener Kaufman & David Whiteman, Opposition to Human Rights Treaties in the United States Senate: The Legacy of The Bricker Amendment, 10 HUM. RTS. Q. 309 (1988).
40. See, e.g., Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt from William Ransom, 4 May 1946, Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
41. See Letter to Eleanor Roosevelt from the American Bar Association (ABA) enclosing the view of the ABA's Committee, Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
42. Id.
43. Quoted in Kaufman & Whiteman, supra note 35, at 327.
44. W.L. McGrath, who represented the USCC at the International Labour Organization (ILO), reported to the Committee that the ILO was already attempting to implement universal socialist laws on social and labor issues, for example, by creating law that regulated women workers, including maternity leave without distinction between legitimate and illegitimate births, free medical care, and the right to one hour a day on full pay to nurse children. Tananbaum, supra note 29, at 84-85.
45. Id.
46. Papers of Eleanor Roosevelt, Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Box No. 4587.
47. Id.
48. U.N. GAOR, Third Committee, U.N. Doc. A/C.3/SR.298, at 178 ¶ 12 (1950).
49. U.N. GAOR, Third Committee, U.N. Doc. A/C.3/SR.299, at 187 ¶ 29 (1950).
50. Memorandum by the Deputy Director of the Office United Nations Economic and Social Affairs (Green) to Mr. David H. Popper, Principal Executive Officer of the US Delegation to the General Assembly, reprinted in U.S. DEP'T OF STATE, FOREI GN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES, 1950, Vol. II: THE UNITED NATIONS; THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE 575-80 (1950), available at http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type= goto&id=FRUS.FRUS19 50v02&isize=L&submit=Go+to+page&page=575.
51. Id.
52. Position Paper Prepared in the Department of State for the United States Delegation to the Sixth Regular Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, reprinted in U.S. DEP'T OF STATE, FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES, 1951, Vol. II: THE UNI TED NATI ONS; THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE 753 (1951), available at http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUSidx? type=turn&entity= FRUS.FRUS1951v02.p0775&pq1=september&q2=position%20 paper&q3=1951.
53. Id. at 756.
54. Id. at 755-56.
55. Preparation of Two Draft International Covenants on Human Rights, G.A. Res. 543(VI) of 5 Feb. 1952, U.N. GAOR, 6th Sess. (1952).
56. Statement made by Mrs. Lord before the Commission on Human Rights, U.N. ESCOR, Comm'n on Hum. Rts., 9th Sess., U.N. Doc. No. E/CN.4/1953 (1953).
57. Id. This plan was in three parts: 1) The appointment of a rapporteur with the responsibility to consult with governments, international agencies, and NGOs when preparing reports of violations; 2) a system of annual reports on human right submitted by each member of the United Nations; and 3) the establishment of advisory services on particular human rights.
58. DWIGH T D. EISENHOWER, THE WHITE HOUSE YEARS: MANDATE FOR CHANGE: 1953-56, at 278 (1963).
59. EVANS, US HEGEMONY AND THE PROJECT OF UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS, supra note 18, at 77.
60. Whelan & Donnelly, supra note 1, at 934.
61. JOHN KENNETH GALBRAITH, THE AFFLUENT SOCIETY 140-42 (1958).
62. See HOBSBAWM, supra note 16, at 284-85.
63. GUNNAR MYRDAL, BEYOND THE WELFARE STATE: ECONOMI C PLANNI NG IN THE WELFARE STATES AND ITS INTERNATIONAL IMPLICATIONS 45 (1960).
64. MCMICHAEL, supra note 16, ch. 1.
65. See, e.g., ERNEST MANDEL, DECLINE OF THE DOLLAR: A MARXIST VIEW OF THE MONETARY CRISIS (1972).
66. Stephen Gill, Globalisation, Market Civilisation, and Disciplinary Neoliberalism, 24 MILLENNIUM: J. INT'L STUD. 399, 411-12 (1995).
67. See Susan George, A Short History of Neo-liberalism: Twenty Years of Elite Economics and Emerging Opportunities for Structural Change, in GLOBAL FINANCE: NEW THINKING ON REGULATING SPECULATIVE CAPITAL MARKETS 27 (Walden Bello et. al. eds., 2000);
68. DAVID HARVEY, A BRIEF HISTORY OF NEOLIBERALISM chs.1-3 (2005); Mark Rupert, Globalisation and Contested Common Sense in the United States, in INNOVATION AND TRANSFORMATION IN INTERNATIONAL STUDIES (Stephen Gill & James H. Mittelman eds., 1997).
69. On "market discipline," see Gill, supra note 62.
70. Quoted in George, supra note 63, at 29.
71. TONY EVANS, THE POLITICS OF HUMAN RIGHTS: A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE 79-80 (2d ed. 2005); HARVEY, supra note 63, ch.1.
72. See JEANE J. KIRKPATRICK, LEGITIMACY AND FORCE 130- 31 (1988); CLIFF DURAND, HUMAN RIGHTS TODAY (2007), available at http://www.globaljusticecenter.org/articles/report-humanrights. htm.
73. M. A. Tetrault, Regimes and Liberal World Order, 13 ALTERNATIVES 5 (1988).
74. Robert Brenner, The Economics of Global Turbulence: A Special Report on the World Economy, 1950-98, at 229 NEW LEFT REV. 181 (1998).
75. Coli n Leys, Market-Driven Politics: Neoliberal Democracy and the Publi c Interest 39 (2003).
76. Id. at 53.
77. Id. at 42.
78. Id. at 220.
79. HOBSBAWM, supra note 16, at 249.
80. PETER GOWAN, THE GLOBAL GAMBLE: WASHINGTON'S FAUSTIAN BID FOR WORLD DOMINANCE chs. 3, 4 (1999).
81. ERIC HELLEINER, STATES AND THE REEMERGENCE OF GLOBAL FINANCE: FROM BRETTON WOODS TO THE 1990s, at 140-44 (1994).
82. See MCMICHAEL, supra note 16, at 139-42.
83. HELLEINER, supra note 76, at 179-80.
84. JOHN WILLIAMSON, INST. FOR INT'L ECON., What Washington Means by Policy Reform, in LATIN AMERICAN ADJUSTMENT: HOW MUCH HAS HAPPENED? (1990), available at http://www.petersoninstitute. org/publications/papers/paper.cfm?ResearchID=486.
85. Stuart Corbridge, Discipline and Punish: The New Right and the Policing of the International Debt Crisis, 23 GEOFORUM 285, 291 (1992).