NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF MODERN LANGUAGES

ISLAMABAD CAMPUS

Department: International Relations.

Submitted by:
Mian Ibtisam Ahmed Saqib
IR-219226
Section B
Submitted to:
Sir Sajid Iqbal
Human Rights in IR
 ➢ Introduction:
If we talk about the literal meaning than ‘’right’’ is meant by something human being
deserves regardless or colour, creed, cast, religion or area, even the constitution of the different
states are made in the light of human rights, so that it can prevent the human right break and the
allow the one’s to defend their rights and moral values.

Human rights are permanent feature of International Relations now days. At first human rights
was known as ‘’Right of Men’’ which was originated back in the 18th centenary. The first bill
which was presented was in 1776 which was incorporated in 1791 in United States which was
known as Virginia bill as it was passed in Virginian state of United States of America, Whereas
the constitution and the French declaration of Rights or Men and citizens was coined in 1789.
But unfortunately it didn’t acquired a place of its own before 1945, it was recognised in 1945 as
its own place in international relation, as we know international relation itself got the
consideration as an academic discipline in 1919, in the university of Wales.

The preamble to the Charter of the United Nations mentions explicitly the notion of basic human
rights. To accomplish worldwide co-activity in taking care of global issues of a financial, social,
or helpful person, and in advancing and empowering in consider to common liberties and for
key opportunities for all the humans without qualification as to race, sex, language or religion.
This drove in 1948 to the reception by the UN General Gathering of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, which was announced as a "normal norm of accomplishment for all people
groups and all countries". A piece of the East West struggle, known as the Cold War, was battled
out as far as questions about human privileges.

➢ Dark History Of Violation:

Human rights were incorporated in the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration
as a reaction to the outrageous crimes against humanity committed by the German
national socialists between 1933 and 1945. The imprisonment, torture and killing of
more than six million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals and political opponents of the Nazis
was the largest-scale break of basic human rights in modern times. Concepts such as
“genocide” and “crimes against humanity” are inseparably linked to this period in world
 history. The victorious allied powers wanted to prevent such events from ever happening
again. They based themselves, among other matter, on the “four freedoms” formulated
by United States President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1941: freedom of speech and
expression, freedom to worship God, freedom from want and freedom from fear.

➢ International Law

International law is an integral part of international society as an institution providing rules

for states’ cooperation (Bull 1995:132). The first point is whether it coherently expresses
shared values of human rights among states. International law had been primarily concerned
with the maintenance order, as seen in provisions such as the UN Charter Article 2(4)
restricting the use of force and Article 2(7) supporting non-intervention principle (Jackson
2000:18). Human rights law has gained significance since the end of Second World War. The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was established in 1948 although it had no
legally binding effect. Two Covenants were signed in 1966 with an intention to create
enforceable treaties with more specified rights. Subsequently, several Conventions were
introduced with focus on particular issues such as torture, children and women’s rights.
These issues were given jus cogen status, which means that these values are so important that
they prevail over other values. (Forsythe 2006:39-41) All these laws came into existence by
states’ agreement to incorporate justice into international relations, establishing human rights
as a common value of international society.

Secondly, in terms of state practice, states do not seem as much to conceive themselves to be
bound by these rules as their rhetoric of human rights protection (Birdsall 2009:30). The
disagreement between the international community and the government of Yugoslavia in the
process of creating International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY)
illustrates the problem of state reluctance. While majority opinion in the UN supported the
ICTY as a multilateral means to enforce internationally agreed justice, the government of
Yugoslavia objected on two grounds. First, it claimed the UN had no right to intervene in its
internal affairs. Second, if the international community indeed recognised the existence of
universal justice, creation of a permanent international tribunal based on sovereign equality
of states would be desirable than a selective approach targeting only at Yugoslavia (Birdcalls
2009:100-101). The ad hoc tribunal was a consequence of compromise between the claim for
order and justice. While accepting the presence of universal justice and the need to ‘do
something’ in the circumstance of break , states were careful not to set a precedence of
justice prevailing order by stressing the uniqueness of Yugoslavia and the temporariness of
the tribunal.

➢ Humanitarian Intervention

Role of humanitarian intervention is to alleviate the sufferings of people within a state’s

border through an armed interference (Morris and Wheeler 1996:135). Pluralists and
solidarists present contrasting views on whether humanitarian intervention has become a
common value among states. Pluralist object intervention for two reasons: selectivity and the
subjectivity of justice (Bull 1995:85). In conditions where there is no agreement on what
human rights are, enforcement of human rights will be based on interests of prominent states
which may threat other values and break the rule of sovereign equality. Nevertheless,
intervention may be allowed if there is strong consensus and agreement among states. This is
reflected in existing international rules where an intervention gains legitimacy only under the
Security Council authorisation based on Article 7 of the UN Charter.

On the other hand, solidarists believe that there are universal human rights from natural law
and humanitarian intervention should be allowed when these basic rights are break. Vincent
argues that Henry Shue’s three basic rights are shared by all human beings and humanitarian
intervention is only acceptable when these basic rights are grossly break , because too
frequent interventions may lead to injustice (Vincent 1999:127). Andrew Hurrell (2003:36-
40) goes even further and suggests possibility of moving towards a world society.
Globalisation has changed international society into a denser network of shared institutions
and practices within which social expectations of global justice are more securely
established.

Although both pluralists and solidarists recognize possibilities of intervention whether it

should be based on states’ agreement or basic rights, state practices seem to suggest that state
sovereignty and national interest continue to be the predominant factors. Three early
interventions in Uganda, East Pakistan and Cambodia show there was little support for the
idea of humanitarian intervention. In each case, states used self-defence to justify
interventions to prove their actions were not illegal, which reflected their perception of the
illegitimacy of the idea of humanitarian intervention . Later cases of Iraqi Kurds, Somalia
and Rwanda do not differ greatly in sense that they were characterised by states’ self-interest,
media and public pressure, and attitudes against precedent-setting by stressing
‘extraordinary’ feature of each case . In Bosnia and Kosovo, Western governments’ ‘casualty
free’ operation in the fear of losing domestic public support overrode the humanitarian
motives

➢ Defects in international human rights

Whereas rights signify abstract to protection of interests by law, human rights refer to
interests directly connected to human dignity, viz. basic freedoms and basic entitlements. To
“protect human rights,” then means protecting the protection of these interests by law. Such
discourse obviously weakens the mission.

(1) Even when country assessments and cases of human rights break are treated as very
serious matters, there is remarkably little attention to the follow-up of cases in which evident
break of human rights were established. This is one explanation why the global human rights
deficit – manifested in impunity of state-related perpetrators of gross and systematic break,
structural non-implementation of the rights of the poor, lack of protection of non-dominant
collectivities, and domestic break against women and children – strongly persists.

(2) The juridical nature of the international human rights venture went together with an
emphasis on case-by-case approaches. Yet, national non-implementation is often of a
structural nature, requiring primarily international political action. Insofar as such action has
been forthcoming, it has suffered from the almost inherent double standards in the world of
states.

3) Effective protection of collectivities requires close co-operation between the UN’s

political set-up, which deals with international peace and security, and its juridical branch,
which is tuned to the “promotion and protection” of human rights. Likewise, the realization
of economic, social, and cultural rights needs the full dedicationasic of relevant development-
oriented agencies, including the international financial institutions (IFIs).

(5) International human rights are not yet fairly focused on the economic, political, social,
and cultural aspects of the distinct environments in which these rights have to be realized.

(6) Devoid of global governance, economic globalization has increased socio-economic

inequality while creating an adverse environment for the realization of economic, social, and
cultural rights.

(7) In the aftermath of 11 September 2001 (9/11) the world has seen a strong revival of
“exceptionalism” in respect to international law. Exceptionalism is a term generally used to
describe the ways and means by which states exempt themselves from the international legal
and political order.

➢ Positive perspectives

Notwithstanding these serious flaws in the operation of the international human rights
system, there are certain hopeful signs:

(1) The global “faith” in universal dignity and inalienable rights that was mentioned in
the preamble of both the UN Charter and the UDHR is implicit in the strong moral-
political rhetoric of the Declaration as exemplified in the articles specifying the
various rights beginning with “all,” “everyone” or “no one.” Indeed, everybody
counts and no one is to be submitted to treatment break their basic human dignity. In
what way the declaration may have finally been drafted – “written in two days in a
hotel room in San Francisco by Eleanor Roosevelt and two assistants” (Korzec: 1993)
– it is a simple fact that these words have a universal appeal. While this may not be
the case in c to all those who rule, it certainly applies to those who are ruled. In fact,
just like Holy Scriptures such as the Bible, the Qur’an and the Bhagavad Gita, the
UDHR appeals to a much wider circle of people breaks the cultural context in which
it originated. Those who have ever carried copies of the Universal Declaration to
 countries with tyrannical regimes know that, in a cultural context entirely different
from “the West,” there can be an overwhelming demand for this document.

(2) Notably, the whole venture is of a programmatic rather than an immediately

conclusive nature. In fact, it all started with a Universal Declaration of Human
Rights. This does not mean, however, that the term “rights” as used here is meant in
the sense of a moral category as if these “moral rights” could be distinguished from
“legal rights.” Rights signify interests protected by law, meaning a public-political
responsibility towards their protection, and in this sense, human rights are not distinct
from other rights. It should be noted that rights are never simply self-executing.
Indeed, realization of one’s rights under the law always requires action and this
applies to announce rights in particular. Hence, although the “downstream” basis of
the international human rights standards is rather weak, “upstream” action may well
serve to actually secure the b freedoms and end permission that are meant to be
protected.

(3) Although UN General Assembly declarations do not routinely qualify as international

law, through periods of customary state practice and guided by a strong opinio
iuris (accepted legal opinion) these may well result in customary international law, in
certain instances even consider as ius cogens (non-denotable provisions of
international law). This applies, for example, to the right to life, liberty and bodily
integrity (banning of torture) and due process. Yet, even to get ius cogens enforced
through effective judicial remedies remains a huge challenge. Hence, the downstream
setout will always need linkages to upstream action on the part of those whose rights
are at stake and the agencies that support them.
(4) The international human rights project was never intended as a separate setout , aside
from regional and national mechanisms. Europe has created a very strong regional
system through the European Convention on Human Rights and the adjoining
European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The regional mechanisms in Africa
and in the Americas are gradually being reinforced. Even more importantly, national
human rights institutions – supervisory commissions and institutes – play an
increasing role. Moreover, as will be illustrated below, national legislators and
particularly national judiciaries often manifest an activist attitude when it comes to
human rights implementation.

(5) Despite its flaws from the legality perspective, international human rights law has
created a strong notion of global validity , based on common standards of justice and
injustice. This implies that no use of power is considered legitimate if it break
international human rights standards. It is particularly in the absence of a reliable
global instrument for human rights enforcement that the international standards
behind human rights play an important part in the real civilizing mission.

(6) Particularly through the support of international civil society, linked to national
NGOs in distinct contexts, international mechanisms for supervision of human rights
compliance serve to bring concrete break out into the open. Quidquid latet
apparebit (whatever is hidden is to be revealed) as Thomas of Celano put it in his
peroration on the final judgment Dies Irae, Dies Illa.

(7) Although the original language of most documents originating in the international
human rights journey is juridical and protective, in actual practice the project is at
least as political and transformational. Indeed, while the history of civil and political
rights is tuned in particular to the protection of citizens against sovereigns who want
 to rob them of their possessions, in a “Third World context” the declaration functions
as a basis for the emancipation of the have-nots.

➢ Conclusion

Role of international relations can be summarized into three main functions in English
School’s theory of international society: human rights as common interests of the society,
binding force on states as a common set of rules, and achieving justice. With particular
reference to international law and humanitarian intervention, it has been argued that there is
growing recognition of and dedication to human rights as a common value among states.
However, state practices have been relatively weak in terms of translating these ideals into
reality. State sovereignty and non-intervention are still the basic principles of inter-state
relations. By placing the entire discussion of state sovereignty and human rights within a
larger context of order and justice, English School provides that these two concepts are not
necessarily conflictual: order may be a preliminary condition for justice and an unjust order
is not likely to help.