Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Human rights in conflict

2006; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 48; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00396330600905478

1468-2699

Rosemary Foot,

Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics

Abstract The language of war has a recognised and intimate relationship with the abuse of a core set of civil and political rights. Detention without trial, arbitrary arrest, disappearance, torture and the like soon result once a political authority decides to describe a conflict in which it is involved as ‘war’. National or regime security takes centre stage, security ideologies play a stronger role, and the means employed push at the boundaries of the acceptable. This close association between conflict and human-rights abuse, if no other reason, should make us pause before we too readily resort to the language of war. The Cold War and the current ‘global war on terror’ – to use the US term – are no exceptions to this general finding. Disappearance, torture and extra-judicial killings have been features of both. The struggle against terrorism has generated a sense of impunity for actions that threaten many different groups. Acknowledgements I am grateful to the International Security Program, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, for research support during the completion of this essay. Notes 1 Steven C. Poe, C. Neal Tate and Linda Camp Keith, ‘Repression of the Human Right to Personal Integrity Revisited: A Global Cross-national Study Covering the Years 1976–1993’, International Studies Quarterly, vol. 43, no. 2, 1999, pp. 291–313; Todd Landman, ‘Holding the Line: Human Rights Defenders in the Age of Terror’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations 8, 2006, pp. 123–47. 2 Greg Grandin, The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 2004), p. 74. 3 Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘Digest of Jurisprudence of the UN and Regional Organizations on the Protection of Human Rights While Countering Terrorism’, http://www.ohchr.org/english/about/publications/docs/digest.doc, p. 8. 4 For further discussion of this point see John Lewis Gaddis, Surprise, Security, and the American Experience (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004); and Walter Russell Mead, Power, Terror, Peace and War: America's Grand Strategy in a World at Risk (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004). 5 President Harry S. Truman's Address before a Joint Session of Congress, 12 March 1947, Public Papers of the President of the United States: Harry S Truman, 1945–53 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 1966), pp. 176–80; National Security Council document no. 68, 14 April 1950, US Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States,1950, vol. 1 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 1977), pp. 237–92. 6 For a discussion of this concept as applied to US domestic politics see George Lakoff, Don't Think Like an Elephant: Know Your Values (White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2004). 7 Julia E. Sweig, Friendly Fire: Losing Friends and Making Enemies in the Anti-American Century (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 2006), pp. 17, 26. 8 National Security Strategy of the United States of America, September 2002, http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss/2002/; National Security Strategy of the United States of America, March 2006, http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss/2006; ‘Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People’, 20 September 2001, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010920-8.html; ‘The President's State of the Union Address’, 29 January 2002, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/01/20020129-11.html. President Bush also drew extensive comparisons with the Cold War experience in a commencement address at the US Military Academy, West Point, on 27 May 2006. See http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/05/print/20060527-1.html. 9 ‘Detention and Interrogation of Captured “Enemies”: Do Law and National Security Clash’, transcript prepared from a tape recording, The Brookings Institution, 12 December 2005, http://www.brookings.edu/comm/events/20051212judicial.htm, pp. 13–21. 10 James Westhead, ‘Spy Charges Pit Security against Privacy’, BBC News online, 12 May 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4763799.stm. Executive power has been asserted on more than one occasion. For one recent example see the exchange over Senator McCain's amendment to a Defense Appropriations Bill that was designed to set more humane standards for those held in US detention facilities. A presidential statement confirmed that Bush would interpret the amendment ‘in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the president’. Elisabeth Bumiller, ‘For President, Final Say on a Bill Sometimes Comes after the Signing’, New York Times, 16 January 2006, p. A.11. 11 Elizabeth Borgwardt, A New Deal for the World: America's Vision for Human Rights (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2005); Paul Gordon Lauren, The Evolution of International Human Rights: Visions Seen (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998). 12 Grandin, The Last Colonial Massacre, p. 13. 13 Kathryn Sikkink, Mixed Signals: U.S. Human Rights Policy and Latin America (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004), p. 181. 14 For discussion see David Wright-Neville, ‘Dangerous Dynamics: Activists, Militants and Terrorists in Southeast Asia’, Pacific Review, vol. 17, no. 1, 2004, pp. 27–46; N. Hamilton-Hart, ‘Terrorism in Southeast Asia: Expert Analysis, Myopia and Fantasy’, Pacific Review, vol. 18, no. 3, September 2005, pp. 303–25; A.M. Rabasa, Political Islam in Southeast Asia: Moderates, Radicals and Terrorists, Adelphi Paper 358 (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the IISS, 2003). 15 Roger Mitton, ‘US to Boost Counterterror Efforts in Asia’, Straits Times, 29 April 2006. 16 Nicholas Becquelin, ‘Criminalizing Ethnicity: Political Repression in Xinjiang’, China Rights Forum, no. 1, 2004, p. 40. 17 For evidence on the detrimental impact of post-11 December 2001 policies on the human-rights defender see Landman, ‘Holding the Line’. He argues that the most frequent forms of abuse have been ‘arbitrary arrest and detention, followed by threats, harassments and summary executions’ (p. 129). 18 ‘US Understands Reason for ISA, Says Rais’, Bernama, 11 May 2002; Human Rights Watch, In the Name of Security: Counterterrorism and Human Rights Abuses under Malaysia's Internal Security Act, http://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/Malaysia/0504, May 2004 19 C.J. Chivers, ‘Rights Group Describes Brutal Uzbek Crackdown’, International Herald Tribune, 20 September 2005, p. 4. 20 International Peace Academy, New York, United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Geneva, and Center on International Organization, Columbia University, New York, Human Rights, the United Nations, and the Struggle Against Terrorism, conference report, 7 November 2003, p. 18. 21 Sikkink, Mixed Signals, p. 113, quoting Kissinger's memoirs. 22 Ibid., pp. 104–105, 113. 23 Barry Buzan treats this topic from a theoretical perspective in From International to World Society? English School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 24 The importance of transparency to accountability is discussed in Ruth W. Grant and Robert O. Keohane, ‘Accountability and Abuses of Power in World Politics’, American Political Science Review, vol. 19, no. 1, February 2005, p. 39. 25 Margaret Keck and Kathryn Sikkink, Activists beyond Borders: Activist Networks in International Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998), pp. viii–ix; Rosemary Foot, Rights beyond Borders: The Global Community and the Struggle over Human Rights in China (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 113–15. 26 Sweig, Friendly Fire, pp. 160–62. 27 Rosemary Foot, ‘The United Nations, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights: Institutional Adaptation and Embedded Ideas’ (unpublished manuscript). 28 Douglas Jehl and Eric Lichtblau, ‘Shift on Suspect is Linked to Role of Qaeda Figures’, New York Times, 24 November 2005, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/24/politics/24padilla.html. 29 Eric Lichtblau, ‘US Inspector General Report Criticises Significant Problems of Round of Immigrants after 9/11’, New York Times, 3 June 2003, p. A1. 30 Eric Licthblau, ‘Gonzales says Humane-Policy Order Doesn't Bind C.I.A’, New York Times, 19 January 2005, p. A17 and discussed in Diane Marie Amann, ‘Abu Ghraib’, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, vol. 153, 2005, p. 2,100, n. 57. 31 This statement came in the context of Rice's visit to Europe, where she faced constant queries about US policy towards detainees. See Richard W. Stevenson and Joel Brinkley, ‘More Questions as Rice Asserts Detainee Policy’, New York Times, 8 December 2005, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/08/politics/08detain.html. 32 Accountability has been defined as ‘some actors [having] the right to hold other actors to a set of standards, to judge whether they have fulfilled their responsibilities in light of these standards, and to impose sanctions if they determine that these responsibilities have not been met’. In the area of human rights, the sanction is damage to reputation as a state that is respectful of human-rights norms. See Grant and Keohane, ‘Accountability and Abuses of Power’, pp. 29, 37. 33 They wrote that the ‘abuse of prisoners hurts America's cause in the war on terror, endangers U.S. service members who might be captured by the enemy, and is anathema to the values Americans have held dear for generations’. The text of the letter is available at http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/us_law/etn/pdf/mccain-100305.pdf. 34 According to the New York Times, the Pentagon, under pressure from a number of Senators and some senior generals, may be retreating from its intention to include a classified annex to the manual which details methods to be adopted for those detainees considered ‘unlawful combatants’ as opposed to regular prisoners of war. See Eric Schmitt, ‘Pentagon Rethinking Manual with Interrogation Methods’, New York Times, 14 June 2006, p. A19. 35 ‘US “Acts to End Prisoner Abuse”’, BBC News online, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4751955.stm, 8 May 2006. For the basis of the questions raised see United Nations Committee against Torture, ‘List of Issues to be Considered during the Examination of the Second Periodic Report of the United States of America (CAT/C/48/Add.3)’, CAT/C/USA/Q/2, 8 February 2006, http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G06/403/55/PDF/G0640355.pdf?OpenElement. An advance unedited version of the Committee's report (CAT/C/USA/ CO/2, 18 May 2006) is available at http://www.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cat/docs/AdvanceVersions/CAT.C.USA.CO.2.pdf. It makes reference, inter alia, to lenient sentencing of those US personnel investigated and prosecuted for acts of torture or cruel and inhuman treatment of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan, and refers to allegations of abusive practices in secret detention facilities. It calls for the facilities at Guantanamo Bay to be closed. 36 The poll was completed by GlobeScan and the Program on International Policy Attitudes for the BBC World Service. See http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/views_on_countriesregions_bt/190.php, 17 April 2006. The Pew Global Attitudes Project published another report on 13 June 2006, a 15-nation survey, which found that ‘America's global image has again slipped and support for the war on terrorism has declined even among close U.S. allies like Japan’. See ‘America's Image Slips, but Allies Share U.S. Concerns over Iran, Hamas’, http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=252. 37 For a recent discussion of the antecedents and current usage of the concept see Yuenfoong Khong and S. Neil MacFarlane, Human Security (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2006). An important founding document was produced by the United Nations Development Program, New Dimensions of Human Security (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994). 38 Francis M. Deng, Sadikiel Kimaro, Terrence Lyons et al., Sovereignty as Responsibility: Conflict Management in Africa (Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1996); The Responsibility to Protect: Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 2001). 39 Adam Roberts, ‘The United Nations and Humanitarian Intervention’, in Jennifer M. Welsh (ed.), Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 81. 40 For one discussion of this in reference to Latin America see Ellen Lutz and Kathryn Sikkink, ‘The Justice Cascade: The Evolution and Impact of Foreign Human Rights Trials in Latin America’, Chicago Journal of International Law, vol. 2, no. 1, 2001, pp. 1–33. 41 See UN Docs SG/SM/10440, GA/10457 2 May 2006 for Annan's comments and ‘Uniting Against Terrorism: Recommendations for a Global Counter-terrorism Strategy, Report of the Secretary-General’, A/60/825, 27 April 2006. For one of many such statements, see the then UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson: ‘Impunity [for gross violations of human rights] induces an atmosphere of fear and terror. It produces unstable societies and de-legitimizes Governments. It encourages terrorist acts and undermines the international community's effort to pursue justice under the law’, ‘Introductory statement by Mary Robinson, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’, Commission on Human Rights, 58th session, 20 March 2002, http://www,unhchr.ch/huricane/huricane,nrf/(Symbol)/OHCHR.STM.02.16.En?. 42 Foot, ‘The United Nations, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights’ contains a number of such examples. 43 See for example the US statement before the UN's Counter-terrorism Committee, UN Doc. S/PV.5168, 25 April 2005, p. 14. The trinity appears in the president's cover letter to the US National Security Strategy, March 2006. 44 Grant and Keohane, ‘Accountability and Abuses of Power’, p. 37. 45 See Joseph S. Nye, Bound to Lead: the Changing Nature of American Power (New York: Basic Books, 1990) and Joseph S. Nye, Soft Power: the Means to Success in World Politics (New York: Public Affairs Press, 2004). 46 Sweig argues, in fact, that the ‘U.S. public and political class has anchored its identity in an understanding of the Cold War's positive highlights that are drawn mainly from the experience of the European continent’. She goes on, ‘In the rare instances that America's darker Cold War associations in the periphery are revisited outside of university classrooms, their sordid nature has been downplayed or treated as the unfortunate but necessary cost of doing business’, Friendly Fire, pp. 27–8. 47 It is not that other democratic states have impeccable records since 11 September; only that matters have gone much further in the United States, and generally European parliaments, courts and assemblies have been more vigilant and combative in attempting to fight terrorism within the framework of human-rights law. 48 Jessica Stern, Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill (New York: HarperCollins, 2003). Alan B. Krueger and Jitka Maleckova argue that terrorism, rather than being caused by poverty and a lack of education, should be ‘more accurately viewed as a response to political conditions and long-standing feelings of indignity and frustration that have little to do with economics’. ‘Education, Poverty and Terrorism: Is there a Causal Connection’, Journal of Economic Perspectives, vol. 17, no. 4, fall 2003, pp. 119–44. 49 ‘UK told US won't shut Guantanamo’, BBC News online, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4760365.stm, 11 May 2006; ‘Rice, Rumsfeld Block Access to Secret Detainees – ICRC’, ABC News, http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1953311, 12 May 2006. 50 Michael Ignatieff in ‘Is the Human Rights Era ending?’, New York Times, 5 February 2002, p. A25. Additional informationNotes on contributorsRosemary Foot Rosemary Foot is Professor of International Relations and Swire Senior Research Fellow in the International Relations of East Asia, St Antony's College, Oxford. During the first half of 2006 she was a Visiting Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.