Nov 19, 2019
Nov 18, 2019
Human Rights #7 families
Human Rights consists of 7 families:
(1) Security rights
Protect people against murder, torture, and genocide;
(2) Due process rights
Protect people against arbitrary and excessively harsh punishments and require fair and public trials of those accused of crimes;
(3) Liberty rights
Protect people’s fundamental freedoms in areas such as belief, expression, association, and movement;
(4) Political rights
Protect people’s liberty to participate in politics by assembling, protesting, voting, and serving in public office;
(5) Equality rights
Guarantee equal citizenship, equality before the law, and freedom
from discrimination;
(6) Social rights
Require that governments ensure to all the availability of work, education, health services, and an adequate standard of living.
(7) Collective Rights
Protect women, children, disabled, minorities, indigenous peoples, migrant workers
(1) Security rights
Protect people against murder, torture, and genocide;
(2) Due process rights
Protect people against arbitrary and excessively harsh punishments and require fair and public trials of those accused of crimes;
(3) Liberty rights
Protect people’s fundamental freedoms in areas such as belief, expression, association, and movement;
(4) Political rights
Protect people’s liberty to participate in politics by assembling, protesting, voting, and serving in public office;
(5) Equality rights
Guarantee equal citizenship, equality before the law, and freedom
from discrimination;
(6) Social rights
Require that governments ensure to all the availability of work, education, health services, and an adequate standard of living.
(7) Collective Rights
Protect women, children, disabled, minorities, indigenous peoples, migrant workers
Cicero the slain humanist of Rome
#Cicero
Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, and writer who vainly tried to uphold republican principles in the final civil wars that destroyed the Roman Republic.
Videos
https://youtu.be/KZA3szW3plI
https://youtu.be/VhgWPAjJdGY
Cicero was not involved in the conspiracy to kill Caesar on March 15, 44.and was not present in the Senate when he was murdered.
Following Julius Caesar's death, Cicero became an enemy of Mark Antony in the ensuing power struggle, attacking him in a series of speeches. He came to admit in the De republica that republican government required the presence of a powerful individual—an idealized Pompey perhaps—to ensure its stability, he showed little appreciation of the intrinsic weaknesses of Roman republican administration. He was proscribed as an enemy of the state by the Second Triumvirate and consequently executed.
Among Cicero's admirers were Desiderius Erasmus, Martin Luther, and John Locke.[114] Following the invention of Johannes Gutenberg's printing press, De Officiis was the second book printed in Europe, after the Gutenberg Bible. Scholars note Cicero's influence on the rebirth of religious toleration in the 17th century.
Cicero was especially popular with the Philosophes of the 18th century, including Edward Gibbon, Diderot, David Hume, Montesquieu, and Voltaire. Voltaire called Cicero "the greatest as well as the most elegant of Roman philosophers".
Across the Atlantic, Cicero the republican inspired the Founding Fathers of the United States and the revolutionaries of the French Revolution. John Adams said, "As all the ages of the world have not produced a greater statesman and philosopher united than Cicero, his authority should have great weight." Jefferson names Cicero as one of a handful of major figures who contributed to a tradition "of public right" that informed his draft of the Declaration of Independence and shaped American understandings of "the common sense" basis for the right of revolution. Camille Desmoulins said of the French republicans in 1789 that they were "mostly young people who, nourished by the reading of Cicero at school, had become passionate enthusiasts for liberty".
Cicero's advice to his brother that "if fate had given you authority over Africans or Spaniards or Gauls, wild and barbarous nations, you would still owe it to your humanitas to be concerned about their comforts, their needs, and their safety.
De re publica
Cicero uses the work to explain Roman constitutional theory. Written in imitation of Plato’s Republic, it takes the form of a Socratic dialogue in which Scipio Aemilianus takes the role of a wise old man.
The work examines the type of government that had been established in Rome since the kings, and that was challenged by amongst others Julius Caesar. The development of the constitution is explained, and Cicero explores the different types of constitutions and the roles played by citizens in government.
Quotes
A room without books is like a body without a soul.
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.
To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.
While there's life, there's hope.
The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.
The safety of the people shall be the highest law.
No one can give you better advice than yourself.
It is foolish to tear one's hair in grief, as though sorrow would be made less by baldness.
Friendship improves happiness and abates misery, by the doubling of our joy and the dividing of our grief.
Humanism
Humanism is a philosophical and ethical stance that emphasizes the value and agency of human beings, individually and collectively, and generally prefers critical thinking and evidence (rationalism and empiricism) over acceptance of dogma or superstition.
Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, and writer who vainly tried to uphold republican principles in the final civil wars that destroyed the Roman Republic.
Videos
https://youtu.be/KZA3szW3plI
https://youtu.be/VhgWPAjJdGY
Cicero was not involved in the conspiracy to kill Caesar on March 15, 44.and was not present in the Senate when he was murdered.
Following Julius Caesar's death, Cicero became an enemy of Mark Antony in the ensuing power struggle, attacking him in a series of speeches. He came to admit in the De republica that republican government required the presence of a powerful individual—an idealized Pompey perhaps—to ensure its stability, he showed little appreciation of the intrinsic weaknesses of Roman republican administration. He was proscribed as an enemy of the state by the Second Triumvirate and consequently executed.
Among Cicero's admirers were Desiderius Erasmus, Martin Luther, and John Locke.[114] Following the invention of Johannes Gutenberg's printing press, De Officiis was the second book printed in Europe, after the Gutenberg Bible. Scholars note Cicero's influence on the rebirth of religious toleration in the 17th century.
Cicero was especially popular with the Philosophes of the 18th century, including Edward Gibbon, Diderot, David Hume, Montesquieu, and Voltaire. Voltaire called Cicero "the greatest as well as the most elegant of Roman philosophers".
Across the Atlantic, Cicero the republican inspired the Founding Fathers of the United States and the revolutionaries of the French Revolution. John Adams said, "As all the ages of the world have not produced a greater statesman and philosopher united than Cicero, his authority should have great weight." Jefferson names Cicero as one of a handful of major figures who contributed to a tradition "of public right" that informed his draft of the Declaration of Independence and shaped American understandings of "the common sense" basis for the right of revolution. Camille Desmoulins said of the French republicans in 1789 that they were "mostly young people who, nourished by the reading of Cicero at school, had become passionate enthusiasts for liberty".
Cicero's advice to his brother that "if fate had given you authority over Africans or Spaniards or Gauls, wild and barbarous nations, you would still owe it to your humanitas to be concerned about their comforts, their needs, and their safety.
De re publica
Cicero uses the work to explain Roman constitutional theory. Written in imitation of Plato’s Republic, it takes the form of a Socratic dialogue in which Scipio Aemilianus takes the role of a wise old man.
The work examines the type of government that had been established in Rome since the kings, and that was challenged by amongst others Julius Caesar. The development of the constitution is explained, and Cicero explores the different types of constitutions and the roles played by citizens in government.
Quotes
A room without books is like a body without a soul.
If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.
To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.
While there's life, there's hope.
The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.
The safety of the people shall be the highest law.
No one can give you better advice than yourself.
It is foolish to tear one's hair in grief, as though sorrow would be made less by baldness.
Friendship improves happiness and abates misery, by the doubling of our joy and the dividing of our grief.
Humanism
Humanism is a philosophical and ethical stance that emphasizes the value and agency of human beings, individually and collectively, and generally prefers critical thinking and evidence (rationalism and empiricism) over acceptance of dogma or superstition.
Oct 12, 2019
Philosophical Foundations of Human Rights
Human Rights
Human rights are social norms or moral principles, which every human being, inherently entitled and protected as natural and legal rights in international law .
Socrates, Plato and Aristotle submitted that natural law grounded on natural justice or natural right of every man, as a social contract between the governed and the governor. Libertarian Locke states if the ruler fails to protect "life, liberty, and property," could be overthrown by people.
Human rights are about our dignity, agency, interests or needs and grounded on common interests of human beings where each and every person possesses an equal moral status and opportunity. Despite the fact that Human rights are based on human dignity, they have a relationship between the morals of human rights and the law and politics of the society.
In western philosophy human rights is a product of a natural law, stems from ancient philosophy, religion and social evolution of moral behavior of human societies, in order to provide security and economic advantage, could be seen as a social contract. The interest theory and the will theory are core theories of human rights. Interest theory argues that the purpose of human rights is to protect and promote essential human interests. The will theory states that human rights are needed to ensure freedom.
The human rights stems from values of pluralism, moral and prudential elements. Each human right has an object which means what that right intend to protect. Freedom of association is right to free association, however does not prevent government to place restrictions of assembly that may eminently violate rights of others or organised crime. Human rights are not generic like father of liberalism, John Locke's right to life, liberty and wealth, but expands to 30 rights in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and other treaties.
Human Rights can be categorized into 7 classes.
1. Rights to security protects a person from murder, torture, massacre and rape.
2. Rights to due process like fair trial, unlawful imprisonment and legal aid
3. Right to fundamental freedoms like freedom of speech, assembly and conscience
4. Political rights like timely elections , voting and protesting
5. Rights for equality like equality before the law and non descrimiation
6. Social Rights like access to education and healthcare
7. Minority group rights like enjoy own culture , language and equality
Most of these rights are incorporated in UDHR and other international treaties, however moral obligations of states to secure them plays a vital role in realities of human rights theory and practice.
Every human right has a rightsholder, object , addressee, normative content, exceptions and weight.
The rightsholder is the person who holds the right, but some rights are held by a group. Minors does not have politicicipation or marriage rights and not all persons have minority rights. Military persons does not have freedom of speech and rights to protest.
Object is what the right is to protect. Freedom of assembly is the right to free association, without government restrictions. However participation in one's own culture is hard to define.
The addressee is the party who does something for making a right available to the rightsholder, mostly the government. Police is directed by government not to interfere with peaceful assembly and protests. States are obligated not to pass laws that restricts freedom of speech online. All states are directed to provide asylum for people suffering from hostility and ill-treatment in their country, where if one state provides asylum the right is fulfilled.
The content of every right provides normative position of addressee and rightsholder in relation to the object of the right. It may Involve Affirmation or Denial of a right. Why a person has a right to marry, the other can deny marry that person. State may not prevent a person mary another based on cast, religion or race but on age. Each person has the right not to be tortured while other person's duty is not to be torture others.
Most human rights have exceptions. For example state may restrict freedom of assembly to control a riot or right work Strike provide electricity service to the public.
Human rights also have high priority or weight in order to other moral considerations like national pride, economic efficiency and the rights of others. Therefore human rights are not absolute. EUCHR identify several justifiable killings compared to UDHR.
Human rights deal with contemporary problems. Ancient Greece had no social security and there was no fair trial in pre-legal societies. Human rights stated in UDHR protect people from most common abuses mostly by states, for enabling fair trials, freedom of expression and assembly and state funded access to education.
Human rights problems are practical, urgent, theoretical and abstract, where activism focused on unlawful imprisonment, torture and political menders which requires legitimate governance and better life conditions, hence two dimensional and exists gap between human rights activism and theory, where they only can be bridged with consensus between rights holder and addressee on the object.
References
https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199688623.001.0001/acprof-9780199688623
http://bankrecht.uni-koeln.de/uploads/Lehrveranstaltungen/WS2016_17/Human_Rights_Horn_IVR_2013.pdf
Philosophical Foundations of Human Rights
Rowan Cruft, S. Matthew Liao, and Massimo Renzo
Open books
https://open.bccampus.ca/
Human rights in principal accepted universally as ideal standards, and incorporated in international law, however cross-cultural realities hinder protection of human rights due to lack of consensus.
Governments who violate human rights , when challenged state that critics are interfering in the internal affairs of the country, which raises a question of the doctrine of state sovereignty adopted from political theory and international law. Evident from the collapse of Yugoslavia, after the cold war, massacres in Serbia and Rwanda raised global concerns of protection of minority rights.
UDHR does not ground on concept of God as its a contested concept, instead enables a moral obligation for governments to adhere to the treaties, however foundations for human rights on ground not absolutely true, as truth is based on multiple perspectives that are argued by other perspectives. Therefore human rights are perspective based and not foundational..
Although the contemporary human rights doctrine consists of a well established and globally agreed set of international legal and moral standards, however they are not or cannot be theoretically founded. Therefore actions taken to protect human rights are based on principles which lack rational foundation, due to competing interests between the moral, legal, cultural and political realities and governments violating the doctrine.
Human rights stems from man's moral nature. It is not a need in life but needed for the dignity of life that combines natural, social, historical, and moral elements of life, with an ultimate purpose for securing for each person's moral status, autonomously, self control and develop themselves to pursue their purposes effective without being subject to domination and harm from others to have their own agency, which is both a metaphysical and a moral basis for human dignity.
Humanist grounds for human rights
Humanist grounds for human rights
(1) Social relativism : Each society has established a set of rules to regulate human relationships to maintain a level of social cohesion like Code of Hamurabi or Bill of Rights. But their moral and legal concepts are based on relatively whats good, right or just, but does not help evaluate one society as better than the other.
(2) A universal moral law provides the basis of all morality and justice and help may project moral values into material world and human consciousness.
(3) Any moral order within a family, a nation, or a civilization forms consciousness to develop a Spirit.
(4) free socio-economic formations of material life conditions of classes separated by social ruptures – revolutions and cultural gaps.
Human rights in principle accepted universally as ideal standards, and incorporated in international law, however cross-cultural realities hinder protection of human rights due to lack of consensus.
Governments who violate human rights , when challenged state that critics are interfering in the internal affairs of the country, which raises a question of the doctrine of state sovereignty adopted from political theory and international law. Evident from the collapse of Yugoslavia, after the cold war, massacres in Serbia and Rwanda raised global concerns of protection of minority rights.
UDHR does not ground on concept of God as its a contested concept, instead enables a moral obligation for governments to adhere to the treaties, however foundations for human rights on ground not absolutely true, as truth is based on multiple perspectives that are argued by other perspectives. Therefore human rights are perspective based and not foundational..
Although the contemporary human rights doctrine consists of a well established and globally agreed set of international legal and moral standards, however they are not or cannot be theoretically founded. Therefore actions taken to protect human rights are based on principles which lack rational foundation, due to competing interests between the moral, legal, cultural and political realities and governments violating the doctrine.
Human rights stems from man's moral nature. It is not a need in life but needed for the dignity of life that combines natural, social, historical, and moral elements of life, with an ultimate purpose for securing for each person's moral status, autonomously, self control and develop themselves to pursue their purposes effective without being subject to domination and harm from others to have their own agency, which is both a metaphysical and a moral basis for human dignity.
Human right may compete with other human rights and be overridden by another human right, when it requires action to protect human rights of others, hence not universal.
The claims of state sovereignty, cultural autonomy, and group rights cannot always be solved by law, are morally and politically questionable. The right to self-determination is a legal right but not realistic in some societies as Laclau and Mouffe, Rorty, Dworkin, Maclntyre, and Donnelly approaches on morals, metaphysics, reason and cultural relativism.
Maclntyre is criticizes the concept of human rights while Laclau, Rorty, and Dworkin support human rights on the basis of liberal culture. Donnelly states the need for protecting human dignity under modern conditions. The doctrine of human rights is universally true as a way to balance the conflict between rights to freedom, well-being, rights of others in diverse cultural and political societies.
The practical realization of human rights is a confrontation between governments and ideological camps where social movements and cultural transformation for social equilibrium are essential to achieve consensus for human freedom and social justice.
Constitutionalism implements the rule of law, in order to ensure security in relations between individuals and the government, which defines powers, limits, responsibilities and behaviors of the government. It is the foundation of protecting the rights and liberties of individuals in the society. Constitutionalism ensures people's right to participate in governance and formulation of laws and policies for the country.
Rights are collectives choices incorporated into constitutions passed by legislature defines relationships between rights holder, object and addressee. They are aimed to ensure autonomy, giving a person freedom to make independent decisions, without interference of others or government. The fundamental premise of constitutional rights is equality, which defines what each member of a society is entitled to have. It defines how we treat each other as equals when we are making collective choices. Therefore institutionalization of rights ensures democratic accountability, require structuring of democratic relationships.
Human Rights are relationships between each individual and their society, possess a historical nature. From ancient times societies established rights, obligations, behaviors as social norms for their members to maintain social order.
Cicero (106–43 B.C.), Roman statesman and philosopher, contributed to thoughts of natural law, that gives both privileges or rights, and responsibilities or duties of man in his works De Re Publica (On the Commonwealth) describes Roman constitutional theory. and De Legibus (On the Laws) discuss how the laws should be.
The Republic is written by Plato around 380 BC, concerning justice on Socratic dialogue, states the order and character of the just city-state, and the just man, is one of the most influential works of philosophy and political theory, discuss meaning of justice and whether the just man is happier than the unjust man, propose a series of different, hypothetical cities in comparison. Socrates states that justice includes helping friends, but a just man would never do harm to anybody.
Human rights is a product of a natural law, stems from various philosophical and religious foundations, as well as moral behavior developed through social evolution, where individuals in a society accept rules from legitimate authority in exchange for security and economic advantage (Rawls) – a social contract. Socrates and his heirs, Plato and Aristotle, considered the existence of natural justice or natural right of a man. Stoics attributed to development of natural justice into one of natural law, taught that "virtue is the only good" for human beings, and that external things—such as health, wealth, and pleasure, are not good or bad in themselves, forms a major foundation to virtue of ethics.
Thomas Hobbes suggests the idea of social contract where "a group of free individuals agree for the sake of preservation to form institutions to govern them. They give up their natural complete liberty in exchange for protection from the Sovereign." John Locke's theory states that "a failure of the government to secure rights is a failure which justifies the removal of the government, and was mirrored in later postulation by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his "Du Contrat Social" (The Social Contract).
Karl Marx criticized the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen as bourgeois ideology stating that "Liberty consists in being able to do everything which does not harm others.", stated that Security is the supreme social concept of a bourgeois society... where that real freedom is to be found positively in our relations with other people, to be found in human community, not in isolation.
Soviet concept of human rights is different from West, declares that state is the source of human rights and law as an arm of politics and courts as agencies of the government. Therefore extensive extra-judiciary powers were given to the Soviet secret police agencies.
Human rights have been incorporated in teachings of most religions. The right to equality and non discrimination has been a foundation of most religions, the code of Hammurabi, explicitly mention the need to protect the weak against the strong. Although the human rights not specifically mentioned in the Bible, its believed that the concept of human rights comes from the Ten Commandments 6 to 10 which prohibits murder, adultery, steal, giving false evidence, envious of goods is related to right to life, equality, non discrimination, justice and property. On Doctrine of the government, Romans 13:1-7 and 1 Peter 2:13-17, states that God instituted government with mandates to commend what is right (Romans 13:3, 1 Peter 2:14), to punish those who do wrong (Romans 13:3-4, 1 Peter 2:14) and to promote human well-being (Romans 13:4).
Buddhism teaches that all human beings as equal in dignity and rights irrespective of their caste, race and gender. The Buddhist Panchaseela or Five Virtues, recognizes right to life and the right to property. The Dhammapada states that all fear death, hence one should neither kill nor cause to kill (22: 129). Buddhist philosophy introduces four characteristics of kindness as friendliness , compassion, equality, sympathy. The dasa raja dharma is 10 principles of good governance to be practiced by Kings lays foundations moral basis of social relations. Human Rights are relationships between each individual and their society, possess a historical nature. From ancient times societies established rights, obligations, behaviors as social norms for their members to maintain social order.
Islamic interpretation of freedom is different from the West, where freedom is defined by spiritual liberation with responsibility towards god. Islam prohibits Adultery, murder, theft cheating, stealing, corruption and promotes wealth to flow from the rich to the poor.
In Hindu philosophy Upanishads literature proclaim universal oneness and universal well-being, sees the World as One Family. The Bhagavad Gita sacred religious text of pre vedic period presents human values for a righteous warrior engaged in a just war. The Mahabharata story brings out the complexity of human nature and problems between the right and wrong deeds of four great warriors Arjuna,Karna,Drona and Bhishma, sets examples of human values in Hinduism.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315863913_Human_Rights_in_Buddhism
In Hindu philosophy Upanishads literature proclaim universal oneness and universal well-being, sees the World as One Family. The Bhagavad Gita sacred religious text of pre-vedic period presents human values for a righteous warrior engaged in a just war. The Mahabharata story brings out the complexity of human nature and problems between the right and wrong deeds of four great warriors Arjuna, Karna,Drona and Bhishma, sets examples of human values in Hinduism.
Human rights are social norms or moral principles, which every human being, inherently entitled and protected as natural and legal rights in international law .
Socrates, Plato and Aristotle submitted that natural law grounded on natural justice or natural right of every man, as a social contract between the governed and the governor. Libertarian Locke states if the ruler fails to protect "life, liberty, and property," could be overthrown by people.
Human rights are about our dignity, agency, interests or needs and grounded on common interests of human beings where each and every person possesses an equal moral status and opportunity. Despite the fact that Human rights are based on human dignity, they have a relationship between the morals of human rights and the law and politics of the society.
In western philosophy human rights is a product of a natural law, stems from ancient philosophy, religion and social evolution of moral behavior of human societies, in order to provide security and economic advantage, could be seen as a social contract. The interest theory and the will theory are core theories of human rights. Interest theory argues that the purpose of human rights is to protect and promote essential human interests. The will theory states that human rights are needed to ensure freedom.
The human rights stems from values of pluralism, moral and prudential elements. Each human right has an object which means what that right intend to protect. Freedom of association is right to free association, however does not prevent government to place restrictions of assembly that may eminently violate rights of others or organised crime. Human rights are not generic like father of liberalism, John Locke's right to life, liberty and wealth, but expands to 30 rights in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and other treaties.
Human Rights can be categorized into 7 classes.
1. Rights to security protects a person from murder, torture, massacre and rape.
2. Rights to due process like fair trial, unlawful imprisonment and legal aid
3. Right to fundamental freedoms like freedom of speech, assembly and conscience
4. Political rights like timely elections , voting and protesting
5. Rights for equality like equality before the law and non descrimiation
6. Social Rights like access to education and healthcare
7. Minority group rights like enjoy own culture , language and equality
Most of these rights are incorporated in UDHR and other international treaties, however moral obligations of states to secure them plays a vital role in realities of human rights theory and practice.
Every human right has a rightsholder, object , addressee, normative content, exceptions and weight.
The rightsholder is the person who holds the right, but some rights are held by a group. Minors does not have politicicipation or marriage rights and not all persons have minority rights. Military persons does not have freedom of speech and rights to protest.
Object is what the right is to protect. Freedom of assembly is the right to free association, without government restrictions. However participation in one's own culture is hard to define.
The addressee is the party who does something for making a right available to the rightsholder, mostly the government. Police is directed by government not to interfere with peaceful assembly and protests. States are obligated not to pass laws that restricts freedom of speech online. All states are directed to provide asylum for people suffering from hostility and ill-treatment in their country, where if one state provides asylum the right is fulfilled.
The content of every right provides normative position of addressee and rightsholder in relation to the object of the right. It may Involve Affirmation or Denial of a right. Why a person has a right to marry, the other can deny marry that person. State may not prevent a person mary another based on cast, religion or race but on age. Each person has the right not to be tortured while other person's duty is not to be torture others.
Most human rights have exceptions. For example state may restrict freedom of assembly to control a riot or right work Strike provide electricity service to the public.
Human rights also have high priority or weight in order to other moral considerations like national pride, economic efficiency and the rights of others. Therefore human rights are not absolute. EUCHR identify several justifiable killings compared to UDHR.
Human rights deal with contemporary problems. Ancient Greece had no social security and there was no fair trial in pre-legal societies. Human rights stated in UDHR protect people from most common abuses mostly by states, for enabling fair trials, freedom of expression and assembly and state funded access to education.
Human rights problems are practical, urgent, theoretical and abstract, where activism focused on unlawful imprisonment, torture and political menders which requires legitimate governance and better life conditions, hence two dimensional and exists gap between human rights activism and theory, where they only can be bridged with consensus between rights holder and addressee on the object.
The Bill of Rights and American Declaration of Independence founded human rights in God and natural law became the basis of modern Western States and legal systems, however disregarded in UDHR. Today metaphysical moral values that makes choice between good and evil as the philosophical foundation of human rights is controversial, although value of human rights is mostly unchallenged.
The discourse theory proposes that men can come to a reasonable consent about moral values and rules through a procedure, where ideal discourse should be free and unbiased between the participants with similar capacities, but a person following a certain rule may not mean that this rule exists morally.
https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199688623.001.0001/acprof-9780199688623
http://bankrecht.uni-koeln.de/uploads/Lehrveranstaltungen/WS2016_17/Human_Rights_Horn_IVR_2013.pdf
Philosophical Foundations of Human Rights
Rowan Cruft, S. Matthew Liao, and Massimo Renzo
Open books
https://open.bccampus.ca/
Human rights in principal accepted universally as ideal standards, and incorporated in international law, however cross-cultural realities hinder protection of human rights due to lack of consensus.
Governments who violate human rights , when challenged state that critics are interfering in the internal affairs of the country, which raises a question of the doctrine of state sovereignty adopted from political theory and international law. Evident from the collapse of Yugoslavia, after the cold war, massacres in Serbia and Rwanda raised global concerns of protection of minority rights.
UDHR does not ground on concept of God as its a contested concept, instead enables a moral obligation for governments to adhere to the treaties, however foundations for human rights on ground not absolutely true, as truth is based on multiple perspectives that are argued by other perspectives. Therefore human rights are perspective based and not foundational..
Although the contemporary human rights doctrine consists of a well established and globally agreed set of international legal and moral standards, however they are not or cannot be theoretically founded. Therefore actions taken to protect human rights are based on principles which lack rational foundation, due to competing interests between the moral, legal, cultural and political realities and governments violating the doctrine.
Human rights stems from man's moral nature. It is not a need in life but needed for the dignity of life that combines natural, social, historical, and moral elements of life, with an ultimate purpose for securing for each person's moral status, autonomously, self control and develop themselves to pursue their purposes effective without being subject to domination and harm from others to have their own agency, which is both a metaphysical and a moral basis for human dignity.
Humanist grounds for human rights
Humanist grounds for human rights
(1) Social relativism : Each society has established a set of rules to regulate human relationships to maintain a level of social cohesion like Code of Hamurabi or Bill of Rights. But their moral and legal concepts are based on relatively whats good, right or just, but does not help evaluate one society as better than the other.
(2) A universal moral law provides the basis of all morality and justice and help may project moral values into material world and human consciousness.
(3) Any moral order within a family, a nation, or a civilization forms consciousness to develop a Spirit.
(4) free socio-economic formations of material life conditions of classes separated by social ruptures – revolutions and cultural gaps.
Human rights in principle accepted universally as ideal standards, and incorporated in international law, however cross-cultural realities hinder protection of human rights due to lack of consensus.
Governments who violate human rights , when challenged state that critics are interfering in the internal affairs of the country, which raises a question of the doctrine of state sovereignty adopted from political theory and international law. Evident from the collapse of Yugoslavia, after the cold war, massacres in Serbia and Rwanda raised global concerns of protection of minority rights.
UDHR does not ground on concept of God as its a contested concept, instead enables a moral obligation for governments to adhere to the treaties, however foundations for human rights on ground not absolutely true, as truth is based on multiple perspectives that are argued by other perspectives. Therefore human rights are perspective based and not foundational..
Although the contemporary human rights doctrine consists of a well established and globally agreed set of international legal and moral standards, however they are not or cannot be theoretically founded. Therefore actions taken to protect human rights are based on principles which lack rational foundation, due to competing interests between the moral, legal, cultural and political realities and governments violating the doctrine.
Human rights stems from man's moral nature. It is not a need in life but needed for the dignity of life that combines natural, social, historical, and moral elements of life, with an ultimate purpose for securing for each person's moral status, autonomously, self control and develop themselves to pursue their purposes effective without being subject to domination and harm from others to have their own agency, which is both a metaphysical and a moral basis for human dignity.
Human right may compete with other human rights and be overridden by another human right, when it requires action to protect human rights of others, hence not universal.
The claims of state sovereignty, cultural autonomy, and group rights cannot always be solved by law, are morally and politically questionable. The right to self-determination is a legal right but not realistic in some societies as Laclau and Mouffe, Rorty, Dworkin, Maclntyre, and Donnelly approaches on morals, metaphysics, reason and cultural relativism.
Maclntyre is criticizes the concept of human rights while Laclau, Rorty, and Dworkin support human rights on the basis of liberal culture. Donnelly states the need for protecting human dignity under modern conditions. The doctrine of human rights is universally true as a way to balance the conflict between rights to freedom, well-being, rights of others in diverse cultural and political societies.
The practical realization of human rights is a confrontation between governments and ideological camps where social movements and cultural transformation for social equilibrium are essential to achieve consensus for human freedom and social justice.
Constitutionalism implements the rule of law, in order to ensure security in relations between individuals and the government, which defines powers, limits, responsibilities and behaviors of the government. It is the foundation of protecting the rights and liberties of individuals in the society. Constitutionalism ensures people's right to participate in governance and formulation of laws and policies for the country.
Rights are collectives choices incorporated into constitutions passed by legislature defines relationships between rights holder, object and addressee. They are aimed to ensure autonomy, giving a person freedom to make independent decisions, without interference of others or government. The fundamental premise of constitutional rights is equality, which defines what each member of a society is entitled to have. It defines how we treat each other as equals when we are making collective choices. Therefore institutionalization of rights ensures democratic accountability, require structuring of democratic relationships.
Human Rights are relationships between each individual and their society, possess a historical nature. From ancient times societies established rights, obligations, behaviors as social norms for their members to maintain social order.
Cicero (106–43 B.C.), Roman statesman and philosopher, contributed to thoughts of natural law, that gives both privileges or rights, and responsibilities or duties of man in his works De Re Publica (On the Commonwealth) describes Roman constitutional theory. and De Legibus (On the Laws) discuss how the laws should be.
The Republic is written by Plato around 380 BC, concerning justice on Socratic dialogue, states the order and character of the just city-state, and the just man, is one of the most influential works of philosophy and political theory, discuss meaning of justice and whether the just man is happier than the unjust man, propose a series of different, hypothetical cities in comparison. Socrates states that justice includes helping friends, but a just man would never do harm to anybody.
Human rights is a product of a natural law, stems from various philosophical and religious foundations, as well as moral behavior developed through social evolution, where individuals in a society accept rules from legitimate authority in exchange for security and economic advantage (Rawls) – a social contract. Socrates and his heirs, Plato and Aristotle, considered the existence of natural justice or natural right of a man. Stoics attributed to development of natural justice into one of natural law, taught that "virtue is the only good" for human beings, and that external things—such as health, wealth, and pleasure, are not good or bad in themselves, forms a major foundation to virtue of ethics.
Thomas Hobbes suggests the idea of social contract where "a group of free individuals agree for the sake of preservation to form institutions to govern them. They give up their natural complete liberty in exchange for protection from the Sovereign." John Locke's theory states that "a failure of the government to secure rights is a failure which justifies the removal of the government, and was mirrored in later postulation by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his "Du Contrat Social" (The Social Contract).
Karl Marx criticized the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen as bourgeois ideology stating that "Liberty consists in being able to do everything which does not harm others.", stated that Security is the supreme social concept of a bourgeois society... where that real freedom is to be found positively in our relations with other people, to be found in human community, not in isolation.
Soviet concept of human rights is different from West, declares that state is the source of human rights and law as an arm of politics and courts as agencies of the government. Therefore extensive extra-judiciary powers were given to the Soviet secret police agencies.
Human rights have been incorporated in teachings of most religions. The right to equality and non discrimination has been a foundation of most religions, the code of Hammurabi, explicitly mention the need to protect the weak against the strong. Although the human rights not specifically mentioned in the Bible, its believed that the concept of human rights comes from the Ten Commandments 6 to 10 which prohibits murder, adultery, steal, giving false evidence, envious of goods is related to right to life, equality, non discrimination, justice and property. On Doctrine of the government, Romans 13:1-7 and 1 Peter 2:13-17, states that God instituted government with mandates to commend what is right (Romans 13:3, 1 Peter 2:14), to punish those who do wrong (Romans 13:3-4, 1 Peter 2:14) and to promote human well-being (Romans 13:4).
Buddhism teaches that all human beings as equal in dignity and rights irrespective of their caste, race and gender. The Buddhist Panchaseela or Five Virtues, recognizes right to life and the right to property. The Dhammapada states that all fear death, hence one should neither kill nor cause to kill (22: 129). Buddhist philosophy introduces four characteristics of kindness as friendliness , compassion, equality, sympathy. The dasa raja dharma is 10 principles of good governance to be practiced by Kings lays foundations moral basis of social relations. Human Rights are relationships between each individual and their society, possess a historical nature. From ancient times societies established rights, obligations, behaviors as social norms for their members to maintain social order.
Islamic interpretation of freedom is different from the West, where freedom is defined by spiritual liberation with responsibility towards god. Islam prohibits Adultery, murder, theft cheating, stealing, corruption and promotes wealth to flow from the rich to the poor.
In Hindu philosophy Upanishads literature proclaim universal oneness and universal well-being, sees the World as One Family. The Bhagavad Gita sacred religious text of pre vedic period presents human values for a righteous warrior engaged in a just war. The Mahabharata story brings out the complexity of human nature and problems between the right and wrong deeds of four great warriors Arjuna,Karna,Drona and Bhishma, sets examples of human values in Hinduism.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315863913_Human_Rights_in_Buddhism
In Hindu philosophy Upanishads literature proclaim universal oneness and universal well-being, sees the World as One Family. The Bhagavad Gita sacred religious text of pre-vedic period presents human values for a righteous warrior engaged in a just war. The Mahabharata story brings out the complexity of human nature and problems between the right and wrong deeds of four great warriors Arjuna, Karna,Drona and Bhishma, sets examples of human values in Hinduism.
Niranjan Meegammaana
Shilpa Sayura Foundation
Shilpa Sayura Foundation
Aug 24, 2019
Human Rights Timeline from 18th Century BCE.
Human Rights norms and mechanisms evolved over many centuries, as a result of historical events, making people think about other people rights of life, liberty and equality.
1760 BCE
In Babylon King Hammurabi set up the ‘Code of Hammurabi’, an early legal document that promises to ‘make justice in the Kingdom and promote the good of the people’.
6th Century BCE
Cyrus the Great, King of the Medes and the Persians, issues the "Charter of Freedom of Mankind." It is considered the first charter of human rights.
509-44 BCE
Rome flourishes under a Republic. Roman values under the Republic emphasize selfless service to the community, individual honor, the necessity of the law, and shared power and decision making. The Roman Republic develops a representative government along with a judicial system. Both the Roman form of government and the Roman form of law become the basis for many later European legal codes still in use today. The Republic ended in 44 BCE when, after civil war, Julius Caesar is named Emperor for life.
528 BCE - 486 BCE
In India, Gautama Buddha advocates morality, reverence for life, non-violence and right conduct.
500 BCE
Confucian teaches respect for other people in China.
262-232 BCE
King Asoka of India issues his Edicts, emphasizing goodness, kindness and generosity.
45-44 BCE
Cicero writes his philosophical works on humanitas, which emphasize goodwill towards humanity.
26 - 33 CE
In Palestine, Jesus Christ preaches morality, tolerance, justice, forgiveness love and equality before god.
27 BCE - 476 CE
Roman Empire develops the concepts of natural law and the rights of citizens .
613 - 632 CE
In Saudi Arabia, Prophet Mohammed teaches the principles of equality, justice and compassion.
1215
Britain's King John is forced by his lords to sign the Magna Carta, acknowledging that free men are entitled to judgment by their peers and that even a King is not above the law.
1583 - 1645
Hugo Grotius, Dutch jurist credited with the birth of international law, speaks of brotherhood of humankind and the need to treat all people fairly.
1679: Habeas Corpus Act
Another crucial step towards the right to a fair trial, this law protected and extended the right of a detained person to go before a judge to determine whether the detention was legal.
1689
In England, Parliament adopts the Bill of Rights that curtails the power of the monarch and includes freedom from torture and from punishment without trial.
1690
John Locke writes about the notions of natural rights of life, liberty and property in his Two Treatises on Government.
1748
Montesquieu writes Spirit of the Laws. To set forth three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. Montesquieu argues that despotism can be avoided if political power is divided with checks on power.
1762 CE
Rousseau writes The Social Contract in which he argues that the "general will," reflecting the common interests of all people in a nation, is sacred and absolute.
1776
US Declaration of Independence proclaims that 'all men are created equal' and endowed with certain inalienable rights.
1789
In France the National Assembly adopts the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, which guarantees the rights to liberty, equality, property, security, and resistance to oppression.
1791
The United States Congress adopts their Bill of Rights, amending the US Constitution to include rights to trial by jury, freedom of expression, speech, belief and assembly.
1833
The British Parliament abolishes slavery through the Slavery Abolition Act
1919
The Treaty of Versailles signed at Paris Peace Conference with other treaties for civil and political rights.
International Labour Organisation (ILO) is established to advocate for human rights in labor law
The Women's International League for Peace and Freedom is established.
The League of Nations Covenant is signed as part of the Treaty of Versailles "to promote international co-operation and to achieve international peace and security."
1920
The Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution grants women the right to vote.
1926
The Geneva Conference passes a Slavery Convention to end slavery worldwide.
1930
The ILO passes the Convention Concerning Forced or Compulsory Labour "to suppress the use of forced or compulsory labour"
1933-1939
A series of discriminatory laws pass in Germany to exclude Jewish people from employment, education, housing, healthcare, marriages of their choice, pension entitlements, professions such as law and medicine, and public accommodations. In addition, Germany begins murdering physically and mentally disabled people by gas, lethal injection and forced starvation.
1935-1953
Joseph Stalin launches a reign of terror, estimated 20 million Russian citizens were killed or died in the Gulags, a vast majority for crimes they never committed.
1939-1945
During World War II, an estimated 6 million European Jews are exterminated by Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime. Millions of civilians were forced into concentration camps, starved, brutalized and/or murdered.
1941
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill adopt the Atlantic Charter, in which they state their hope is "that all men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from want and fear" and that all nations shall enjoy self-determination.
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union Address identifies "Four Freedoms" as essential for all people: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want and freedom from fear.
1942
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, which forcibly moves over 110,000 Japanese Americans from the coastal regions of the western U.S. to isolated inland internment camps. Their detention lasts almost four years.
René Cassin of France urges that an international court be created to punish those guilty of war crimes.
1943
The Magnuson Act passes the U.S. Congress, lifting the prohibitions of citizenship for people of Asian descent.
1944
Representatives from the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and China meet at Dumbarton Oaks to create the foundation for the United Nations.
1945 up
The United Nations (UN) is established. The Charter of the UN states that one of the primary purposes of the UN is the promotion and encouragement of "respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion."
1948
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the first detailed expression of the basic rights and fundamental freedoms to which all human beings are entitled.
1948
Genocide Convention
adopted by the UN in an effort to prevent atrocities, from happening again.
South Africa begins enacting more rigorous and authoritarian segregation laws that cement the ideology of apartheid into law.
1949
The Australian Parliament passes the Social Services Consolidation Act, policy towards the Aboriginal people.
The ILO adopts the Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining.
International Conventions for the Protection of Victims of War (Geneva Convention) approves standards for more humane treatment for prisoners of war, the wounded and civilians.
The Statute of the Council of Europe asserts that human rights and fundamental freedoms are the basis of the emerging European system.
1950-1954
U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy launches his anti-Communist campaign.
1950
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is established.
The UN adopts the European Convention on Human Rights
Convention for the Suppression of Traffic in Persons and Exploitation or Prostitution of Others.
European Convention on Human Rights, to provide basic rights both for their own citizens and for other nationalities within their borders.
The Mattachine Society organizes in Los Angeles to fight discrimination against gays.
1951
Refugee Convention protect the rights of people who are forced to flee their home country.
1952
The U.S. Congress passes the Immigration and Nationality Act, which ends the last racial and ethnic barriers to naturalization of aliens living in the U.S.
The UN adopts the Convention on Political Rights of Women.
1953
The Council of Europe creates the European Commission on Human Rights and the Court of Human Rights.
1954
The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Brown v. Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools is unconstitutional.
1955
The Daughters of Bilitis is founded in San Francisco as an organization to work for the acceptance of lesbians as respectable citizens of society.
The U.S. adopts the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.
1957
Great Britain decriminalizes homosexual behavior between two consenting adults but bans gays in the military.
The UN adopts the Convention on Nationality of Married Women.
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Abolition of Forced Labour.
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Populations.
1958
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Discrimination in Employment and Occupation.
1960
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is established as an advisory body to the Organization of American States.
The Convention Against Discrimination in Education is adopted by the UN (UNESCO).
A upnti-apartheid protest challenging raicial discrimstion laws, 69 protestors are killed by police.,
South African government bans the African National Congress (ANC) and other opposition groups.
Discrimination in Employment Convention, I up inLO prohibits discrimination at work.
1961
President John F. Kennedy appoints Eleanor Roosevelt to head the first Presidential Commission on the Status of Women.
The European Social Charter defines economic and social rights for member states of the Council of Europe.
Peter Benenson founds Amnesty International.
1962
Voting rights are extended to all Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders by the Australian Parliament.
1963
The Organization of African Unity is established, dedicated to African self-determination and the advancement of the African people.
1964
U.S. passes Omnibus Civil Rights Bill, banning discrimination in voting, jobs, public accommodation, and other activities.
Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C.
Martin Luther King, Jr. wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
Nelson Mandela and seven other leaders of the ANC sentenced to life in prison in South Africa.
1965
The U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Immigration Act of 1965, eliminating the ethnic quotas established.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
1965
Racial Discrimination Convention Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD)
1966
International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. (ICESCR)999
International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR)
1966-1976
Mao Zedong begins a "purification" of leftist ideas and thousands of Chinese citizens are killed by their own government.
1965
The U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Immigration Act of 1965, eliminating the ethnic quotas established.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
1968
The UN adopts the Convention on War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity.
The First World Conference on Human Rights is held in Tehran.
René Cassin wins the Nobel Peace Prize for drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Organization of American States (OAS) adopts the American Convention on Human Rights.
Homosexuality is decriminalized in Canada.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid.
A military coup overthrows Chilean President Allende. General Pinochet, takes power, dissolves the Congress, suspends the constitution, criminalizes opposition political parties, and places strict limits on the media. During his seventeen-year dictatorship, Pinochet presides over the repression, torture, disappearance, and death of thousands of Chilean citizens who opposed his rule.
1975
The UN adopts the Declaration on Rights of Disabled Persons.
Andrei D. Sakharov wins the Nobel Peace Prize for his promotion of human rights in the Soviet Union.
Portugal becomes the last major power to end colonial rule in Africa.
1976
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights takes effect after ratification of enough UN Member states.
1977
A human rights bureau is created within the U.S. Department of State.
Amnesty International wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter begins to institutionalize human rights agendas into American foreign policy.
1978
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence is founded in the United States.
Helsinki Watch is established to monitor the Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords, now called Human Rights Watch.
The Camp David Peace Accords help negotiations between Egypt and Israel, toward peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.
1979
The UN adopts the Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. The Organization of American States establishes the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
1980
The U.S. Supreme Court orders the federal government to pay some $120 million dollars to eight tribes of Sioux Indians in reparation for American Indian land that the government seized illegally in 1877.
1981
The African Charter of Human Rights is adopted by the Organization for African Unity (OAU).
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning the Promotion of Collective Bargaining.
1982
The UN adopts the Principles of Medical Ethics.
1983
The Arab Organization for Human Rights is formed.
1984
The UN adopts the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Desmond Tutu wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1985
The Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights is established by United Nations.
The UN adopts the International Convention against Apartheid in Sports.
The U.S. Senate votes to impose economic sanctions on South Africa against the apartheid policy.
1986
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Right to Development.
1976 CE
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights takes effect after ratification of enough UN Member states.
1977
A human rights bureau is created within the U.S. Department of State.
Amnesty International wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter begins to institutionalize human rights agendas into American foreign policy.
1978
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence is founded in the United States.
Helsinki Watch is established to monitor the Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords, now called Human Rights Watch.
The Camp David Peace Accords help negotiations between Egypt and Israel, toward peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.
1979
The UN adopts the Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. The Organization of American States establishes the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
1980
The U.S. Supreme Court orders the federal government to pay some $120 million dollars to eight tribes of Sioux Indians in reparation for American Indian land that the government seized illegally in 1877.
1981
The African Charter of Human Rights is adopted by the Organization for African Unity (OAU).
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning the Promotion of Collective Bargaining.
1982
The UN adopts the Principles of Medical Ethics.
1983
The Arab Organization for Human Rights is formed.
1984
The UN adopts the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Desmond Tutu wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1985
The Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights is established by United Nations.
The UN adopts the International Convention against Apartheid in Sports.
The U.S. Senate votes to impose economic sanctions on South Africa against the apartheid policy.
1986
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Right to Development.
1988
U.S. Congress ratifies the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
The UN ratifies the Body of Principles for Protection of All Persons Under Any Form of Detention of Imprisonment.
African governments create the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights.
1989
In Tiananmen Square, Chinese authorities massacre student demonstrators struggling for democracy.
The UN adopts both the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights aimed at the abolition of the death penalty.
The Dalai Lama wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries.
The Berlin Wall is dismantled.
1984
Convention against Torture
(CAT)
1989
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
1989
Indigenous Peoples Convention
protects the rights of Indigenous and tribal peoples around the world.
1990
Convention on Migrant Workers.
1990
UN imposes sanctions on Iraq, the U.S. enters the Gulf War to protect the sovereignty of Kuwait.
The Americans With Disabilities Act is signed into law.
The World Summit for Children of the World adopts the Declaration on the Survival, Protection, and Development of Children.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
After 27 years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela is released
and anti-apartheid ban lifted.
UN imposes sanctions on Iraq, the U.S. enters the Gulf War to protect the sovereignty of Kuwait.
The Americans With Disabilities Act is signed into law.
The World Summit for Children of the World adopts the Declaration on the Survival, Protection, and Development of Children.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
After 27 years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela is released
and anti-apartheid ban lifted.
1991
Aung San Suu Kyi wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1992
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious, and Linguistic Minorities.
The U.S. Congress ratifies the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Rigoberta Menchu Tum wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious, and Linguistic Minorities.
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
1993
A Criminal Tribunal on the Former Yugoslavia is established in the Hague
to prosecute persons responsible for crimes against humanity and war crimes since 1991.
The Second World Conference on Human Rights Convenes in Vienna, where the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action is adopted.
The United Nations General Assembly creates the post of High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk are awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime"
The Second World Conference on Human Rights Convenes in Vienna, where the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action is adopted.
The United Nations General Assembly creates the post of High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The U.S. adopts the policy "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue" which gives the government the right to remove open homosexuals from military service.
1994
The UN declares a Decade for Human Rights Education on.
An emergency session of the Commission on Human Rights convenes to respond to genocide in Rwanda.
The first UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Jose Ayala Lasso, takes his post.
Nelson Mandela is elected as president of South Africa.
1995
The Beijing Declaration at the World Conference on Women declares that "Women's rights are human rights."
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission is set up by the South African Government to address human rights violations under apartheid.
Aung San Suu Kyi is released from house arrest in Burma.
1996
Jose Ramos Horta and Bishop Carlos Belo win the Nobel Peace Prize.
President Clinton signs the Defense of Marriage Act, denying the right of marriage to same-sex couples by defining marriage "only as a legal union between one man and one woman."
1997
Mary Robinson, former President of the Republic of Ireland, becomes the second UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
General Pinochet is arrested for murder in London on a warrant from Spain requesting his extradition on allegations of murder, torture and disappearances of Spanish nationals in Chile between 1973 and 1990.
2000
The International Labour Organisation adopts the revised Maternity Protection Convention.
2001
The U.S. ratifies the Patriot Act reducing the rights and freedoms of many Americans.
2003
Massachusetts high court ruled that it would allow same sex marriage and the first gay marriages in the U.S. were performed.
2004
Press reports describe the U.S. torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison during and after the 2003 Iraq War.
President George W. Bush reacts to the legalization of gay marriage in Massachusetts by supporting a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as between one man and one woman.
Genocide begins in the Darfur region of the Sudan as the Janjaweed have displaced millions.
2004
Press reports describe the U.S. torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison during and after the 2003 Iraq War.
2005
Two years after the invasion of Iraq by Coalition Forces to remove Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi people hold their first free election
2006
Convention on Persons with Disabilities.
2007
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
1760 BCE
In Babylon King Hammurabi set up the ‘Code of Hammurabi’, an early legal document that promises to ‘make justice in the Kingdom and promote the good of the people’.
6th Century BCE
Cyrus the Great, King of the Medes and the Persians, issues the "Charter of Freedom of Mankind." It is considered the first charter of human rights.
509-44 BCE
Rome flourishes under a Republic. Roman values under the Republic emphasize selfless service to the community, individual honor, the necessity of the law, and shared power and decision making. The Roman Republic develops a representative government along with a judicial system. Both the Roman form of government and the Roman form of law become the basis for many later European legal codes still in use today. The Republic ended in 44 BCE when, after civil war, Julius Caesar is named Emperor for life.
528 BCE - 486 BCE
In India, Gautama Buddha advocates morality, reverence for life, non-violence and right conduct.
500 BCE
Confucian teaches respect for other people in China.
262-232 BCE
King Asoka of India issues his Edicts, emphasizing goodness, kindness and generosity.
45-44 BCE
Cicero writes his philosophical works on humanitas, which emphasize goodwill towards humanity.
26 - 33 CE
In Palestine, Jesus Christ preaches morality, tolerance, justice, forgiveness love and equality before god.
27 BCE - 476 CE
Roman Empire develops the concepts of natural law and the rights of citizens .
613 - 632 CE
In Saudi Arabia, Prophet Mohammed teaches the principles of equality, justice and compassion.
1215
Britain's King John is forced by his lords to sign the Magna Carta, acknowledging that free men are entitled to judgment by their peers and that even a King is not above the law.
1583 - 1645
Hugo Grotius, Dutch jurist credited with the birth of international law, speaks of brotherhood of humankind and the need to treat all people fairly.
1679: Habeas Corpus Act
Another crucial step towards the right to a fair trial, this law protected and extended the right of a detained person to go before a judge to determine whether the detention was legal.
1689
In England, Parliament adopts the Bill of Rights that curtails the power of the monarch and includes freedom from torture and from punishment without trial.
1690
John Locke writes about the notions of natural rights of life, liberty and property in his Two Treatises on Government.
1748
Montesquieu writes Spirit of the Laws. To set forth three branches of government: executive, legislative and judicial. Montesquieu argues that despotism can be avoided if political power is divided with checks on power.
1762 CE
Rousseau writes The Social Contract in which he argues that the "general will," reflecting the common interests of all people in a nation, is sacred and absolute.
1776
US Declaration of Independence proclaims that 'all men are created equal' and endowed with certain inalienable rights.
1789
In France the National Assembly adopts the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, which guarantees the rights to liberty, equality, property, security, and resistance to oppression.
1791
The United States Congress adopts their Bill of Rights, amending the US Constitution to include rights to trial by jury, freedom of expression, speech, belief and assembly.
1833
The British Parliament abolishes slavery through the Slavery Abolition Act
1919
The Treaty of Versailles signed at Paris Peace Conference with other treaties for civil and political rights.
International Labour Organisation (ILO) is established to advocate for human rights in labor law
The Women's International League for Peace and Freedom is established.
The League of Nations Covenant is signed as part of the Treaty of Versailles "to promote international co-operation and to achieve international peace and security."
1920
The Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution grants women the right to vote.
1926
The Geneva Conference passes a Slavery Convention to end slavery worldwide.
1930
The ILO passes the Convention Concerning Forced or Compulsory Labour "to suppress the use of forced or compulsory labour"
1933-1939
A series of discriminatory laws pass in Germany to exclude Jewish people from employment, education, housing, healthcare, marriages of their choice, pension entitlements, professions such as law and medicine, and public accommodations. In addition, Germany begins murdering physically and mentally disabled people by gas, lethal injection and forced starvation.
1935-1953
Joseph Stalin launches a reign of terror, estimated 20 million Russian citizens were killed or died in the Gulags, a vast majority for crimes they never committed.
1939-1945
During World War II, an estimated 6 million European Jews are exterminated by Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime. Millions of civilians were forced into concentration camps, starved, brutalized and/or murdered.
1941
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill adopt the Atlantic Charter, in which they state their hope is "that all men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from want and fear" and that all nations shall enjoy self-determination.
U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union Address identifies "Four Freedoms" as essential for all people: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want and freedom from fear.
1942
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, which forcibly moves over 110,000 Japanese Americans from the coastal regions of the western U.S. to isolated inland internment camps. Their detention lasts almost four years.
René Cassin of France urges that an international court be created to punish those guilty of war crimes.
1943
The Magnuson Act passes the U.S. Congress, lifting the prohibitions of citizenship for people of Asian descent.
1944
Representatives from the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and China meet at Dumbarton Oaks to create the foundation for the United Nations.
1945 up
The United Nations (UN) is established. The Charter of the UN states that one of the primary purposes of the UN is the promotion and encouragement of "respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion."
1948
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the first detailed expression of the basic rights and fundamental freedoms to which all human beings are entitled.
1948
Genocide Convention
adopted by the UN in an effort to prevent atrocities, from happening again.
South Africa begins enacting more rigorous and authoritarian segregation laws that cement the ideology of apartheid into law.
1949
The Australian Parliament passes the Social Services Consolidation Act, policy towards the Aboriginal people.
The ILO adopts the Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining.
International Conventions for the Protection of Victims of War (Geneva Convention) approves standards for more humane treatment for prisoners of war, the wounded and civilians.
The Statute of the Council of Europe asserts that human rights and fundamental freedoms are the basis of the emerging European system.
1950-1954
U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy launches his anti-Communist campaign.
1950
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is established.
The UN adopts the European Convention on Human Rights
Convention for the Suppression of Traffic in Persons and Exploitation or Prostitution of Others.
European Convention on Human Rights, to provide basic rights both for their own citizens and for other nationalities within their borders.
The Mattachine Society organizes in Los Angeles to fight discrimination against gays.
1951
Refugee Convention protect the rights of people who are forced to flee their home country.
1952
The U.S. Congress passes the Immigration and Nationality Act, which ends the last racial and ethnic barriers to naturalization of aliens living in the U.S.
The UN adopts the Convention on Political Rights of Women.
1953
The Council of Europe creates the European Commission on Human Rights and the Court of Human Rights.
1954
The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Brown v. Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools is unconstitutional.
1955
The Daughters of Bilitis is founded in San Francisco as an organization to work for the acceptance of lesbians as respectable citizens of society.
The U.S. adopts the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners.
1957
Great Britain decriminalizes homosexual behavior between two consenting adults but bans gays in the military.
The UN adopts the Convention on Nationality of Married Women.
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Abolition of Forced Labour.
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Populations.
1958
The ILO adopts the Convention Concerning Discrimination in Employment and Occupation.
1960
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is established as an advisory body to the Organization of American States.
The Convention Against Discrimination in Education is adopted by the UN (UNESCO).
A upnti-apartheid protest challenging raicial discrimstion laws, 69 protestors are killed by police.,
South African government bans the African National Congress (ANC) and other opposition groups.
Discrimination in Employment Convention, I up inLO prohibits discrimination at work.
1961
President John F. Kennedy appoints Eleanor Roosevelt to head the first Presidential Commission on the Status of Women.
The European Social Charter defines economic and social rights for member states of the Council of Europe.
Peter Benenson founds Amnesty International.
1962
Voting rights are extended to all Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders by the Australian Parliament.
1963
The Organization of African Unity is established, dedicated to African self-determination and the advancement of the African people.
1964
U.S. passes Omnibus Civil Rights Bill, banning discrimination in voting, jobs, public accommodation, and other activities.
Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C.
Martin Luther King, Jr. wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
Nelson Mandela and seven other leaders of the ANC sentenced to life in prison in South Africa.
1965
The U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Immigration Act of 1965, eliminating the ethnic quotas established.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
1965
Racial Discrimination Convention Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD)
1966
International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. (ICESCR)999
International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR)
1966-1976
Mao Zedong begins a "purification" of leftist ideas and thousands of Chinese citizens are killed by their own government.
1965
The U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Immigration Act of 1965, eliminating the ethnic quotas established.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
1968
The UN adopts the Convention on War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity.
The First World Conference on Human Rights is held in Tehran.
René Cassin wins the Nobel Peace Prize for drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Organization of American States (OAS) adopts the American Convention on Human Rights.
Homosexuality is decriminalized in Canada.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid.
A military coup overthrows Chilean President Allende. General Pinochet, takes power, dissolves the Congress, suspends the constitution, criminalizes opposition political parties, and places strict limits on the media. During his seventeen-year dictatorship, Pinochet presides over the repression, torture, disappearance, and death of thousands of Chilean citizens who opposed his rule.
1975
The UN adopts the Declaration on Rights of Disabled Persons.
Andrei D. Sakharov wins the Nobel Peace Prize for his promotion of human rights in the Soviet Union.
Portugal becomes the last major power to end colonial rule in Africa.
1976
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights takes effect after ratification of enough UN Member states.
1977
A human rights bureau is created within the U.S. Department of State.
Amnesty International wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter begins to institutionalize human rights agendas into American foreign policy.
1978
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence is founded in the United States.
Helsinki Watch is established to monitor the Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords, now called Human Rights Watch.
The Camp David Peace Accords help negotiations between Egypt and Israel, toward peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.
1979
The UN adopts the Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. The Organization of American States establishes the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
1980
The U.S. Supreme Court orders the federal government to pay some $120 million dollars to eight tribes of Sioux Indians in reparation for American Indian land that the government seized illegally in 1877.
1981
The African Charter of Human Rights is adopted by the Organization for African Unity (OAU).
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning the Promotion of Collective Bargaining.
1982
The UN adopts the Principles of Medical Ethics.
1983
The Arab Organization for Human Rights is formed.
1984
The UN adopts the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Desmond Tutu wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1985
The Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights is established by United Nations.
The UN adopts the International Convention against Apartheid in Sports.
The U.S. Senate votes to impose economic sanctions on South Africa against the apartheid policy.
1986
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Right to Development.
1976 CE
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights takes effect after ratification of enough UN Member states.
1977
A human rights bureau is created within the U.S. Department of State.
Amnesty International wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter begins to institutionalize human rights agendas into American foreign policy.
1978
The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence is founded in the United States.
Helsinki Watch is established to monitor the Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords, now called Human Rights Watch.
The Camp David Peace Accords help negotiations between Egypt and Israel, toward peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.
1979
The UN adopts the Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. The Organization of American States establishes the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
1980
The U.S. Supreme Court orders the federal government to pay some $120 million dollars to eight tribes of Sioux Indians in reparation for American Indian land that the government seized illegally in 1877.
1981
The African Charter of Human Rights is adopted by the Organization for African Unity (OAU).
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning the Promotion of Collective Bargaining.
1982
The UN adopts the Principles of Medical Ethics.
1983
The Arab Organization for Human Rights is formed.
1984
The UN adopts the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Desmond Tutu wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1985
The Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights is established by United Nations.
The UN adopts the International Convention against Apartheid in Sports.
The U.S. Senate votes to impose economic sanctions on South Africa against the apartheid policy.
1986
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Right to Development.
1988
U.S. Congress ratifies the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
The UN ratifies the Body of Principles for Protection of All Persons Under Any Form of Detention of Imprisonment.
African governments create the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights.
1989
In Tiananmen Square, Chinese authorities massacre student demonstrators struggling for democracy.
The UN adopts both the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights aimed at the abolition of the death penalty.
The Dalai Lama wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
The International Labour Organisation adopts the Convention Concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries.
The Berlin Wall is dismantled.
1984
Convention against Torture
(CAT)
1989
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
1989
Indigenous Peoples Convention
protects the rights of Indigenous and tribal peoples around the world.
1990
Convention on Migrant Workers.
1990
UN imposes sanctions on Iraq, the U.S. enters the Gulf War to protect the sovereignty of Kuwait.
The Americans With Disabilities Act is signed into law.
The World Summit for Children of the World adopts the Declaration on the Survival, Protection, and Development of Children.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
After 27 years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela is released
and anti-apartheid ban lifted.
UN imposes sanctions on Iraq, the U.S. enters the Gulf War to protect the sovereignty of Kuwait.
The Americans With Disabilities Act is signed into law.
The World Summit for Children of the World adopts the Declaration on the Survival, Protection, and Development of Children.
The UN adopts the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
After 27 years of imprisonment, Nelson Mandela is released
and anti-apartheid ban lifted.
1991
Aung San Suu Kyi wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
1992
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious, and Linguistic Minorities.
The U.S. Congress ratifies the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Rigoberta Menchu Tum wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance.
The UN adopts the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious, and Linguistic Minorities.
The UN Security Council adopts a resolution to deploy the United Nations Protection Force in the former Yugoslavia.
A UN Security Council resolution condemns "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
1993
A Criminal Tribunal on the Former Yugoslavia is established in the Hague
to prosecute persons responsible for crimes against humanity and war crimes since 1991.
The Second World Conference on Human Rights Convenes in Vienna, where the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action is adopted.
The United Nations General Assembly creates the post of High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Nelson Mandela and F.W. de Klerk are awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime"
The Second World Conference on Human Rights Convenes in Vienna, where the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action is adopted.
The United Nations General Assembly creates the post of High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The U.S. adopts the policy "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue" which gives the government the right to remove open homosexuals from military service.
1994
The UN declares a Decade for Human Rights Education on.
An emergency session of the Commission on Human Rights convenes to respond to genocide in Rwanda.
The first UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Jose Ayala Lasso, takes his post.
Nelson Mandela is elected as president of South Africa.
1995
The Beijing Declaration at the World Conference on Women declares that "Women's rights are human rights."
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission is set up by the South African Government to address human rights violations under apartheid.
Aung San Suu Kyi is released from house arrest in Burma.
1996
Jose Ramos Horta and Bishop Carlos Belo win the Nobel Peace Prize.
President Clinton signs the Defense of Marriage Act, denying the right of marriage to same-sex couples by defining marriage "only as a legal union between one man and one woman."
1997
Mary Robinson, former President of the Republic of Ireland, becomes the second UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
General Pinochet is arrested for murder in London on a warrant from Spain requesting his extradition on allegations of murder, torture and disappearances of Spanish nationals in Chile between 1973 and 1990.
2000
The International Labour Organisation adopts the revised Maternity Protection Convention.
2001
The U.S. ratifies the Patriot Act reducing the rights and freedoms of many Americans.
2003
Massachusetts high court ruled that it would allow same sex marriage and the first gay marriages in the U.S. were performed.
2004
Press reports describe the U.S. torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison during and after the 2003 Iraq War.
President George W. Bush reacts to the legalization of gay marriage in Massachusetts by supporting a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as between one man and one woman.
Genocide begins in the Darfur region of the Sudan as the Janjaweed have displaced millions.
2004
Press reports describe the U.S. torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison during and after the 2003 Iraq War.
2005
Two years after the invasion of Iraq by Coalition Forces to remove Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi people hold their first free election
2006
Convention on Persons with Disabilities.
2007
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Aug 23, 2019
Evolution of Human Rights in Sri Lanka
Based on article by
Dr. Shirani A. Bandaranayake
Former Chief Justice of Sri Lanka.
Fundamental principle of the Constitution, formed by The Rule of Law, a necessity for equality before the law, is the constitutional guarantee of human rights known as fundamental rights for civilized existence of a State.
Human Rights hold the concept of inborn rights of an individual, which cannot be denied by the State or other party.
The doctrine of Human Rights has been treated in many religions as welfare of all human beings as a state duty, emphasizing the infinite value of the human life.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 1948, stemed from UN Charter 1045, contains 30 basic laws on Human Rights, giving high priority for right to life, liberty and equal protection are given .
Human Rights Protection in Sri Lanka
The 1947 Constitution did not include s Bill of Rights, however the Rule of Law prevailed evident from Bracegirdle case in 1937 of colonial era.
Bracegirdle, an Anglo-Australian Marxist revolutionary, who played a key role in Sri Lanka's independence struggle, was one of the handful of European Radicals in Sri Lanka, critisized planters breaking the labour laws and urged plantation workers not to allow it. The angry planters requested the British Colonial Governor Sir Reginald Stubbs to deport him. He was arrested and detained on the orders of the Governor for deportation.
The Courts ordered the release of Bracegirdle, when an application was made for a writ of habeas corpus for his release.
The Supreme Court held that Governors power vested under the provisions of the Order in Council of 1896, could only be exercised in a state of emergency, and Courts inquiry did not find a state of war or grave civil disturbance caused by
Bracegirdle speech.
Although the 1972 Constitution comprised a chapter on Fundamental Rights and Freedoms, there was no provision for special procedure for their enforcement against the State. However a case filed in 1973, the court held in 1983 that infringement of human rights has occured.
The 1978 Constitution vested the Supreme Court with exclusive jurisdiction in respect of the infringement of a person’s fundamental right.
Article 17 of the 1978 Constitution read with Article 126 provides a person direct access to the Supreme Court to move the Court in respect of any infringement of a fundamental right.
The rights guaranteed by Articles 10, 11, 12(1), 12(3) and 13 of the 1978 Constitution are available to all natural and juristic persons, whereas the rights guaranteed in Articles 12(2) and 14 are available only to citizens.
The fundamental rights recognized by the Constitution of Sri Lanka, Article 4(d) states "shall be respected, secured and advanced by all the organs of government, and shall not be abridged, restricted or denied save in the manner and to the extent provided by the Constitution."
These fundamental rights are set out in Chapter III of the Constitution:
(A) Rights made available to every "person" :
Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
Freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment
Right to equality before the law and the equal protection of the law
Right to non-discrimination on grounds of race, religion, language, caste, sex, political opinion or place of birth
Right not to be arrested excepted according to procedure established by law, and to be informed of the reason for the arrest
Right not to be kept in custody without a judicial order for longer than the period prescribed by law.
Right of a person charged with an offence to be heard in person or through an Attorney-at-Law at a fair trial by a competent court
Right not to be punished with death or imprisonment except by order of a competent court made in accordance with procedure established by law
Right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty
Right not to be punished retrospectively, i.e. for something that was not an offence at the time it was committed
(B) Rights to every "citizen":
Freedom of speech and expression including publication
Freedom of peaceful assembly.
Freedom of association.
Freedom to form and join a trade union
Freedom to manifest one's religion by observance, practice and teaching.
Freedom, by oneself or in association with others, to promote one's own culture and use one's own language
Freedom to engage in any lawful occupation, profession, trade, business or enterprise.
Freedom of movement and of choosing one's residence within Sri Lanka.
Freedom to return to Sri Lanka
If the Court finds that there is an infringement or imminent infringement of any of the petitioner's fundamental rights set out in the Constitution, it is empowered to "grant such relief or make such directions as it may deem just and equitable in the circumstances".
In Perera v University Grants Commission case, "Constitutional guarantee of fundamental rights is directed against the State" raised a situation with regard to the interpretation of an application on fundamental rights. The Court held that infringement of Fundamental right of equality of the complaint has occured in selection to university and relief was granted.
The Human Rights Treaties
Human Rights Law is a branch of International Law, refers to different types of agreements or treaties.
A treaty is defined as: "Any international agreement in written form, whether embodied in a single instrument or in two or more related instruments[ ...] concluded between two or more states or other subjects of international law and governed by international law."
The most important universal treaties are:
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
and
The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR).
Regional Human Rights treaties have been adopted by the Council of Europe, the Organisation of the American States and the Organisation of African Unity.
A State cannot enforce any law other than what is stated in its Constitution, hence It is necessary for a State to ratify an international covenant for it to become part of the State law.
Sri Lanka Constitution sovereignty is in the people and is inalienable. Article 4(a) states that the legislative power of the people shall be exercised by Parliament.
The.Article 2(2) of the ICCPR states that, "When not already provided for by existing legislative or other measures, each State Party to the present covenant undertakes ... to adopt such legislation or other measures as may be necessary to give effect to the rights recognized in the present covenant."
The UN Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 1984 was enacted by parliament Act, No. 22 of 1994, giving effect to that Convention.
In the Danzig Railway Officials case, The Free City of Danzig’s railway employees sued their Polish employers over pay and pensions.
the Permanent Court of International Justice ,(PCIJ) stated that "It cannot be disputed that the very object of an international agreement ... may be the adopting by the parties of some definite rules creating individuals rights and obligations enforceable by the national courts." , shows that In general, treaties do not create direct rights and obligations for private individuals in a State party.
Right to Education
It has been stated that "Education is both a human right in itself and an indispensable means of realizing other human rights: civil, cultural, economic, political and social. It is the primary vehicle by which economically and socially marginalized people can lift themselves out of poverty and obtain the means to participate fully in national life. Its impact is thus felt in the future, as much if not more than in the present. Education benefits societies as well as individuals."
The UDHR declares that, "Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit."
It further went on to declare: "Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religions groups and shall further the activities of the UN for the maintenance of peace."
The ICESCR has recognized this right and has stated that "The States parties to the present covenant recognize the right of everyone to education." There are several other international instruments which have declared not only the right to education, but also the prime objective of such a right.
Allthough in Sri Lanka, education is not treated as a separate fundamental right. However, the Constitution provides for the right to equality. This provision is one of the most important principles in any Constitution.
Several cases have come before the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka on the basis of Article on equality and equal protection in the Constitution.
Equality and Equal Protection
Article 7 of the UDHR reads: "All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination"
Article 12 of Sri Lanka Constitution provides the right to equality and Article 12(1) states: "All persons are equal before the law and are entitled to the equal protection of the law".
Equal protection generally means the right to equal treatment, treated alike and administered equally on similar circumstances.
The concrpt, "equality before the law" implies the absence of any special privilege in anyone’s favour before the law.
The concept ‘equal protection of the law’ means the application of the same law without any kind of discrimination to all alike.
Article 126 of the Constitution refers to need for "executive" or "administrative" action, but no clear definition has been given on what would involve "executive" or "administrative" action.
In Thadchanamurthi v Attorney General case , it was held that the State will be liable for the wrongs of its subordinate officials only where there is a violation of ‘administrative practice’ within the scope of their authority viewed as "official action of all State Officers."
Accordingly if there is no proof of administrative practice, the State will not be liable for any alleged ill treatment as the acts are not authorized, encouraged or performed for the benefit of the State, then the State cannot be held responsible for such acts.
Study cases of
Mohamed Faiz v Attorney General
Jayakody v Sri Lanka Insurance and Robinson Hotel Company Ltd.
Elmore Perera v Montagu Jayawickrama , the Supreme Court held that to prove contravention of Article 12(1), unjust or wrongful treatment alone would not be sufficient.
in Jayasinghe v Attorney General case, the court stated that Article 12 of the Constitution ensures equality and equal treatment even when a right is not granted by common law, statute or regulation.
International Covenants and Sri Lankan Courts
Sri Lanka has a duty to respect for treaty obligations based on Article 27(15) of the Constitution:
"The State shall promote international peace, security and co-operation, and the establishment of a just and equitable international economic and social order and shall endeavour to foster respect for international law and treaty obligations in dealing among nations."
in Weerawansa v Attorney General case, The Court held that "Article 27(15) requires the State to endeavour to foster respect for international law and treaty obligations in dealings among nations.
That implies that the State must likewise respect [such] obligations in its dealings with its own citizens, particularly when their liberty is involved. The State must afford to them the benefit of the safeguards which international law recognises."
Leela Violet vs Vidanapathirana , Court of Appeal.relied upon a leading decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and Resolutions of UN Commission on Human Rights.
In Weerawansa v Attorney General Fernando, J. was of the view that our Courts should have regard to the provisions of International Covenants.
In Manawadu v Attorney General, the Court referred to applicability of UDHR in enacting statutes.
Indian Supreme Court stated that, in the absence of suitable legislation in a certain sphere, international conventions and norms so far as they are consistent with the constitutional sprit, could be relied on by the Courts.
The Bangalore Principles states
that the conclusions were “expressed in recognition of the fact that judgesa and lawyers have a special contribution to make in administration of justice in fostering universal respect for fundamental human rights and freedoms”.
http://www.island.lk/2003/08/22/featur02.html
Discussion :
Discuss evolution of human rights law in Sri Lanka, enabling environment and norms with reference to international treaties
Niranjan Meegammana
HR Researcher and Technologist
Digital Human Rights Institute
Dr. Shirani A. Bandaranayake
Former Chief Justice of Sri Lanka.
Fundamental principle of the Constitution, formed by The Rule of Law, a necessity for equality before the law, is the constitutional guarantee of human rights known as fundamental rights for civilized existence of a State.
Human Rights hold the concept of inborn rights of an individual, which cannot be denied by the State or other party.
The doctrine of Human Rights has been treated in many religions as welfare of all human beings as a state duty, emphasizing the infinite value of the human life.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 1948, stemed from UN Charter 1045, contains 30 basic laws on Human Rights, giving high priority for right to life, liberty and equal protection are given .
Human Rights Protection in Sri Lanka
The 1947 Constitution did not include s Bill of Rights, however the Rule of Law prevailed evident from Bracegirdle case in 1937 of colonial era.
Bracegirdle, an Anglo-Australian Marxist revolutionary, who played a key role in Sri Lanka's independence struggle, was one of the handful of European Radicals in Sri Lanka, critisized planters breaking the labour laws and urged plantation workers not to allow it. The angry planters requested the British Colonial Governor Sir Reginald Stubbs to deport him. He was arrested and detained on the orders of the Governor for deportation.
The Courts ordered the release of Bracegirdle, when an application was made for a writ of habeas corpus for his release.
The Supreme Court held that Governors power vested under the provisions of the Order in Council of 1896, could only be exercised in a state of emergency, and Courts inquiry did not find a state of war or grave civil disturbance caused by
Bracegirdle speech.
Although the 1972 Constitution comprised a chapter on Fundamental Rights and Freedoms, there was no provision for special procedure for their enforcement against the State. However a case filed in 1973, the court held in 1983 that infringement of human rights has occured.
The 1978 Constitution vested the Supreme Court with exclusive jurisdiction in respect of the infringement of a person’s fundamental right.
Article 17 of the 1978 Constitution read with Article 126 provides a person direct access to the Supreme Court to move the Court in respect of any infringement of a fundamental right.
The rights guaranteed by Articles 10, 11, 12(1), 12(3) and 13 of the 1978 Constitution are available to all natural and juristic persons, whereas the rights guaranteed in Articles 12(2) and 14 are available only to citizens.
The fundamental rights recognized by the Constitution of Sri Lanka, Article 4(d) states "shall be respected, secured and advanced by all the organs of government, and shall not be abridged, restricted or denied save in the manner and to the extent provided by the Constitution."
These fundamental rights are set out in Chapter III of the Constitution:
(A) Rights made available to every "person" :
Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
Freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment
Right to equality before the law and the equal protection of the law
Right to non-discrimination on grounds of race, religion, language, caste, sex, political opinion or place of birth
Right not to be arrested excepted according to procedure established by law, and to be informed of the reason for the arrest
Right not to be kept in custody without a judicial order for longer than the period prescribed by law.
Right of a person charged with an offence to be heard in person or through an Attorney-at-Law at a fair trial by a competent court
Right not to be punished with death or imprisonment except by order of a competent court made in accordance with procedure established by law
Right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty
Right not to be punished retrospectively, i.e. for something that was not an offence at the time it was committed
(B) Rights to every "citizen":
Freedom of speech and expression including publication
Freedom of peaceful assembly.
Freedom of association.
Freedom to form and join a trade union
Freedom to manifest one's religion by observance, practice and teaching.
Freedom, by oneself or in association with others, to promote one's own culture and use one's own language
Freedom to engage in any lawful occupation, profession, trade, business or enterprise.
Freedom of movement and of choosing one's residence within Sri Lanka.
Freedom to return to Sri Lanka
If the Court finds that there is an infringement or imminent infringement of any of the petitioner's fundamental rights set out in the Constitution, it is empowered to "grant such relief or make such directions as it may deem just and equitable in the circumstances".
In Perera v University Grants Commission case, "Constitutional guarantee of fundamental rights is directed against the State" raised a situation with regard to the interpretation of an application on fundamental rights. The Court held that infringement of Fundamental right of equality of the complaint has occured in selection to university and relief was granted.
The Human Rights Treaties
Human Rights Law is a branch of International Law, refers to different types of agreements or treaties.
A treaty is defined as: "Any international agreement in written form, whether embodied in a single instrument or in two or more related instruments[ ...] concluded between two or more states or other subjects of international law and governed by international law."
The most important universal treaties are:
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)
and
The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR).
Regional Human Rights treaties have been adopted by the Council of Europe, the Organisation of the American States and the Organisation of African Unity.
A State cannot enforce any law other than what is stated in its Constitution, hence It is necessary for a State to ratify an international covenant for it to become part of the State law.
Sri Lanka Constitution sovereignty is in the people and is inalienable. Article 4(a) states that the legislative power of the people shall be exercised by Parliament.
The.Article 2(2) of the ICCPR states that, "When not already provided for by existing legislative or other measures, each State Party to the present covenant undertakes ... to adopt such legislation or other measures as may be necessary to give effect to the rights recognized in the present covenant."
The UN Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, 1984 was enacted by parliament Act, No. 22 of 1994, giving effect to that Convention.
In the Danzig Railway Officials case, The Free City of Danzig’s railway employees sued their Polish employers over pay and pensions.
the Permanent Court of International Justice ,(PCIJ) stated that "It cannot be disputed that the very object of an international agreement ... may be the adopting by the parties of some definite rules creating individuals rights and obligations enforceable by the national courts." , shows that In general, treaties do not create direct rights and obligations for private individuals in a State party.
Right to Education
It has been stated that "Education is both a human right in itself and an indispensable means of realizing other human rights: civil, cultural, economic, political and social. It is the primary vehicle by which economically and socially marginalized people can lift themselves out of poverty and obtain the means to participate fully in national life. Its impact is thus felt in the future, as much if not more than in the present. Education benefits societies as well as individuals."
The UDHR declares that, "Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit."
It further went on to declare: "Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religions groups and shall further the activities of the UN for the maintenance of peace."
The ICESCR has recognized this right and has stated that "The States parties to the present covenant recognize the right of everyone to education." There are several other international instruments which have declared not only the right to education, but also the prime objective of such a right.
Allthough in Sri Lanka, education is not treated as a separate fundamental right. However, the Constitution provides for the right to equality. This provision is one of the most important principles in any Constitution.
Several cases have come before the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka on the basis of Article on equality and equal protection in the Constitution.
Equality and Equal Protection
Article 7 of the UDHR reads: "All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination"
Article 12 of Sri Lanka Constitution provides the right to equality and Article 12(1) states: "All persons are equal before the law and are entitled to the equal protection of the law".
Equal protection generally means the right to equal treatment, treated alike and administered equally on similar circumstances.
The concrpt, "equality before the law" implies the absence of any special privilege in anyone’s favour before the law.
The concept ‘equal protection of the law’ means the application of the same law without any kind of discrimination to all alike.
Article 126 of the Constitution refers to need for "executive" or "administrative" action, but no clear definition has been given on what would involve "executive" or "administrative" action.
In Thadchanamurthi v Attorney General case , it was held that the State will be liable for the wrongs of its subordinate officials only where there is a violation of ‘administrative practice’ within the scope of their authority viewed as "official action of all State Officers."
Accordingly if there is no proof of administrative practice, the State will not be liable for any alleged ill treatment as the acts are not authorized, encouraged or performed for the benefit of the State, then the State cannot be held responsible for such acts.
Study cases of
Mohamed Faiz v Attorney General
Jayakody v Sri Lanka Insurance and Robinson Hotel Company Ltd.
Elmore Perera v Montagu Jayawickrama , the Supreme Court held that to prove contravention of Article 12(1), unjust or wrongful treatment alone would not be sufficient.
in Jayasinghe v Attorney General case, the court stated that Article 12 of the Constitution ensures equality and equal treatment even when a right is not granted by common law, statute or regulation.
International Covenants and Sri Lankan Courts
Sri Lanka has a duty to respect for treaty obligations based on Article 27(15) of the Constitution:
"The State shall promote international peace, security and co-operation, and the establishment of a just and equitable international economic and social order and shall endeavour to foster respect for international law and treaty obligations in dealing among nations."
in Weerawansa v Attorney General case, The Court held that "Article 27(15) requires the State to endeavour to foster respect for international law and treaty obligations in dealings among nations.
That implies that the State must likewise respect [such] obligations in its dealings with its own citizens, particularly when their liberty is involved. The State must afford to them the benefit of the safeguards which international law recognises."
Leela Violet vs Vidanapathirana , Court of Appeal.relied upon a leading decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and Resolutions of UN Commission on Human Rights.
In Weerawansa v Attorney General Fernando, J. was of the view that our Courts should have regard to the provisions of International Covenants.
In Manawadu v Attorney General, the Court referred to applicability of UDHR in enacting statutes.
Indian Supreme Court stated that, in the absence of suitable legislation in a certain sphere, international conventions and norms so far as they are consistent with the constitutional sprit, could be relied on by the Courts.
The Bangalore Principles states
that the conclusions were “expressed in recognition of the fact that judgesa and lawyers have a special contribution to make in administration of justice in fostering universal respect for fundamental human rights and freedoms”.
http://www.island.lk/2003/08/22/featur02.html
Discussion :
Discuss evolution of human rights law in Sri Lanka, enabling environment and norms with reference to international treaties
Niranjan Meegammana
HR Researcher and Technologist
Digital Human Rights Institute
Freedom of Expression in Social Media and Privacy
In emerging digital world, social media has become the main medium of communication, with 2.2 billion Facebook users, 330 million Twitter users and users viewing billion hours of video
daily on YouTube, creates a huge positive impact on freedom of expression. However these social media companies have gained enormous power on what information each individual has access to and how they consume them.
When a user is joining a social platform, require acceptance of Terms of Service companies. It lays down community standards for acceptable types of content and user behavior.
The content posted against community standards are subject to removal, on reporting by users or through algorithms.
or user's account could be disabled. Therefore the social media platforms are not control-free.
Governements constantly pressure these companies to remove content labeled as ‘hate speech’ and ‘fake news’ so online censorship is increasingly privatised.
Social media news feeds curated by algorithms, to serve targeted advertisements for the perceived interests of the users determined by machines, collecting analysing user behavior on their platform. Therefore the freedom of speech online is now regulated by the terms of companies, mostly based in the United States (US).
When hundreds of.millions of users joining their platforms, these companies had to address the humanr rights concerns of various communities joined their platforms, justified protection freedom of expression and right to privacy online.
This raises the questions of;
• What are the free speech standards social media companies need to respect?
• How social media services provided by private
companies, comply with international standards on
freedom of expression?
• Does the electronic nature of the Internet require different policies and regulations?
• What are the procedural safeguards these companies should practice to respect the right to freedom of expression online?
Right to freedom of expression
is protected by Article 19 of the UniversalD of Human Rights (UDHR), and legally forced with Article 19 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and other regional treaties.
In order to comply with other human rights and democracy,
limitations on right to freedom of expression can be made;
• By a law or regulation for conduct. Examples are Contempt of Court and Official Secrets Act, 1955
• To respect right to privacy of others. ICCPR Article 17 covers protection from defamation.
• Protection of national security or of public ordero of public health or morals. Social Media ban under emergency law.
Article 20(2) of the ICCPR provides that any expression of national, racial or religious hatred which constitutes incitement to discrimination or violence is prohibited by law.
These restrictions also apply to expressions made on Internet.
Intermediary liability
In 2011 the UN Special Rapporteur recommended
that intermediaries should not be liable for content produced by others when providing
technical services, unless if they have specially intervened in the content, and stated that censorship should never be delegated to a private entity to promote protection of the right
to freedom of opinion and expression online.
However lack of transparency by the intermediaries on online censorship done with discriminatory practices or on political pressure affects right to freedom of expression on Internet.
It is the responsibility of private companies to respect human rights, independent of State obligations.
The Manila Principles on Intermediary Liability states that companies should respect human rights, and their content restriction policies and practices must comply with human rights law, and also provide users a complaints mechanism to review
decisions taken to restrict content.
The Joint Declaration on Freedom of Expression and Countering Violent Extremism , in 2016 recommended that States should not make mandatory orders to remove or otherwise restrict content by intermediaries, unless the content is lawfully restricted under international standards.
The 2017 Joint Declaration on ‘Fake news’, Disinformation and Propaganda recommended that intermediaries should adopt clear, pre-determined policies governing actions that restrict third party content under a justifiable criteria rather than ideological or political
goals, and Intermediaries should ensure easy access and understanding of Terms of Service, policies and practices with detailed information on how they are enforced and where, with clear, concise and easy to understand sumeries.
It further recommended that intermediaries should respect a due process for notifying users promptly when content is subject to restrictions giving the user an opportunity to contest restriction.
The Special Rapporteur on violence against women has urged States and companies to address online gender-based abuse, whilst warning against censorship, requires preventative measures to tackle online abuse often faced by women online.
Right to privacy and anonymity
Ability to communicate privately
guranteee right to privacy and freedom of expression.
The 2011, May Special Rapporteur on FOE expressed his concern on States and private actors using the Internet to monitor and collect information about individuals, their communications and activities ont Internet, which can violate right privacy of Internet users’ and ultimately prevent the free flow of information and ideas online, hence recommended that States should ensure that
individuals can express themselves anonymously online and refrain from adopting
real-name registration systems.
Further, in his May 2015 report on encryption and anonymity in the digital age, recommended that States to refrain from making the
identification of users a pre-condition for access to digital communications and
online services like requiring SIM card registration for mobile users, further recommended that corporate actors to reconsider their own policies that restrict
encryption and anonymity.
Keyword, image based algorithms or filters used in practice are uncertain in content restriction.
As Terms of Service written in broad terms, make it generally impossible to know if they applied
reasonable, arbitrarily or discriminatory mechanism.
Social Media platforms
They allow users to report content thought to violate community guidelines. However there is no obvious appeals mechanisms for users to challenge a wrongful content removal decision, as the Terms of Service does not
contain a clear information about redress mechanisms.
Terms of services containing unfair contract terms imbalance
power between the companies and individuals.
The Terms of Service specifies a jurisdiction for dealing with dispute arising from the right
to privacy, of the service, but it is a significant barrier for those based outside of the respective jurisdiction to access to justice.
Google, Twitter and Facebook accepted making their jurisdiction clauses
compliant with EU law.
The Communications Decency Act (CDA) , safeguards companies for any action taken voluntarily and in good faith to restrict
objectionable content based on their Terms Of Service.
It is critisized that lower standards in TOS applied for restrictions on freedom of expression than those permitted under international human rights law.
Companies day say that they intend to create safer online environments to grow their user base, but not proportionate with free speech and privacy.
The companies are adapting their
community standards to domestic legal requirements due to political pressure, falling below international standards on freedom of expression.
Twitter and Facebook both prohibited “promotion” of violence or terrorism in 2015. Facebook Community Standards do not permit supporting or
praising leaders of terrorist organisations, or condoning their violent activities.
Companies now using Artificial Intelligence to remove extremism, phonography , hate speech and fake news posts.
A challange prohibiting such content is that they are hard to define as offensive to the TOS.
Hate speech is a major issue on social media, and companies are pressured by governments and
the public to make a safe online environment.
The Human Rights commitee ellaborating on freedom of expression states that "freedom of expression expands to contravercial , disturbing or even shocking material, disliked or thought to be incorrect does not justify preventing a person expressing it"9
Facebook Community Standards define hate speech as direct attack on people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, sex, gender, gender identity and serious disability or disease and does not allow on their platform.
Twitter defines “hateful conduct” as a prohibited bIt upehaviour
"including violent threats, wishes for the physical harm, death, or
disease of individuals or gr groups ... or other content that degrades someone."
YouTube Community Guidelines defines "hate speech" as “content that promotes violence against or has tIthe primary purpose of inciting hatred against individuals or groups ...", does not permit such content on its platform.
It is Generally permitted to criticize a nation-state, but not hateful comments on a group based on their race.
Youtube further states that “not everything that’s mean or insulting is hate speech.” unless it creates incitement to violence, hostility or discrimination.
Facebook does not allow any
organisations or individuals who engage in terrorist organisations organised hate..., provides that content that “expresses support or praise for groups, leaders or individuals involved in these activities” will be removed from the platform.
Facebook defines graphic violence as content that “glorifies
violence or celebrates the suffering or humiliation of others because it may create an
environment that discourages participation."
It further states that “people value the ability to discuss important issues such as human rights abuse or acts of terrorism.”, which allows graphic content “to help people raise awareness about issues” but adds a “warning label to especially graphic or violent the same time,
Facebook states “people value the ability to discuss important issues such as human rights abuse or acts of terrorism." allows graphic content “to help people raise awareness about issues”, and adds a warning lable or prevent access to users under 18.
Twitter does not have a specific policy to deal with ‘terrorist’ content, but prohibits the use of Twitter “for any unlawful purposes or in furtherance of illegal activities.” and “violent threats and glorification of violence."
Social media platforms prohibit content that violates right to privacy on the grounds of public morals.
1. Threats of violence
2. Nudity or pornography
3. Posting of private information.
Among them can be offensive or insulting material that
falls short of harassment, but justified in the public interest, although they may constitute an interference with the right to privacy.
Facebook restricts nudity, but makes allowance for nudity content for artistic, humor and educational puposes.
Google bans “nude” or “sexually explicit” images in broad terms.
YouTube prohibits sexually explicit content, but allows documentary or scientific purpose sexual content.
Fake news has become a key concern since 2016 US Presidential election. Social Media platforms are combating spreading of fake news .
Facebook anti-spam policy
does not allow inaccurate or misleading posts to gain liked or shares.
Facebook removes profiles that impersonate other people, and encourage users to report false information.
Regulation
Gives disproportionate powers to State for censorship, inclusive of
prison terms, fines or content blocking powers.
When regulator is not an independent body, chills down free expression.
Tends to undermine minority view points.
May be below international standards on freedom of expression .
Unable to transfer existing laws for radio, print and TV to internet due to open nature.
Powers to block entire platform and hefty fines for not complying with domestic legal requirements.
Co-regulation
This model established self-regulatory bodies by
State. However they will have same flaws as State regulated model, and hamper innovation. it's also not possible to guaranteee the independence of the body.
Self-regulation
Here members of self-regulatory bodies promote and develop respect for ethical
standards with in membership with desire for heathy internet, however these are “voluntary” initiatives and often used to circumvent the rule of law.
A strong weakness in this is lack transparency. They fail to hold companies and governments accountable for wrongful removal of content.
Social media companies,
who are central enablers of freedom of expression should respect the international
standards on human rights consistent with the Guiding Principles of their businesd.
Their Community
Standards should be in line with international standards on freedom of expression and they need to provide a remedy for violations of freedom of expression under their Community Standards.
States must provide for an effective remedy to protect Individuals’ right to freedom of expression as well as right to privacy under international human rights law.
1. Discuss freedom of expression and right to privacy giving examples and how human rights
based policies to be formulated for balancing two rights privacy and speech .
Niranjan Meegammana
HR Researcher & Technologist
Digital Human Rights Institute
daily on YouTube, creates a huge positive impact on freedom of expression. However these social media companies have gained enormous power on what information each individual has access to and how they consume them.
When a user is joining a social platform, require acceptance of Terms of Service companies. It lays down community standards for acceptable types of content and user behavior.
The content posted against community standards are subject to removal, on reporting by users or through algorithms.
or user's account could be disabled. Therefore the social media platforms are not control-free.
Governements constantly pressure these companies to remove content labeled as ‘hate speech’ and ‘fake news’ so online censorship is increasingly privatised.
Social media news feeds curated by algorithms, to serve targeted advertisements for the perceived interests of the users determined by machines, collecting analysing user behavior on their platform. Therefore the freedom of speech online is now regulated by the terms of companies, mostly based in the United States (US).
When hundreds of.millions of users joining their platforms, these companies had to address the humanr rights concerns of various communities joined their platforms, justified protection freedom of expression and right to privacy online.
This raises the questions of;
• What are the free speech standards social media companies need to respect?
• How social media services provided by private
companies, comply with international standards on
freedom of expression?
• Does the electronic nature of the Internet require different policies and regulations?
• What are the procedural safeguards these companies should practice to respect the right to freedom of expression online?
Right to freedom of expression
is protected by Article 19 of the UniversalD of Human Rights (UDHR), and legally forced with Article 19 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and other regional treaties.
In order to comply with other human rights and democracy,
limitations on right to freedom of expression can be made;
• By a law or regulation for conduct. Examples are Contempt of Court and Official Secrets Act, 1955
• To respect right to privacy of others. ICCPR Article 17 covers protection from defamation.
• Protection of national security or of public ordero of public health or morals. Social Media ban under emergency law.
Article 20(2) of the ICCPR provides that any expression of national, racial or religious hatred which constitutes incitement to discrimination or violence is prohibited by law.
These restrictions also apply to expressions made on Internet.
Intermediary liability
In 2011 the UN Special Rapporteur recommended
that intermediaries should not be liable for content produced by others when providing
technical services, unless if they have specially intervened in the content, and stated that censorship should never be delegated to a private entity to promote protection of the right
to freedom of opinion and expression online.
However lack of transparency by the intermediaries on online censorship done with discriminatory practices or on political pressure affects right to freedom of expression on Internet.
It is the responsibility of private companies to respect human rights, independent of State obligations.
The Manila Principles on Intermediary Liability states that companies should respect human rights, and their content restriction policies and practices must comply with human rights law, and also provide users a complaints mechanism to review
decisions taken to restrict content.
The Joint Declaration on Freedom of Expression and Countering Violent Extremism , in 2016 recommended that States should not make mandatory orders to remove or otherwise restrict content by intermediaries, unless the content is lawfully restricted under international standards.
The 2017 Joint Declaration on ‘Fake news’, Disinformation and Propaganda recommended that intermediaries should adopt clear, pre-determined policies governing actions that restrict third party content under a justifiable criteria rather than ideological or political
goals, and Intermediaries should ensure easy access and understanding of Terms of Service, policies and practices with detailed information on how they are enforced and where, with clear, concise and easy to understand sumeries.
It further recommended that intermediaries should respect a due process for notifying users promptly when content is subject to restrictions giving the user an opportunity to contest restriction.
The Special Rapporteur on violence against women has urged States and companies to address online gender-based abuse, whilst warning against censorship, requires preventative measures to tackle online abuse often faced by women online.
Right to privacy and anonymity
Ability to communicate privately
guranteee right to privacy and freedom of expression.
The 2011, May Special Rapporteur on FOE expressed his concern on States and private actors using the Internet to monitor and collect information about individuals, their communications and activities ont Internet, which can violate right privacy of Internet users’ and ultimately prevent the free flow of information and ideas online, hence recommended that States should ensure that
individuals can express themselves anonymously online and refrain from adopting
real-name registration systems.
Further, in his May 2015 report on encryption and anonymity in the digital age, recommended that States to refrain from making the
identification of users a pre-condition for access to digital communications and
online services like requiring SIM card registration for mobile users, further recommended that corporate actors to reconsider their own policies that restrict
encryption and anonymity.
Keyword, image based algorithms or filters used in practice are uncertain in content restriction.
As Terms of Service written in broad terms, make it generally impossible to know if they applied
reasonable, arbitrarily or discriminatory mechanism.
Social Media platforms
They allow users to report content thought to violate community guidelines. However there is no obvious appeals mechanisms for users to challenge a wrongful content removal decision, as the Terms of Service does not
contain a clear information about redress mechanisms.
Terms of services containing unfair contract terms imbalance
power between the companies and individuals.
The Terms of Service specifies a jurisdiction for dealing with dispute arising from the right
to privacy, of the service, but it is a significant barrier for those based outside of the respective jurisdiction to access to justice.
Google, Twitter and Facebook accepted making their jurisdiction clauses
compliant with EU law.
The Communications Decency Act (CDA) , safeguards companies for any action taken voluntarily and in good faith to restrict
objectionable content based on their Terms Of Service.
It is critisized that lower standards in TOS applied for restrictions on freedom of expression than those permitted under international human rights law.
Companies day say that they intend to create safer online environments to grow their user base, but not proportionate with free speech and privacy.
The companies are adapting their
community standards to domestic legal requirements due to political pressure, falling below international standards on freedom of expression.
Twitter and Facebook both prohibited “promotion” of violence or terrorism in 2015. Facebook Community Standards do not permit supporting or
praising leaders of terrorist organisations, or condoning their violent activities.
Companies now using Artificial Intelligence to remove extremism, phonography , hate speech and fake news posts.
A challange prohibiting such content is that they are hard to define as offensive to the TOS.
Hate speech is a major issue on social media, and companies are pressured by governments and
the public to make a safe online environment.
The Human Rights commitee ellaborating on freedom of expression states that "freedom of expression expands to contravercial , disturbing or even shocking material, disliked or thought to be incorrect does not justify preventing a person expressing it"9
Facebook Community Standards define hate speech as direct attack on people based on race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, sex, gender, gender identity and serious disability or disease and does not allow on their platform.
Twitter defines “hateful conduct” as a prohibited bIt upehaviour
"including violent threats, wishes for the physical harm, death, or
disease of individuals or gr groups ... or other content that degrades someone."
YouTube Community Guidelines defines "hate speech" as “content that promotes violence against or has tIthe primary purpose of inciting hatred against individuals or groups ...", does not permit such content on its platform.
It is Generally permitted to criticize a nation-state, but not hateful comments on a group based on their race.
Youtube further states that “not everything that’s mean or insulting is hate speech.” unless it creates incitement to violence, hostility or discrimination.
Facebook does not allow any
organisations or individuals who engage in terrorist organisations organised hate..., provides that content that “expresses support or praise for groups, leaders or individuals involved in these activities” will be removed from the platform.
Facebook defines graphic violence as content that “glorifies
violence or celebrates the suffering or humiliation of others because it may create an
environment that discourages participation."
It further states that “people value the ability to discuss important issues such as human rights abuse or acts of terrorism.”, which allows graphic content “to help people raise awareness about issues” but adds a “warning label to especially graphic or violent the same time,
Facebook states “people value the ability to discuss important issues such as human rights abuse or acts of terrorism." allows graphic content “to help people raise awareness about issues”, and adds a warning lable or prevent access to users under 18.
Twitter does not have a specific policy to deal with ‘terrorist’ content, but prohibits the use of Twitter “for any unlawful purposes or in furtherance of illegal activities.” and “violent threats and glorification of violence."
Social media platforms prohibit content that violates right to privacy on the grounds of public morals.
1. Threats of violence
2. Nudity or pornography
3. Posting of private information.
Among them can be offensive or insulting material that
falls short of harassment, but justified in the public interest, although they may constitute an interference with the right to privacy.
Facebook restricts nudity, but makes allowance for nudity content for artistic, humor and educational puposes.
Google bans “nude” or “sexually explicit” images in broad terms.
YouTube prohibits sexually explicit content, but allows documentary or scientific purpose sexual content.
Fake news has become a key concern since 2016 US Presidential election. Social Media platforms are combating spreading of fake news .
Facebook anti-spam policy
does not allow inaccurate or misleading posts to gain liked or shares.
Facebook removes profiles that impersonate other people, and encourage users to report false information.
Regulation
Gives disproportionate powers to State for censorship, inclusive of
prison terms, fines or content blocking powers.
When regulator is not an independent body, chills down free expression.
Tends to undermine minority view points.
May be below international standards on freedom of expression .
Unable to transfer existing laws for radio, print and TV to internet due to open nature.
Powers to block entire platform and hefty fines for not complying with domestic legal requirements.
Co-regulation
This model established self-regulatory bodies by
State. However they will have same flaws as State regulated model, and hamper innovation. it's also not possible to guaranteee the independence of the body.
Self-regulation
Here members of self-regulatory bodies promote and develop respect for ethical
standards with in membership with desire for heathy internet, however these are “voluntary” initiatives and often used to circumvent the rule of law.
A strong weakness in this is lack transparency. They fail to hold companies and governments accountable for wrongful removal of content.
Social media companies,
who are central enablers of freedom of expression should respect the international
standards on human rights consistent with the Guiding Principles of their businesd.
Their Community
Standards should be in line with international standards on freedom of expression and they need to provide a remedy for violations of freedom of expression under their Community Standards.
States must provide for an effective remedy to protect Individuals’ right to freedom of expression as well as right to privacy under international human rights law.
1. Discuss freedom of expression and right to privacy giving examples and how human rights
based policies to be formulated for balancing two rights privacy and speech .
Niranjan Meegammana
HR Researcher & Technologist
Digital Human Rights Institute
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)