IN SEARCH OF A HUMAN RIGHTS ORIENTED ECONOMIC PARADIGM: OR ANALYZING THE IDEOLOGY OF HUMAN RIGHTS

The field of human rights has been short on political economy. While some important studies established the relationship between economic development and human rights, economic structures that are appropriate for the realization of human rights are not examined. The equality and anti-discrimination principles of international human rights, when applied to all aspects of life, make certain economic and political organizations incompatible and directly in conflict with the advancement of human rights. While the authoritarian politics is often addressed as inappropriate or constituting violations of civil and political rights, capitalist, or more benignly defined market economy, is seldom identified as an obstacle to the realization of human rights or as a necessary target of change for projects that advance human rights. This paper contends that the implementation of full spectrum of human rights call for a social democratic model, if not a substantial democracy (as opposed to procedural) that can be actualized only in a socialist economy. The radicalism embedded in such an argument, however, makes human rights less palatable to some people. This may explain why the study of human rights has been short on political economy and why many advocates of human rights strategically avoid controversy. INTRODUCTION Ideologies are belief systems that people use to interpret their environment, physical or social, and define their response and behavior. Political ideologies deal with social relations related to power. They embody ideals and express mentalities, but as systems they connect ideas and justify structures and prescribe the essentials of good life and governance. Although they are akin to or overlap with philosophies, political ideologies are modern formulations that respond to the discontented social lives in organized and bureaucratic societies. Their modernity presupposes human agency, and especially new and radical ideologies mobilize people to seek and bring about desirable changes. I contend that a modern ideology, perhaps more prevalent in our times, is that of human rights. Historically, human rights constituted “ideals” that were addressed by different ideologies. In fact, we are accustomed to talk about varying conceptualization of human rights in different political ideologies/theories. However, since the mid-twentieth century, the concept and discourse of human rights have evolved considerably and now qualified to be considered a separate and distinct ideology. In this paper, after a discussion of various components and dimensions of ideologies, I will analyze the International Bill of Rights as the preliminary sources of Human Rights ideology. Then, I advance the argument that despite the tendency, or 1 I am grateful to my colleagues, Michael Freeman, for inspiring me to undertake this study with his comments on the weakness of human rights studies in political economy (2002), and Peter Ohring, for his critical guidance and technical assistance in developing Figure II, as well as to my student assistants Kathryn Eaker and Amy Treffers, for their help with the library research. 2 Relying upon human beings as agents of change, political ideologies differ also from religions, which are powerful belief systems. In fact, some religions emerged as a critique of the world to which they were introduced and demanded change. However, the significance attached to the divine will in most religions tends to limit the human agency. The notion of afterlife and eternal salvation may even work to prevent change. Limited human agency, however, does not mean lack of it, and religions can be politicized and serve ideological purposes both to mobilize and pacify people.