The scholarship of Brown, Bromley and Athreye present a detailed and analytical account of the relations between cultural claims, power and universal human rights. From a historical perspective, ever since the conception of geo-political organization through formation of nation-states, the notions of national identity have been at the forefront of politics. The roles of cultural and political history in constituting this national identity have been much debated. The rest of this essay will attempt to elicit the relationship between these concepts and their relevance in a world that is marching toward economic globalization.
To begin with, let us consider the controversy surrounding the design of the Australian flag. This case is representative of the ideological and power struggles that is rampant everywhere else in the world. The Australian flag evokes starkly different emotions from different sections of its populace. For the indigenous community, it denotes a selective and exclusivist interpretation of Australian history, which completely neglects pre-colonial heritage. For the majority of the European settlers, the blatant human rights violations perpetrated against innocent hordes of indigenous tribes do not evoke sympathy as much as colonial supremacy. This dual viewpoints of history is typical in the post-colonial societies elsewhere, with a marked shift between the sentiments of the ruling elite and the subaltern masses. As the authors point out,
“These debates about the meaning of flags raise issues that point to the very foundations of international politics. States claim that they embody the identities of the peoples living within their territorial boundaries. These identities are a powerful force, even if they are sometimes contrived or imagined. The principle of state sovereignty is often upheld not just as a fundamental political and legal tool but also as the means of protecting the culture or cultures operating within the state’s boundaries”. (Brown, Bromley & Athreye, p.200)
Over the course of the last century, states have claimed legitimacy to their causes using the language of rights. The hope lies therein for minorities and underprivileged within states to also employ the language of rights to claim their legitimate share of opportunity, prosperity and privilege. While traditionally, notions of cultural identity held sway over other abstract categorizations, the world of neo-liberal economic globalization has given precedence to universal human rights and justice. So, the twentieth century world is undergoing an interesting political and cultural evolution that breaks away from conventional notions of rights and justice.
One of the significant contributors to this changing understanding of culture and identity is the discovery of new theories on human cognition and behaviour. In other words, the field of psychology has brought a new synthesis to what used to be disparate and exclusive cultural realms. By pointing out to the universal pool of emotions, feelings and actions, psychology has dispelled many myths that were at the foundations of cultural hegemony. For instance, conditions such as oedipal complex, anxiety, sexual envy could affect a member of British aristocracy as much as a member of the Romany tribe. When such universalities were put forth in scholarly journals, the reactionary elements in society were up in arms against these theories; mostly because they tend to undermine their comforting set of illusions. In this view, “attachment to a political unit, be it the nation, the state or the region, is a fundamental desire, almost akin to a biological imperative” (Robert Garson, p.203). Just as individuals are keen to form personal bonds and relationships in order to feel good about them, they also look to political affiliations. But these political identities can take a dangerous turn, when “some identities are encouraged to exclude individuals from certain territories, to deprive them of their property or to isolate them from social networks” (Robert Garson, p.203). In the realm of geo-political entities, citizens will identify with their nation if it provides them a feeling of personal security and comfort and if it is able to keep alive comforting illusions about the past and present. According to this view,
“the state fulfils fundamental human needs but in turn depends on continuing loyalty to continue functioning. This requires a steady output of stimuli to confirm the experience of community. These vehicles of solidarity will include language, political organization and mundane reminders of the values that hold the community together. Those reminders will comprise anthems, banknotes and coins, flags, education, commemorations, monuments and so on, which become part of the conversation of politics. These artefacts form the material culture of the community and flag the special characteristics that distinguish it from others”. (Robert Garson, p.205).
It is not an exaggeration to say that such deliberate manoeuvring of people’s minds is at the root of most international disputes. The governments that perpetrate are primarily responsible for this state of affairs; and so are the easily gullible masses of citizens who lack critical perspective.
The Second World War and the holocaust associated with it shook up the conscience of the international community. The result was the declaration by the United Nations of Universal Human Rights in 1948. Ever since, all alleged human rights violations were judged on the basis of the provisions in this important document. While erecting a common platform for justice to all humanity is a noble idea, it has had its share of practical difficulties. For one thing, the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights were conceived by the victors of the Second World War, namely the Western Democratic coalition comprising of the United States of America, Great Britain, France, etc. The Soviet Union was also a participant, but the issue of human rights was not high on its list of priorities. Moreover, the Soviet Union cannot be said to represent the entire hemispherical East. Hence, the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights essentially embody Western notions of rights and justice. This has led to several misunderstandings between the liberal-democratic West and the community-based political arrangements of the East. A case in point is China, which has long drawn criticism from British and American press for its human rights violations. But observers with wider cultural sensitivity and understanding suggest that what looks like excesses of the Communist Party from Washington D.C. is not perceived to be a hideous violation by the Chinese people. It all boils down to a matter of particular viewpoints instead of one of objective reality. The lead up to the Beijing Olympics saw such a hue and cry. But the flawless manner in which the event was organized and celebrated by Chinese citizens suggests that they are not an oppressed lot. Such cultural misunderstandings are at the core of most injustices in international relations. The solution to this problem lies in greater awareness of alien cultural norms. Nevertheless, there is no doubting the fact that the concept of universal human rights is essential for harmonious international relations. To its credit, the UN Charter and UN Declaration of Human Rights are based on some of the illustrious examples from the Western judicial canon:
“The modern rights movement has its origins in two separate sources – the tradition of ideas and political theory of the late eighteenth century, and the social reform movements of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Milestones of the first source include the development of the modern view of rights established with the popularity of the American Bill of Rights in 1791 and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in 1789. Works like Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man (first published in 1791) were also important in spreading Enlightenment notions of human rights and freedom from hierarchical forms of authority such as the church. Through such means, that is, the juridical codification of rights in state law, the nation state became the body authorized to enact and protect rights”. (Raia Prokhovnik, p.230)
This crucial development in international diplomacy shifted the emphasis from individual rights that are constitutionally protected by geo-political entities to the acceptance of universality of rights as described in the UN’s Declaration. This shift has accentuated the visibility and legitimacy of rights claims within any particular nation. It has also had a significant influence on “international politics and law by setting standards or norms of conduct and treatment” (Raia Prokhovnik, p.231). Either way, it has helped foster a better world to live in.
Scholars such as Samuel Huntington have theorized the perennial unrest between nations across the East-West divide as well as the North-South divide. Huntington famously proposed an underlying “clash of civilizations” to account for some of the recurrent conflicts in international history. He attributes this situation to the inherent incompatibility between the cultures of modern Europe and traditional Islam. The author cites many examples from the last century to illustrate the nature of this incompatibility. Starting from the British occupation of Egypt way back in 1882, to subsequent decline of the Ottoman Empire, to Iraqi Independence in 1932; followed by first Israel-Arab war in 1948, the Suez crisis in 1956 and the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the list seems almost endless. But this theory needs to be seen with a touch of scepticism, for the strong ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia is in complete contradiction to it. So are also some of the opportunistic alliances that the western powers have made with Islamic nations such as Pakistan. So, international relations are often complex and international conflicts cannot always be seen in a good/evil dichotomy. There is plenty of grey areas to be explored and understood and simplistic theorizing as that of Samuel Huntington’s “Clash of Civilizations” is at best of academic interest.
The neo-liberal economic globalization, which has come to define the last decade of international commerce and its entailing western lifestyles and consumption preferences are consolidating as never before. These cultural changes are popularly referred to as “McDonaldization” and “CocaCola-ization” of the globe. It implies that economic globalization leads to a “global homogenous consumer culture in which Western models increasingly displace alternative cultural traditions” (Jef Huysmans, p.311). This apprehension is not a entirely the result of changing economic models; the equations of political power is at the heart of this trend. The aspect of worldwide propagation of sets of norms and values brings with it some crucial questions about the merits of cultural globalization. It implies that
“cultural globalization cannot be reduced to consumption patterns and lifestyles. But more importantly, it indicates that cultural globalization cannot be reduced to a side effect of economic globalization. It is a development in its own right that is (partly) independent of economic processes. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, for example, has to be understood against the background of the catastrophic experience of totalitarianism in the first half of the twentieth century in Europe”. (Jef Huysmans, p.313)
The globalization of rights, which was kick started by the universal declaration, has of late included property rights. This has given rise to disagreements within the international community about the cultural content of rights. Again, the questions being asked were related to the Western centric origins of some of these rights. The individualistic culture of the west, it is complained, does not heed to the family-centric cultural norms of the East, where the community and society are placed ahead of the individual. Even in the contentious issue of women empowerment, the opinions of women in Islamic societies about their status in the community is not as bleak as western commentators would have us believe.
The global propagation of rights and values inevitably leads to cultural homogenization. Similarly, the world is witnessing an escalating tension between modern European culture and conservative Islamic way of life. It is important to realize that the conflict between global rights and national/regional cultures is not a struggle for supremacy between cultures. Instead, it should be analyzed and debated in wider contexts of values, traditions and universal human qualities.
Reference:
Ordering the International:History, Change and Transformation (2004) by Brown, Bromley and Athreye, Open University Press in association with Pluto Press.