Political Theory of Human Rights

It's over

2005-06-09T07:18:00.000-07:00

Congratulations, everyone, on all your hard work this quarter. I know I assign a lot of work and a lot of reading, and I appreciate your efforts, insights, and enthusiasm a great deal. I learned quite a bit myself through teaching this class, and I have many of you to thank for it.

Best of luck to you all, and I hope to see some of you around this summer (I'll be teaching B-term), and maybe beyond.

TAKE HOME FINAL

2005-06-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

Each essay 3-4 pages typed, double spaced. Choose two. Due Wednesday, June 8th, 5:00 PM.

FINAL EXAM—TAKE HOME VERSION.

1. Is the “minimalism” promoted by Ignatieff consistent with Shue’s approach to basic rights? Is there tension between the two positions? In your essay, be sure to explain how these positions might appear to be in tension with each other, and how they might fit together (while making clear which interpretation you find to be correct).

2. What problems does the “cross-cultural” approach to human rights solve? What problems does it create? Which are more significant? What alternatives are there to the cross-cultural approach?

3. What is the biggest problem in constructing a theoretical justification for the idea of human rights? Be as precise as possible, and try to show how this problem plagues at least two theories from this course.

Final paper topic

2005-05-28T04:45:00.000-07:00

For many of our major authors, nationalism and national self-determination have been portrayed as at odds with human rights. Do Ishay and Goldfischer successfully shed doubt on this presumption? Analyze their contribution and compare their arguments to a nationalism-skeptic from earlier in the term.

Due Monday, J. 6.

Papers

2005-05-27T21:28:00.000-07:00

I'll post a final paper topic, for the readings for next Wednesday, shortly. That paper, should you choose/need to do it, will be due Monday June 6. You can email it or bring it to the inclass exam.

As for the paper due on Monday, as I said in class this week, it'll be due Tuesday at noon. If you'd rather enjoy your three day weekend rather than working on a paper, you now have official license to procrastinate until Monday night/Tuesday morning if you wish.

(Yes, the time stamp for this post is correct. I'm still working at 9:30 on Friday. My weekend won't start for another several hours. Remember this when you contemplate graduate school)

Final, papers

2005-05-27T20:01:00.000-07:00

I now have responded to (according to my records) every electronically submitted paper. I've got about 12 dead-tree papers that need to be returned. If you submitted a paper via email and you haven't heard back, send me a quick note with a) the date you originally sent it, and b) another copy of the paper as attachment.

With all that aside, here are some sample questions for the final exam. Remember--the inclass final will have 3 questions very similar to some of these. You will choose two to write about.

1) Does the distinction between "negative" and "positive" rights have any signifigance for human rights? Consider carefully the arguments of one theorist who thinks it does and one theorist who thinks it doesn't while constructing your answer.

2) What is the "cross-cultural" approach to human rights? Does it constitute an effective "middle path" between universalism and cultural relativism? Consider at least one argument that it does succeed on those terms, and one argument that it doesn't.

3) Now that we've had a whole quarter to look at the ideas and theories surrounding human rights, let's return to our three critical perspectives on rights--Burke/Bentham/Marx. Which of these three offers the most compelling critique of the idea of human rights? Give the strongest version of the critique you can. Does it succeed?

4) Why, according to Shue, must duties be part of any theory of rights? Would Ignatieff agree with Shue? Why or why not? Which one has the more compelling approach to this issue?

(note--if this question comes up, I'll expect a fairly precise answer to the first part of the question)

5) What is the biggest problem in constructing a theoretical justification for the idea of human rights? Be as precise as possible, and try to show how this problem plagues at least two theories from this course.

6) What is the most compelling justification for at theory of human rights you've seen? Again, be as precise as possible, giving concrete reasons why this is stronger than other approaches.

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There you go. Remember, the take-home version of the midterm will be distributed, via blog and paper, on the evening of June 1st. I hope you can all make it to the last class. I've really enjoyed our time together this quarter, and I appreciate all your feedback, effort, ideas, and hard work.

Paper topic, week nine

2005-05-23T18:06:00.000-07:00

Hmmm. I don't have any particular topic I feel compelled to ask you to write about.

How about this:

Identify and describe one specific criticism of the version of human rights articulated by Michael Ignatieff. Assess this criticism, and offer a response from Ignatieff's perspective.

Does the criticism succeed? Why (not)?

Final: Plan (Moved to the front)

2005-05-20T18:02:00.000-07:00

Update: Due to popular demand, I will create a take-home option. This option will be given on the last day of class (and posted that day as well). The suggested study questions may be used, although there may be parts to the exam that don't use them at all. There will be 2-3 questions and you should expect to write about seven pages (double-spaced, normal fonts and margins) for the take-home. For reasons that should be obvious, the take-home exams will be held to a higher standard, especially with regard to organization, quality of writing, spelling, grammar, etc. Than the inclass exam. If the past is any guide to the future, the take-home and inclass grades will be similar. Of course, the past isn't always a guide to the future....

Here is my plan for the final.

About 10 days before the final is to take place, I'll distribute a list of 5-6 essay questions on the blog. On the final, you'll be asked to write responses to 2/3 essays. THese essays will be similar to the ones on the list (and it's possible one or more might be identical). In all likelihood, there will be some small difference between these questions and the one you'll prepare for.

Any comments? Suggestions? Let me know soon. This plan will be finalized by the end of the week.

Shake Hands with the Devil

2005-05-18T21:12:00.000-07:00

The documentary based on Romeo Dallaire's memoir on his experience as an often helpless UN Peacekeeping General during the Rwandan genocide is playing at SIFF (Seattle International Film Festival) this year, on May 23rd at 7:00 PM (they shouldn't schedule important human rights films at the same time as important human rights classes!) and Wednesday, May 25th at 2:00 PM. I doubt many of you can make these times, but I do expect a theatrical release at some point this summer.

Links of interest:

SIFF Link.

More on the film.

A recent speech by Dallaire.

Ignatieff

2005-05-17T18:54:00.000-07:00

Here's a simple question, that you can use as an essay question for this week if you like, in addition to the question posted Monday. Or, alternatively, we can discuss this topic tomorrow.

Does Ignatieff's analysis of the politics surrounding human rights shed any new light on the relativism/universalism question? Why or why not?

Paper topic; week of 5/16

2005-05-16T17:57:00.000-07:00

I'll post another paper topic on Wednesday's readings, as well as some questions, later tonight.

Paper topic option #1:

Take up one of the three versions of nationalism Pogge argues against in chapter 5. Present a nationalist counterargument to Pogge, and give (what you think) Pogge's response might be. Does any argument for nationalism offer a meaningful challenge to Pogge's argument?

Paper topic for this week

2005-05-09T16:38:00.000-07:00

Here is a paper topic for this week. Due next Monday:

1) Steven Lukes admits that his treatment of the five types of societies isn't exactly fair. Is this a problem? Can any of these types of societies do a better job of incorporating human rights than Lukes suggests? Explain.

2) How does the problem identified by Pogge in "Loopholes in Moralities" relate to the issue of Human Rights? Does this essay help clarify or advance our understanding of human rights? How so?

Update on Missing women

2005-05-05T15:21:00.000-07:00

Here's a recent editorial by Armatya Sen on the missing women issue. He's updating for changes between 1990-2003. It's a short little essay, but the basic jist of it is this: progress has been made--considerable progress--on differential mortality rates. However, that progress has been almost entirely offset by an increase in gender-selective abortion. So, there are still about 100 Million women missing, but the reasons why have shifted.

Culture, relativism, women's rights

2005-05-05T09:10:00.000-07:00

An aspiring philosopher/blogger who goes by the name of Majikthise discusses a cultural practice called 'ala kachoo' which is apparently widespread in Kyrgyzstan. This practice is essentially, marriage by forcible kidnapping of the bride.

Links:

New York Times article on ala kachoo (this link will probably die in a few days, as NYT stories over a week old are put behind a pay-per-view wall)

Majikthise on ala kachoo and relativism.

I like philosophers because they're so careful and precise with their terms. Majikthise makes a very important distinction here between relativism and moral skepticism. Moral skeptics are, well, skeptical that we can know or say anything about morality. So a moral skeptic might say something like "Who's to say whether this practice is right or wrong? How can anyone know?" Whereas a cultural relativist must say something along the lines of "This practice is morally acceptable if it is approved of by the culture in which it takes place."

If you don't want to bother to read the whole thing, I'll just excerpt one point Majikthise makes on the problems of cultural relativism, which sums up a point I tried to make in class, but never made as clearly as she does here:

One of the fundamental problems with cultural relativism is that it's not clear what it means for a culture to approve of something. If we take cultural approval to mean universal and unqualified assent, then cultural relativism never settles anything. If it means something less than that, then the relativist has to give us a non-arbitrary definition of approval that we can actually use for real cultures. Without that such a standard, cultural relativism collapses into moral skepticism.

She goes on to show that the ala kuchoo is widespread, but also not all that popular. What does a cultural relativist say about a practice that is both widely practiced and widely distained? Cultures are full of such practices.

Feel free to use this thread to further discuss the issues of relativism, group rights, women's rights, etc. in addition to the content of this post.

Paper topic for this week

2005-05-02T16:16:00.000-07:00

This is due next Monday.

As you may have noticed, today's readings have to do with the rights of groups, and how much sense that can make. It's a tricky question, as you can see.

Wednesday's readings have to do with the rights of women. They approach the issue from several different angles and it's hard to categorize the general approaches of those essays. One way to think about the issue of the rights women, from a theoretical perspective, is to pose the question--when we talk about women's rights, rather than human rights, are we then talking about the rights of a group? If so, what are the implications of that fact?

I don't really know how to answer that or even how to pose the question. But I'll pose another question on a related topic. Here is your paper topic for the week:

If Sen is correct that "100 million women are missing" due to gender-selective abortion and/or infanticide (and various other causes), is that a human rights issue? Consider arguments on both sides in your paper.

UPDATE: late edition--paper option #2.

Given our discussion of the challenges of women's rights and human rights in class today (Wednesday), how well does CEDAW address these challenges? Use a theoretical insight from class reading or discussion to analyze (critically or supportively) one or more articles of CEDAW.

Link!

2005-04-29T09:45:00.000-07:00

Next Wednesday, I've asked you to read a number of short-ish essays on women's rights and human rights. One of those essays in only available on the internets. It is reprinted hither and thither, but you can save yourself the trouble of googling and find Armatya Sen's wonderful and important essay "100 Million Women Are Missing" (originally published in The New York Review of Books in 1990) right here.

Velleman on relativism.

2005-04-28T09:37:00.000-07:00

A link of possible interest to some of you, given the topics we've been discussing.

David Velleman, a prominent moral and political philosophy professor, shares his thoughts on relativism. He's a universalist, and he's happy to reject relativism on the grounds that it "denies the universality of morality." Well, yeah. But that's not what makes this an interesting read. He agrees with me about the paucity of actual extreme relativists, and concludes that anti-relativists generally have some other agenda.

Note: I don't recommend reading the comments and discussion, unless you've got about four hours to kill. If you do, I'll give you better reading recommendations.

Update: Another blogger/philosopher chimes in to clarify debates about relativism, and particularly to speculate on why some want to connect liberals (in the contemporary political sense) with relativism. One particularly important point she makes is:

I have met people who think that if you are not a moral relativist, then you must believe not just that there are right answers to moral questions, but that you know what they are. If you think about it, there's no obvious reason why this should be true: in almost every other area, it's clear that we can believe both that there are right answers to questions and that we don't know what they are. (I mean: I don't know how tall Moe and von are, but that doesn't mean I don't believe that they have a determinate height.)

This is important. Universalists needn't be entirely sure of themselves on the content or morality, just that specific content exists. Universalists can admit to all kinds of uncertainty on just what exactly the moral rules that apply to all of us are. This can lead to making some concessions to relativists on practical grounds ("Well, we're not sure if this is wrong or not, so we'll tolerate different ways of doing it") while conceding nothing on philosophical grounds.

Questions

2005-04-25T21:22:00.000-07:00

Think about these discussion questions for next time:

An-na’im proposes to examine the HR based prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment” as an exploration of the cross-cultural approach. What conclusions does he reach? Does this make the CC approach to HR seem more or less appealing?

How do we determine what “cultural values” are if they are not universal within the culture in question? (In other words, does relativism mean, in practice, that the powerful speak for all of the culture?)

3) Falk says that “without cultural practices and traditions being tested against the norms of IHRs, there will be a regressive disposition toward the retention of cruel, brutal, and exploitative aspects of religious and cultural tradition.” (45-46) Why do you think Falk reaches this conclusion? Do you agree?

I'll begin class with a brief overview of the cross-cultural compromise, but I won't dwell on the details as they are in the reading.

Paper policy

2005-04-22T15:53:00.000-07:00

I'm flexible about papers, so I'll adjust the schedule. Papers will now be due Monday rather than Friday. I'll post a couple questions to choose from shortly. I won't necessarily post them on Friday from here on out; but I will post them before Monday.

Note: THIS WEEKS PAPERS ARE STILL DUE TODAY. Thank you.

Paper topics for this week (choose one).

1)An-Na'im wants to pursue a cross-cultural approach to human rights. Do you think this approach is capable of ~~pursuing~~ avoiding the twin dangers of universalism and relativism? Why or why not?

2)What lessons does Alford think we should draw from a better understanding of the Chinese protest movement? Do you agree that these are the correct lessons to draw from these facts? Why or why not?

Two general reminders on paper-writing.

1) Make sure your own voice shows up loud and clear. Be clear about what the author is arguing, but also be clear about what your assessment (positive or negative) is.

2) Always, always, always include page numbers for any direct quotations you use. This is important. I haven't been deducting points for failing to do this but I'll start soon.

Have a great weekend. See you Monday.

Update (Monday night): I fixed the first question.

From Class Wednesday

2005-04-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, I mentioned an essay that makes the argument that makes the case that everyday forms of "moral favoritism"--duties to families, communities, and even nations aren't opposed to the idea of international duty, but are rather complementary with it, and can be understood as the source of any sense of cosmopolitan obligation. Per one student's request, here is the citation.

Richard W. Miller, "Moral Closeness and World Community," in The Ethics of Assistance: Morality and the Distant Needy (edited by Deen Chatterjee), Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp.101-122.

From the intro:

...in ordinary moral thinking, I have as an American citizen, a much more demanding duty to support tax-financed aid to the poor in the U.S. than to support such aid to the foreign poor. I have a duty t osave a drowning toddler I encounter at the cost of ruining my 400 dollar suit, but not a duty to donate 400 dollars to save children in a distant village....One of my goals is to defend these biases, showing that they express a deep commitment to moral equality. The other is to show that proper understanding of their justification establishes substantial, if less demanding duties to help the foreign poor. In this way, a vindication of ordinary moral favoritism toward closeness grounds a case for extensive foreign aid that could be believable to the vast majority of non-philosophers, who find it unbelievable that a strong duty of impartial concern for neediness, whether near or far, determines what should be done to help needy strangers.

Here's a link to the book (amazon). It's got a number of excellent essays on the topic we're discussing, including essays by Peter Singer (see post below on his view) and Thomas Pogge, following up on the argument he makes in the book we're reading soon. I seriously considered assigning this book.

More Shue

2005-04-22T08:22:00.000-07:00

A couple of links of potential interest found on the internets regarding Henry Shue...

Here's an interview with Henry Shue from 2001, on the subject of World Hunger and Moral Obligation. He reiterates many ideas we've already discussed. One interesting issue that comes up is the difference between his position on our obligations to help compared to those of Peter Singer. Peter Singer is the most famous utilitarian philosopher (perhaps the most famous living philosopher, period) who is well known for vigorously defending moral positions that most people find insane, and doing it disturbingly well. The article Shue refers to in the interview is one in which Singer argued that our obligation to help, assist, and give to needy, distant others should have virtually no bearing on our relationship to them, and our moral obligation to give and assist shouldn't end until we've given away so much as to be just about as impovershed as they are. Shue disagrees with this strong utilitarian position, but he doesn't (to my mind) make clear exactly how much, and why.

There was some conversational drift toward the question of how Shue would address a "post 9/11 world." I myself am rather convinced the radical shift in the world before and after 9/11 is asserted more often than it is successfully argued or defended, but that's just me. Here is a link to a statement made by Shue only a few days after the fact. Personally, I don't actually find this all that insightful--mostly, he's issuing a warning that military solutions to what happened a) may not work, and b) may cause the rights of more innocents to be violated. I agree, in general, on both counts (as does almost everyone, I suspect--all proponents of military solution understand that it might fail, and it'll probably kill a fair number of innocent people--it's a question of tradeoffs). But nevertheless, here is Shue's raw (9/17/2001) take on the world after the terrorist attacks.

Speaking of terrorist attacks--did anyone realize that Tuesday was the 10th anniversary of the attack on the Murrah building in Oklahoma City? I'm somewhat amazed at how little press coverage that got. I think people forget a bit too easily that a sizeable portion of the terrorist threat we live under is from domestic terrorism, and the media doesn't help that perception when they let the 10th anniversary of the second worst terrorist attack of our lifetimes go unmentioned! Here's a link to one of the only stories on the 10th anniversary I've found on a major national news outlet.

Paper timetable

2005-04-20T22:05:00.000-07:00

As it stands, through week four, the paper topics are distributed and due on Fridays. A proposal has been made (and seconded and thirded) to shift that the schedule shift to place the weekend at the end of the paper cycle, in other words, the topics and due date would be shifted to Mondays. As I see it,

Pros: Students would apparently like it. It would give students more time after the Wednesday class to work on your paper.

Cons: Students might (might!) be tempted to postpone work on their papers until Monday afternoon, and then be unprepared for class on Monday. I have visions of students stumbling in 20 minutes late, a freshly printed paper in hand (not you, of course, some other student).

So convince this won't happen, or tell me why I shouldn't care, or tell me why I should switch to this policy anyway, or why I shouldn't.

Shue--general discussion

2005-04-20T21:58:00.000-07:00

Use the comments here to discuss any aspect you like of Shue's book. Some suggestions:

Are you convinced about the primacy and content of basic rights?

What are the greatest strengths of this book? Weaknesses?

Are there important or interesting sections and arguments from the book we didn't discuss?

If we buy the argument--what next? What sort of institutional reforms should be enacted?

Paper rewrite policy

2005-04-18T09:12:00.000-07:00

Policy: If you wish to write a 5th paper this quarter, I'll drop your lowest paper score from consideration in your final grade.

paper topic

2005-04-15T18:23:00.000-07:00

Reflect on Shue's arguments in chapter 6. Shue focuses on the argument that we owe more aid to compatriots (fellow citizens of our country) than those without. Do Shue's criticisms of this view transfer to other groups? Obviously, most people accept that we owe more aid to our own children than children 1000 miles away.

Do Shue's arguments help us understand the difference? Do they give us a good way to understand our differential obligations? How would you address this issue?

Update (3/19) OK, here's what I was trying to get at. Shue argues in ch. 6 that we should doubt that any of the standard reasons offered for a greater duty to compatriots (that is, fellow national citizens) are suspicious. He's not convinced they hold up to scrutiny, in other words. I'd like you to use this paper to take up the issue of how Shue's arguments regarding national identity might apply to other forms of group identity. In other words, if Shue shows us we shouldn't prioritize national identity for aid provision as much as many people think, what about other forms of group identity? Community identity? Etc.

I wanted to get you thinking about the issue this way: it's clear that we owe more aid and protection (of basic rights) to our own children than to anyone elses. Shue gives us reasons to believe identity based on nation citizenship is a dubious means to prioritize aid and protection of basic rights. I want you to consider Shue's arguments with respect to other forms of identity, between the family and the nation-state (for example, fellow members of your community. Members of your neighborhood, social club, religion, etc.) What standard or reasons could we use to justify prioritizing basic rights associated duties to these people, if any?

I know this is kind of open-ended, so if you write this week, be sure to address this issue in some way, and have a clear point/argument to your paper. Sorry about the confusion.

week 4

2005-04-15T18:05:00.000-07:00

Great discussion going on below. I'll comment on some of the issues raised on Monday. We'll tackle the important issue that Chris raises more directly next week, with a couple readings that relate directly to his position (for it and against it).

This week, we're finishing up with Shue. We'll work through the final three chapters, all of which are meant to respond to an expected criticism of the inclusion of subsistence as a basic right.

For Monday, we'll read chapters 4 and 5. Try to follow all the major arguments here against the so called "realist" objection and the more "selfish" objection discussed in chapter 5. Take a particular look at an issue raised on page 94. "I have already conceded elsewhere that no right, not even the right not to be tortured, is absolute...." What is his argument here? If rights aren't absolute, what's the point? Are we simply back to utilitarianism?

I raise this issue in particular because it's a minor discussion in the chapter, but I want to spend a fair bit of time thinking about it.

Chapter 5: I'm interested in putting together the best possible version of the selfish argument we can put together? Can we respond to Shue's objections?

For Wednesday...I'm particularly interested in the argument of chapter six. A number of issues are raised in this chapter regarding what we owe to those in our immediate communities and nations as compared to those who are "distant." This question deserves its own course, but we'll consider it here.

Why do we regularly presume to have greater duties to those "closer" to us in some way?

Are these feelings ever justified? Why, and to what extent?

How does Shue address this controversy? Is his solution satisfying?

Also, be sure to read the afterward carefully. What does Shue mean by the "institutional turn"?

Pay attention to how he revises and extends his discussion of duties in chapter II. We'll look at these reconsiderations in some detail.

Book

2005-04-11T13:05:00.000-07:00

Here's a link to the book by Jeffrey Sachs I will have talked about in class today.

Discuss: Does anyone in the world today have a duty to end extreme poverty? If so, who/what has the duty, and why do they have it?

(Update: Um, never mind. I meant to talk about this book in class yesterday but I forgot. I *will* talk about it tomorrow. Consider this another book recommendation!)

paper topic--week three

2005-04-08T11:36:00.000-07:00

Here's a paper topic:

What is Shue's view on the relationship between rights, on the one hand, and duties, on the other? (be as precise and clear as possible, vagueness is a danger here). Do you agree or disagree? Why/why not?

Next Monday

2005-04-08T11:22:00.000-07:00

Not much time to post (Chicago is waaaay behind Seattle in providing free wifi access....)

Reading Shue: I don't know if this will prove more or less difficult than Marx et al. Shue is careful, and you can't really skim. He's building an argument meticulously, carefully, and if you don't pay attention to one step, you might not see where he's going after that. But his preciseness can also lead to clarity if you read carefully.

First off, Shue defines what rights are, in more precise language than we're used to.

What are rights? What are the three necessary components to rights? Do you agree with this characterization?

How does Shue build his argument for the necessity of the inclusion of subsistence rights?

We need to evaluate that argument both internally (does it follow from his premises?) and externally (does it cause problems he doesn't account for?).

How does Shue understand the relationship between rights and duties?

One criticism of Shue is that rights and duties, while related in a very practical way, needn't be thought of as conceptually linked as strongly as Shue does. We might agree, for example, that rights should include subsistence rights, but disagree on how the duty to provide for that subsistence should be distributed. Is that a plausible position?

What is the difference between negative and positive rights?

Shue identifies a couple of positions on the difference between negative and positive rights that he then proceeds to disagree with. What are the main positions he disagrees with, and why?

What is Shue's position? Is Shue persuasive on the (lack) of difference between negative and positive rights?

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w/r/t Wednesday's class, more coming. I assigned three authors: Cranston/Shue/Pogge. Forget Cranston. He's not online, I'll lecture all the important points in the argument.

I'm told Pogge's book is in. Go get it! In addition to chapter 2 (52-72) I encourage you all to read his introduction as well.

Book recommendations, Rwanda, intervention

2005-04-05T12:06:00.000-07:00

A periodic feature of this blog will be to recommend books as they relate to some aspect of the course. These recommendations are simply FYI, for those of you with a broader interest in the subject of human rights.

Yesterday we discussed three 19th century critics of HR (well, two, we'll get to Marx soon enough). These essays, along with very insightful introductions and a 60 page response defending the idea of human rights against these criticisms are collected in Nonsense Upon Stilts: Bentham, Burke and Marx on the Rights of Man, edited by Jeremy Waldron. (who is one of human rights more eloquent defenders). Sadly, this book is out of print; otherwise I would have assigned it. Waldron's essays are enormously helpful, and generally fair, to these critical perspectives. (I have UW library's copy, so please don't recall it!)

Books you can actually get: I mentioned, in the course of discussion yesterday, some of my own views on the Rwanda genocide of 1994. This is probably the worst thing that happened in the world in most of your lifetimes. I think that as horrible as it is to face, there is a great deal to be gained from trying to understand how things this terrible can happen. To that end, I recommend learning as much about it as possible. Here are a few recommendations:

We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda, by Phillip Goutrevich.

This is a largely journalistic account, very well written, about what happened, from a number of different perspectives.

When Victims Become Killers, Mahmood Mamdani

This is a much more academic account by a political anthropologist who studies Africa. It is more ambitious than Goutrevich's book, and more difficult, but accessible for an academic study. He seeks to explain how something like this could happen. Of course, he acknowledges that an adequate explanation is simply impossible, but it's worth trying anyway. He does a wonderful job of showing how the history of the ethnic categories "Hutu" and "Tutsi" came into being, how immigration and regional politics helped make this possible, etc. It's hard to overstate how impressed I am with the quality of this book.

Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity In Rwanda, Romeo Dallaire

I haven't read this yet (it just came out), but I'm eager to. It's a first hand account from the Canadian UN General who was in charge of a small peacekeeping force in Rwanda in 1993. He saw evidence that a genocide was on the horizon, and he requested 5,000 troops to stop it. When his request was denied, and he was forced to do what he could with a few hundred troops, almost a million people were killed. Dallaire went on to retire from the military while struggling with Post-tramautic Stress Disorder and immense guilt over not being able to do more to prevent this. This will be very difficult to read, but I hope to give it a shot soon.

There are lots of books about this, but this is a good start. If you prefer movies to books (and in many ways, I do), I can't recommend enough Terry George's Hotel Rwanda. It tells the story of Paul Rusesabagina, a luxury hotel manager who managed to successfully give refuge to over 1000 Tutsi's who otherwise would almost certainly have perished. Not only is the film accurate on the details of the story (Rusesabagina was a consultant on the film, which involved his first trip to Rwanda since 1994--I very much hope the DVD will include a mini-documentary about that), it's very well made. And Jamie Foxx is a fine actor, but he's got an Oscar that rightfully belongs to Don Cheadle.

That should keep you busy. To tie this into the theory of human rights, I encourage you to think about how to address the issue at the heart of the controversy here. Every country in the world has some human rights violations going on in it's borders. How should the interational community determine when to intervene to prevent these abuses. It was suggested in class, and I'm sympathetic to the argument, that utilitarianism must play a role in making this difficult decision. Do you agree? Any other ideas about how this difficult issue is best approached. (discuss!)

Things get more complicated when we consider the possibility of a right of national self-determination. More tomorrow.

rewrites

2005-04-05T12:03:00.000-07:00

As it stands, I have no policy to allow a rewrite of any of the essays for this course.

Should I initiate a policy?

What should it look like?

Convince me.

Essay question for week two

2005-04-01T11:47:00.000-08:00

Want to get an early start?

1) Which of the three critical perspectives on rights studied this week do you find most compelling, and why? Apply this critical perspective to some or all of the UDHR, and explain where this document goes wrong from a (conservative, utilitarian, or Marxist) perspective.

3-4 pages, typed, double spaced, standard font and margins. Submit it to me electronically by Friday, end of the day.

Plan

2005-04-01T11:19:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday, we talked about where "human rights (the idea) come from." A topic indirectly related to that is "Why we believe in human rights (if, in fact, we do)." Most people, I find, do, in fact believe in them, althougth they're often not sure why.

On Monday, we'll examine three critical perspectives on the idea of human rights. These three perspectives share little in common except their suspicion of the idea of HR.

Read the short readings from Burke, Marx, and Bentham for Monday. As you read them, try to figure out what their objection to human rights is, boiled down to one or two sentences. Second, try to figure out what to make of these objections. If you find merit to the objections levied here, do you think the idea of (or content of) human rights could be altered to take account of this criticism?

(This will be difficult to glean from these short readings, but do try. I'll fill in the gaps Monday)

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For Wednesday, we'll examine in close detail the content of human rights, as determined by the authors of the UDHR. You'll read a bit about the story of how this document came into being in the Lauren text.

I don't plan on lecturing much on Wednesday; I want us to examine this text in considerable detail. I want you to think about what you think the content of universal HR should be, and why, and how the UDHR does (or doesn't) measure up. What potential problems do you see for this document? Do some rights potentially contradict others? Are important rights missing? Are inappropriate rights added? etc.

Reading for Monday (Burke)

2005-04-01T11:10:00.000-08:00

Here.

(update: I have no idea why everyone is being denied permission to view this document. I hope to have this fixed shortly)

(update the second: fixed it. Link now works for IE and Mozilla, and hopefully other browsers as well)

Reading for Monday

2005-03-30T09:46:00.000-08:00

The reading assignments for Monday are short excerpts from the writing of three critics of the idea of rights. Marx's "On the Jewish Question" is in Ishay's collection. The other two, Burke and Bentham, are not. I'm going to select a few pages worth of Burke and give you a link to the document tomorrow. Bentham's essay, "Anarchical Fallacies," his commentary on the rhetoric of rights coming from French revolutionaries, can be found here. This is a 19 page document. For class, I'd like to you read the first 13 pages, Bentham's opening comments and his commentary on the first first, second, and fourth articles of the declaration of rights. This takes you up to line 485.

Link to syllabus

2005-03-28T18:20:00.000-08:00

here.

Welcome!

2005-03-27T22:55:00.000-08:00

This blog will serve as the official homepage for TCSIG 452, The Political Theory of Human Rights, University of Washington, Tacoma. This will be my primary way of communicating with the class outside of class meetings, so you're encouraged to check this website on a regular basis. I'll post reading guides, study questions, announcements, links of interest, and discussion threads. You are encouraged to respond to my posts, to discuss various matters related to this course and the themes and issues it addresses. You can register with blogger, or you can "sign" anonymous posts, or you can post anonymously if you like.

The first order of business will be posting a link to the syllabus. That'll be along shortly. Please feel free to email me if you have any questions or concerns.