PART TWO
By Anthony George Ravlich
The Optional Protocol (OP) for the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights which will be open for ratification by States on September 24, 2009, excludes such core minimum obligations as the right to food and also the right to development so the world’s hungry will be reliant on the insecurity of charity and the vagaries of the market.
World hunger is projected to reach an historic high in 2009 with 1.02 billion people going hungry every day, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (June 22, 2009). The inclusion of core minimum obligations in the above OP would have ensured that the hungry could have their rights to food and development as the State is ultimately responsible for human rights. Without the right to development there is no assurance the poor will be permitted to help themselves. Kanayo Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development states: "For most developing countries there is little doubt that investing in smallholder agriculture is the most sustainable safety net, particularly during a time of global economic crisis”.
The excluded rights are included in the ‘bottom-up’ approach to human rights which can be struggled for by NGOs to have included in domestic and international law. Part Three argues that the ‘bottom-up’ approach is ethically far superior to neo liberalism. The ‘bottom-up’ approach is discussed in my book, Freedom from Our Social Prisons: The Rise of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Lexington Books).
The recent ideological shift at the UN was from right wing (Bush administration) to left wing neo liberalism (adopted by Obama). What both approaches have in common is the exclusion of the above rights. However, while the right wing curbed civil liberties as a means of social control the left wing is ensuring social control (e.g. silence in return for ‘safety’) by adopting a ‘we are all in this together’ approach with a consensus between the liberal and trade union elites.
The establishment will oversee the growing unemployed who may get health insurance and infrastructure jobs but without the right to development they will have little chance of making use of their talents and gifts. For instance, the American Small Business League state: “This year small businesses have lost about $48 billion dollars in federal small business contracts to large corporations. To date, President Obama has not honored his campaign promise to stop the diversion of small business contracts to corporate giants”. In addition, without core minimum obligations in place, for small entrepreneurs failure can not be an option.
However, I consider the main purpose of the ‘we are all in this together’ approach is internationally where the elite consensus further supports the West’s promotion of democracy to empower liberal forces within autocratic regimes. In addition, the West’s social model which involves the subjugation of the independent peoples and the most disadvantaged may also meet foreign elite approval.
Anthony George Ravlich is founder and chairperson of the Human Rights Council Inc. in New Zealand and the author of Freedom from Our Social Prisons: The Rise of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights.
Comments