SUBCOMMISSION CONTINUES DEBATE ON REALIZATION OF ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS

MORNING

HR/SC/99/11
12 August 1999


Hears of Vital Importance of Rights to Education and Development


The Subcommission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights continued discussion this morning of the realization of economic, social and cultural rights. Speakers stressed the indivisibility of all human rights and pointed to the increasing recognition given to economic, social and cultural rights over the last decade.

Many of those addressing the meeting said the right to education was vital, since it led to the ability to achieve all other rights. Yet the distribution of knowledge around the world was even less equal than the distribution of income, Subcommission Expert Jose Bengoa pointed out. He said this inequality was having grave consequences on development.

Successful development needed to be carried out in an honest and forthright manner, yet that was not usually how it occurred, Subcommission Expert Ahmad Khalifa told the meeting -- the right to development presupposed that all people in a society were provided equal opportunity to participate in political, social, economic and cultural fields, a condition that often was lacking.

Expert Asbjorn Eide introduced his annual updated study on the right to food, saying the widespread failure of States and the international community to ensure freedom from hunger and the enjoyment by all of the right to food constituted one of the most serious shortcomings of the human-rights agenda. The scope of hunger was appalling in its magnitude, he said, and an outrage to the conscience of mankind.


Also speaking this morning were Subcommission Experts El-Hadji Guisse, Sang Yong Park, Francoise Jane Hampson, Yeung Kam Yeung Sik Yuen, and David Weissbrodt.

Representatives of the following non-governmental organizations also addressed the meeting: Minority Rights Group International; International Federation of Human Rights; Centro de Estudios Economicos y Sociales del Tercer Mundo; Interfaith International; International Association of Democratic Lawyers; International Institute for Non-Aligned Studies; Indian Council of Education; Afro-Asian People's Soldiarity Organization; Himalayan Research and Cultural Foundation; and World Federation of Trade Unions.

Statements

ANNA-MARIA BIRO, of Minority Rights Group International, said the main challenge facing minorities was the subordination of human rights to the imperatives of economic development. In 1995, the MRG had hosted an international seminar on minorities and development, bringing together delegates from 22 countries and from a range of Governmental, intergovernmental and non-governmental backgrounds, including Experts from the Subcommission.

This meeting concluded that minorities were often marginalized or excluded from the development process and, in some instances, programmes implemented in the name of development were at the expense of minorities. Following the seminar, the MRG reviewed the subject and consulted with partner organizations working with and on behalf of minority communities. A significant number expressed their concern about the impact on minority communities of development interventions as conventionally practiced.

ELENI PETROULA, of International Federation of Human Rights, said that economic, cultural and social rights, despite the indivisibility of human rights, had long been ignored, or at least treated as second-level rights, as less important than civil or political rights. The development of the liberal model where the State and the market were opposites, had largely contributed to delegitimizing these rights. States had hidden behind various arguments to justify their lack of action in the field of these rights for too long.

The protection, promotion and implementation of international laws concerning human rights were the responsibility of the State. The Commission on Human Rights had named, during its 54th session, a Special Rapporteur on the right to education. By doing that it had taken an important step towards reinforcing the protection of economic, social and cultural rights. The Subcommission should reinforce this step and create mechanisms for the supervision of these rights, notably in the case of the rights to food and to acceptable housing.

SONIA CUEVAS KANTUN, of Central de Estudios Economicos y Sociales del Tercer Mundo, said there had been changes in Mexico. There were complex social and economic problems. It was sad to hear what was said about Mexico, and it was sadder that there were no other representatives here from indigenous groups in Mexico.

The Government should enhance its role in basic education. The indigenous peoples of Mexico wanted to be involved with development. The right to education must be a fully exercised human right.

GUL NAWAZ KHAN, of Interfaith International, said fifty-one years of development in the field of human rights showed that the deliberations of the UN Commission on Human Rights had made a difference in advancing the cause of human rights to the benefit of each and every individual and to all peoples of the world. However, the right to development could not be realized in Kashmir, since Pakistani rulers, through an organized move, had been keeping the people illiterate. The cultural invasion of the area by Pakistan had destroyed the entity and identity of the Kashmiri nation.

The Subcommission and other effective world fora should help the Kashmiri people to secure their national freedom from both Pakistan and India so that they could enjoy the right to development along with everyone else.

ASBJORN EIDE, Subcommission Expert, said, in describing his working paper on the right to food, that the widespread failure by States and the international community to ensure freedom from hunger and enjoyment by all of the right to food constituted one of the most serious shortcomings of the human-rights agenda. Urgent measures were required at the national, regional and international levels for the elimination of hunger and the creation of conditions whereby everyone could enjoy the right to food and nutrition. Unless this was done, the credibility of the human-rights edifice was in serious doubt. It was to be hoped that the study on the right to food and the present update could be a contribution to remedying that situation.

Everyone agreed that freedom from hunger was a fundamental human right. United States President Bill Clinton recently had described the right to food as the most basic human right. And yet the scope of malnutrition and hunger was even today appalling in its magnitude and an outrage to the conscience of humankind. Statistics could be boring, but those present should be shocked into action when told that anaemia and iron deficiency affected more than 2 billion people the world over, and that more than 900 million people suffered from goiter, 16 million were severely retarded, and another 50 million suffered from other forms of brain damage due to a deficiency of iodine. These and the other figures in the report were scary, but the good news was that something could be done if the leaders and politicians chose to take this area of human rights seriously.

AHMAD KHALIFA, Subcommission Expert, said the Subcommission was not supposed to deal in detail with all these issues in 15 minutes. Mr. loka-Onyango's study appeared to be a somewhat forced exercise, racism being alive and well before, after and during globalization. Globalization, while being a multi-faceted phenomena, still had its roots in the world of economics, and should be studied as an economic endeavour.

The paper on the rights of non-citizens should not have been included under item 3, since these did not necessarily have anything to do with racism. The issue of non-citizenship was a legal issue. The paper on the right to education was masterful, but maybe in the future all emphasis could be placed on education in human rights, and the raising of awareness, particularly among young people, of human rights. The right to food was the most basic human right.

The pivotal issue, however, was the right to development. In the aftermath of the Cold War, the American people felt proud that their way of life had prevailed. But it was too much to think that this way of life had gained universality, and that it should be adopted by the whole world. Indeed, the model should not be shipped out to all four corners of the world. No one should push for forced conformity among all nations. The Third World was reduced to providing open markets for unhealthy consumerism. There was an increasing gap between the world's rich and poor. Successful development needed to be achieved in an honest and forthright manner. This however, was not usually the case, and democracy was not present to defend it. A free economy was closely linked to political freedom. Democracy was not a wonder-drug for providing a free economy and for guaranteeing development.

EL-HADJI GUISSE, Subcommission Expert, said each individual had a right to live in conditions of peace and national security, and had a right to fully enjoy economic, social and cultural rights. The Commission on Human Rights looked at economic, social and cultural rights in a particular framework. It was agreed that the real effective enjoyment of these rights required an effective economic atmosphere at the regional and international levels.

The richest one-fifth was becoming richer and the poorest one-fifth was becoming poorer. What did that mean? What would happen to extremely poor people? The conflicts over the last decade had highlighted the inequality of treatment of people in need, whether or not they were from developing countries. The embargo against Iraq had cost thousands of lives, including those of many children. These international measures should be stopped, as should the bombing of the Iraqi people.

JOSE BENGOA, Subcommission Expert, said a dialogue was necessary between NGOs, Governments, and Experts. The documents under this agenda item showed there was common ground. There were two main topics: the unification of human rights, and the need to take specific measures to protect economic, cultural and social rights. There had been an appeal to set up machinery to evaluate the impact of organizations that could harm human rights, and to devise indicators showing the impact of decisions made in the economic sphere on human rights. The issue was how to combine the market and fundamental human rights, such as the freedom of education. The distribution of knowledge around the world was even less equal than the distribution of income. This was an important subject.

The right to food was a very complex topic, and a fundamental one considering the extent to which it was violated.

Six points needed to be discussed regarding the idea of a Social Forum, and importance should be given within that body to economic, social and cultural rights. The suggested agenda of the Commission on Human Rights was excellent, and specific participants should be invited. A discussion on the issue needed to be held.

PAK KUM SUK, of International Association of Democratic Lawyers, said there were human-rights violations by the Japanese Government against Korean students studying at Korean schools in Japan, and their parents. In the past, as a result of Japan's invasion and its colonial policy over Korea, many Korean people had come over and had resided in Japan against their will. Since the end of World War II, they had founded more than 100 Korean schools throughout Japan, hoping that their children would keep their cultural and ethnic identity. The Japanese Government, however, had maintained its discriminatory policy against these Korean schools instead of protecting them.

There were 123 foreign schools in Japan and about 27,000 students studying at these schools. Most foreign schools were actually Korean schools. In fact, the issues of Japan's discriminative treatment towards foreign schools mainly related to these Korean schools. The Japanese Government insisted that Korean students, to be qualified to take university entrance examinations and get educational support from the Government, must be educated to be Japanese at Japanese schools. In other words, its education policy discouraged Korean students from learning their own language and culture by putting Korean schools in a disadvantageous position. This policy clearly threatened the right to maintain the culture of ethnic minorities, which violated an article of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and an article of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

PRAMILA SRIVASTAVA, of International Institute for Non-Aligned Studies, said the right to development presupposed that all people in a society were provided equal opportunity to participate in the political, social, economic and cultural fields. Discrimination of any kind negated the concept of human rights, including the right to development. Therefore, particularly in heterogenous societies with a multi-religious, multi-ethnic character, necessary institutional safeguards needed to be provided to prevent such discrimination. The process of development had to be tailored the peculiar characteristics of each society. Any unthinking replication of models that had been successful elsewhere could create societal tensions that hampered the entire development process.

Progress was meaningless if the sensibilities of the human beings involved were ignored. Development with a human face required concentration on endeavouring to create human wealth through a process of education which preserved social and cultural traditions. Debates on the right to development should be preceded by debates to ensure that peoples were free to exercise the choices that made development possible.

A. S. KOHLI, of Indian Council of Education, said the destructive experience of armed conflicts and wars was leading to a growing threat to human survival because of nuclear proliferation. Increasing international competition in weaponry had created an urgent need for positive measures for promoting international understanding and cooperation among diverse groups and nations. Likewise, the denial of fundamental freedoms to large populations and frequent violations of human rights in different parts of the world warranted the creation of awareness among people of different nations about human rights and fundamental freedoms.

Since wars, apartheid, the desire to exploit and dominate others and greed and selfishness lay in the minds of men, defenses for peace, social harmony and cooperation could only be built in the human mind through education. The record of the 20th century in expanding educational opportunities was a source both of pride and shame. Since 1960, enrollment in the world's primary and secondary schools had risen from an estimated 250 million children to more than 1 billion today. The number of literate adults had nearly tripled in that period. Even so, there were still 885 million adult illiterates in the world. Access to basic education, let alone the expectation of completing primary education, was far from universal -- 130 million children had no access to primary education and another 100 million enrolled in school but did not complete even four years. The gender gap, although it was narrowing, was still shockingly high.

S. J. R. BILGRAMI, of Afro-Asian People's Solidarity Organization, said that civil and political rights apparently were more measurable than social and cultural rights, which seemed more relative and more complicated. However, in fact this was not the case. There had been a blurring of the nature of the sources of equality and inequality. Realization of the right to development had emerged out of this crisis, and there appeared to be mismanagement with regard to the importance given to the market.

The process of economic and social development was at the service of civil and political rights, and any attempt to implement social and cultural rights without civil and political rights was ridiculous, as was the converse. Human-rights issues needed to be viewed in a wider social context. Human rights were only possible in the context of sustainable development.

SANG YONG PARK, Subcommission Expert, said this was the third year that the realization of the right to development had been on the agenda of the annual session of the Subcommission as a separate sub-item. The right to development had also been a major agenda item at recent sessions of the General Assembly and the Commission on Human Rights. This signified an increased recognition of the importance of this issue, and this development was welcomed not only because momentum was building and efforts were being concentrated, but because genuine work was being done and attention was being paid to one of the most profound problems the community of nations faced. In a resolution last December, the General Assembly, while reaffirming the right to development as a universal and inalienable right and an integral part of fundamental human rights, expressed its concern that unacceptable situations of absolute poverty, hunger, disease, lack of adequate shelter, illiteracy and hopelessness continued to affect over 1 bi
llion people.

On the subject of debt, it should be recalled that last April the Commission on Human Rights adopted a resolution about the effects on the full enjoyment of human rights of the economic adjustment policies arising from foreign debt, and, in particular, effects of such debt on implementation of the Declaration on the Right to Development. In the resolution, the Commission, recognizing that foreign debt constituted one of the main obstacles preventing developing countries from fully enjoying their right to development, requested the Special Rapporteur on the subject to present an analytical report to the Commission.

FRANCOISE JANE HAMPSON, Subcommission Expert, said three issues emerged from the documents under this agenda item. First there was the contention that there was something untameable about the economic development sweeping the world. This was absurd, since this economic development only existed as allowed by States, as it was their duty to control the activities of companies and individuals in their own jurisdictions. States should be encouraged to feel responsible for protecting human rights.

The second issue was that while the protectionist nature of the State had been curtailed, only the State could strike a balance between protection of the country and economic development. Structural-adjustment policies often had negative results, such as an increase in the poverty rate and a rise in unemployment. The human rights treaty bodies should play their part, and where a State was not providing the rights to which it had committed itself, the bodies should examine the reasons for this failure. The perpetrators should be identified.

The third issue was a particular type of international corporation, that providing so-called security services. The actions of these entities needed to be made imputable to their home States and their host States.

In all the arguments, what was at stake was being lost from view. Poverty led to a disappearance of human rights, making economic progress disappear. To fail to take into account the effects of economic developments was yet another denial of "cause and effect", which had been discussed so many times. To understand economic development was to understand cause and effect.

YEUNG KAM YEUNG SIK YUEN, Subcommission Expert, said Experts were usually submerged with many documents, often at the last minute, and these documents had to be digested. This, of course, could not happen. If these papers were submitted with adequate time, a more fruitful discussion could be held.

There had been many provoking thoughts discussed here. One was the amazing discrepancy of wealth between nations. This was an age of globalization, but to live, one must let other people live as well. The report on the right to food was excellent, and the report that showed a link between globalization and racism was groundbreaking. The other reports also were lauded.


DAVID WEISSBRODT, Subcommission Expert, said the paper on the right to education had provided some very interesting insights and research. The paper on human rights as the primary objective of international trade, investment and finance policy and practice had taken a very important step in the field, and was very valuable work. The subject of transnational corporations and the impact of their activities on human rights was very important. Mr. Eide's updated study on the right to food had been extremely useful over the years, and a major contribution to the field.

The Subcommission continued to do very important work under this agenda item, and the authors of all papers and studies were congratulated, and the Subcommission was encouraged to continue to support this type of research in the future.

RIYAZ PUNJABI, of Himalayan Research and Cultural Foundation, said there was a United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) report that made a significant contribution by focusing on the links between disarmament and development. The UNIDIR report had formulated the doctrine of "security and development" as an important element for realizing the right to development. This doctrine had raised the basic issue of creating an environment for development. The doctrine, although developed on the basis of a specific case study of West African States, had nonetheless relevance and application to other conflict zones in different parts of the world.

A peaceful environment was a prerequisite for realization of the right to development. How could any kind of development -- educational, economic or social -- take place in the face of pervading violence and turmoil? It was ironic that many developing countries were faced with the problem of violence in their societies. On the one hand they were faced with situations of hunger, poverty and illiteracy, and on the other hand, their societies were embroiled in perpetual conflicts.

SUZANNE KHOURY, of World Federation of Trade Unions, said the process of sustained social, political and economic development required the existence of an environment of peace and freedom. Unfortunately, those freedoms that the developed world had begun to take for granted were denied to countries most in need of maintaining the pace of development. Nations with tremendous promise and dedication were thwarted in their quest for a better life by factors outside their control. In many cases, such as in India and Pakistan, it was violence born of obscurantism and the ambitions of others that imposed the obstacles.

When there was talk about the right to development, the focus should be on the developing countries. If the international community desired to preserve the right to development of democratic nations, then the first prerequisite was to neutralize the threat posed by unbridled terrorism, which caused a diversion of scarce resources from the development process to the realm of security, which entailed a considerable delay in implementing essential projects.