By Noemie
Broussoux-Coutard*, Guest Blogger
Activists
assert the universality of human rights to demand that governments respect
everyone’s rights and duties universally. Embodied by treaties, covenants and
declarations, human rights enforcement appears to provide an antidote to ongoing
violence and inequality in the world. Has the demand for respect of universal
human rights principles led to greater respect of our rights?
In
her book, Human Rights and Gender Violence: Translating International Law
Into Local Justice, Sally Engle Merry, Professor of Anthropology, Law and
Society, analyzes the current flaws in international human rights law creation
and dissemination, and attempts to respond to these flaws by proposing that
international law and human rights development should return to local community
engagement. Education and promotion of
human rights standards, she maintains, should be in accordance with the culture
of the local area.
Merry
highlights the knowledge gap between the drafters of international law and the
communities who are directly impacted by these laws. Localities are often
excluded from crucial conversations and preparatory work during the drafting of
human rights laws, as well as from what those laws will do and how they will be
implemented. Merry posits that the lack of awareness of the law-making process creates
an unwillingness to abide by the laws, as well as a perpetuation of human
rights violations all over the globe.
Because
law drafting tends to be an elitist process, lawmakers sometimes fail to
acknowledge the concepts of culture and local identity, and how those concepts
relate to human rights. Local culture,
to a significant amount of communities, represents the essence of their existence.
Merry states that cultural considerations in human rights often are either
overlooked by international standards, or used as a shield against laws, but instead
should serve as a peaceful tool to benefit all parties. She writes, “Even as
anthropologists and others have repudiated the idea of culture as a consensual,
interconnected system of beliefs and values, the idea has taken on a new life
on the public sphere.” Merry proceeds by explaining that culture can be used as
a method of educating all parties: the international actors, by teaching them
the intricate diversity of each community and how it ultimately relates to
human rights, and the localities, by teaching them the essentiality of having
human rights laws by giving local examples of human rights violations, stemming
injustice in their communities.
Merry
argues that the solution lies in the “vernacularization” of human rights, by
bridging the gap between participants at the international and the local levels,
utilizing resources such as NGOs and other activist groups who can translate
and understand both parties in this dilemma. This solution is particularly
useful in implementing crucial laws that are generally misunderstood by
populations with little to no access to the human rights education. This
misunderstanding is due in large part to the law-makers of the privileged world
who take part in what Merry calls the “transnational culture of modernity.”
This
term describes the general grouping of people who, by the simple fact that they
all live in modern, organized states with high regards towards individual
rights and protection from the state, fail to consider the differences between
their world, and communities whose cultures largely differ from these standards.
The people in this transnational culture of modernity are often the very people
who compose human rights codes and promote human rights on a global scale. Through
the assistance of NGOs and activists to bridge the gap of understanding between
global standards and local cultures, various disadvantaged communities have come
to understand how their governments are mistreating and oppressing them. They
have begun to claim their rights utilizing the resources that international human
rights treaties provide.
To
achieve greater awareness and respect for human rights everywhere, we need to
deal with how globalization of human rights has excluded many underprivileged
communities from participating in the development of legal standards and legal
processes. We need to provide human rights education to local communities,
explaining how human rights law and human rights violations directly impact
those communities. We also need to educate everyone involved in drafting and
implementing international human rights laws that those laws will achieve
greater recognition and support when local communities have a voice in the
process.
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*Noemie Broussoux-Coutard participated in the Summer 2017 Session of the World Law Internship Program in World Service Authority's Legal Department.
