HUMAN RIGHTS: Economic and Social Rights Must Take Centre-Stage

By Humberto Márquez Reprint | | Print |

Humberto Marquez

CARACAS, Jun 21 1995 (IPS) - Today’s challenge in Latin America is a new focus on economic, social and cultural rights, which up to now have taken backstage because of the urgency of defending civil and political rights, a meeting of legal experts from the region emphasised.

If a regional map of human rights were drawn up, “we could see progress in civil and political rights, but a disturbing deterioration of economic, social and cultural rights,” Antonio Cancado, a judge who sits on the Inter-American Human Rights Court, told IPS on Tuesday.

But “the advances gained with the predominance of democratically elected governments are frail if we fail to make progress in economic and social rights,” said Diego Garcia, director of the Andean Commission of Jurists.

Pointing out that Latin America “talks more about economics than about politics” today, Juan Mendez, with Human Rights Watch, proposed working for the “indivisibility” of human rights and their promotion and defence.

Toward that end, the experts, called together by the Andean Commission of Jurists, began to study a protocol to be added to the International Pact on Economic and Social Rights, which will provide for a system by which abuses can be denounced, and violations of such fundamental rights can be overseen.

The document would provide for a double follow-up mechanism, Cancado explained, “with a system of reports that would be sent to entities of international supervision,” and also with “on- site verification visits.”

A third mechanism “would be the creation of an international system for making accusations and denunciations in terms of economic, social and cultural rights.”

Speaking with IPS, Cancado, Garcia and Mendez agreed that non- governmental organisations dedicated to the defence of human rights must shift towards a focus on economic and social rights.

“Amnesty International is giving increasing priority to considering economic and social rights,” said Cancado, and in Latin America “the NGOs grew up confronting authoritarian regimes, and now face the challenge of improving their functioning.”

“At times it is easier to work with clear duties that come from the state, of not-doing, such as torture or forced disappearances, than with commitments to action, such as providing adequate housing,” Mendez said.

But at the same time, the legal experts warned that the fight for civil and political rights is far from finished, “because the advances are feeble, and at least in the Andean area, democratic institutionality is very weak,” said Garcia.

“Far from being resolved,” problems of civil and political rights are still quite prevalent, “such as armed conflicts in four countries (Colombia, Guatemala, Mexico and Peru) and problems of electoral legitimacy in Mexico, as well as what we could call endemic violent violations of rights,” Mendez added.

Mendez specifically pointed to “police violence against poor urban youth and street children, and rural violence arising from conflict over land.”

And Garcia cited “the prison situation, which is dramatic in countries such as Peru and Venezuela, due to overcrowding, low funds,” a lack of timely justice and realistic judicial practices.

In spite of all these things, “the transition to democracy gives us access to a more independent press,” said Mendez, “and an opportunity to focus the debate on the issue of human rights.

“But we must not fall into the hypocrisy of the ‘Reagan era’, when it was enough for a government to be elected in order for its good behaviour to be accredited, nor accept (U.S. President Bill) Clinton’s thesis that free trade (automatically) brings with it the promotion of human rights.”

An additional difficulty highlighted by Mendez is the boom in the region of “neoliberal religion” that mistrusts old statist formulas, and rejects anything that hints of expensive and difficult government, “as they perceive those who promote social and economic rights.”

Cancado said the magnitude of the region’s economic, social and cultural problems “can be illustrated by the case of Brazil, where 62 percent of the population lives in extreme poverty and wealth is highly concentrated, and which has one of the largest social gaps in the world.”

Thus, a new focus on economic and social rights is today’s challenge, Garcia stressed, because “if the people continue to suffer from so many economic and social shortcomings, they will stop opposing authoritarian movements, and a regression in the region’s feeble democratic advances could be seen.”