WHY DO I HAVE PROBLEMS WITH DICHOTOMY OF RIGHTS
(Read: Serious Observation)

“So you can’t give me a hand in this?”
‘Sorry, I have to conduct visits to rural schools, wrap up my report on indigenous children’s education, state of health and etc, quite busy, M, you know I would help you if I have the time”,
“But this has a lot to do with our civil and political rights, you know. I mean it is very typical of your organization to work on “safe” welfare issues and neglect these big issues? I mean who I am kidding?”.

My brain cells did a bit of gymnastic and mentally spelled these words- dichotomy, Cold War, liberal dweeb…I said my final sorry and hang off. Let `s do a mental check on why this short conversation irritated me- The reason is definitely because she i.e. M, an advocate for freedom of assembly entraps herself in the whole dichotomization of human rights. That is so Cold War. Yeah, I know the plain fact is that, Universal Declaration of Human Rights was a creature of political diplomacy and PR practice among the superpowers during that time. However, I am NOT a generation of the Cold War nor I see any point of being sentimental about it.

I especially get annoyed when people fancy civil and political rights as actual rights whereas economic, social and cultural rights are ideals. Tell that to the poor hungry malnourished citizens in Africa and see if they care about your freedom of shredding your cloths in the middle of the park as a form of expression. Brag about how we open our arms widely to MNCs and liberal market as opposed to social market and see if those underpaid workers, unemployed citizens or child labors in the third world countries are accorded the same freedom and profit that their employers are getting. Dude, dichotomizing rights confers enough reason on the powers that be which I will gladly call dictators and despotic rulers, to turn their back on us and say “Hey, you guys, rights are not inalienable. That `s an option to gladly fulfill one set of rights before the other. Err…good reason to skip some social obligation, there”

The third generation of rights which appeared much later, deals with right to development, peace and self determination, and to me was notions that involve all categories of rights i.e. collective rights.

Frankly, I have nothing against both set of rights. I used to be an advocate for student` s political and civil rights. I just couldn’t bear to let myself victimized by suppression of opinion and academic freedom during my campus life. But when I am doing my job now, I realized that my past struggle was just as crucial as my present. Fighting for equal access to education for the marginalized sector of the society fertilize deeper understanding of civil and political rights among the people. In the same vein, speaking up on the huge economic disparity in the society pave way for economic policy reform.

Dichotomization of rights was the power struggle that the Soviet Union and United States had to endure in the midst of Cold War. The glaring ideological differences were seen in many ways to dilute the whole process of formulating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. For example, to the U.S, the United Kingdom, France and other cultural descendants of the West European countries, rights were natural and self evident. Soviet Union and other Communist countries believed that rights are conferred by the State. If that’s not a tough quorum to discuss crucial issue like world peace and universal declaration, check this out; Americans Declaration of Independence proclaimed that rights are conferred by their Creator (Re: God). How do you think the Communist or any atheistic governments would take that? Hence, the magic word used was “inherent” which means you got your rights because you are a human being; religious or atheist, hey, make your pick!

To think I always fumble when I need to explain what “inherent” means during human rights workshops. I should just be honest and say “That word is used because the U.S and Communist block cannot agree on whether there is God or not when they were drafting the document!”

That, my dear Watsons, is just one example of how notion of rights were dichotomized when the world attempted to codify it. You get the picture better if you enlist all the Communist and U.S + Allies `s differences and imagine how they tried to work things out at the negotiation table without getting at each other `s throat.

If we forever set our mind that both civil+political rights and economic+social+cultural rights are always competing for the frontline in our struggle for democracy and, than we will fall victim to the whole idea that in order to make one set of rights seemed important, we must have another. Just like America, after the absence of the Communist Block, they seek new enemies to make themselves relevant globally. Why indeed can’t we gladly accept all the rights as equally important, crucial and in dire need for advocacy and protection?