Human rights and regional order - Amitav Acharya

Résumé du document

After the end of the Cold-War and the tolerance of human rights denial, these have become an issue in ASEAN agenda and the core of the new geopolitical framework between the West and Southeast Asia.

This conflict reflects the lively debate between absolute and relative rights. If absolute and natural rights could be assimilated in being universal and inalienable, relative rights are contingent upon the laws, customs, or beliefs of a particular culture or government. They shall be distinguished from legal or social rights, evolving and given to citizens in a legal system that is actually the very application of absolute or relative rights in a Nation-State.

Thus, this article written by Amitav Acharya highlights the post-Cold-War conflict between the western vision of absolute rights promoted in the "New World Order" particularly by the US, and the legal system of ASEAN reflecting its relative and not only regional but national view of human rights.

Extraits

[...] Applied to human rights, each nations, rather than universal criteria, should determine its own legal rights under certain conditions. In ASEAN declarations, these preconditions are said to be socio-economic, cultural and political but also national and regional, which are the variable of the evolving process of human rights. Indeed, human rights are not a set concept and progress according to the above factors. In that way, Western countries 200 years of process before claiming having democracy and the absolute human rights, because of their economic, social, educational prosperity which ensure political rights. [...]

[...] Thailand is one of the best illustration of the limited freedom of speech and media pluralism because of interests as the society as a whole. The true reasons of these strict lèse-majesté laws and the call for respect and love for the King in the mass media are more communitarian than concerning the personality of Rama IX. In fact, the King is the sacrilized symbol of stability and unity of the community and the monarchy in social and political terms. [...]

[...] International and proselytic tool of the West to maintain and strengthen their place on the world diplomatic stage Since the Cold-War, the West and particularly the US have amplified their ideological mission to promote and establish liberal ideas around the world. It is a manner of recruiting countries to their cause and strengthening partnership with a leading position on the international scene. This attitude is also a sign of the willingness of domination and interference through the role of the world policemen. [...]

[...] However, the attempt to coordinate a common approach on human rights illustrates that ASEAN is capable of providing an alternative vision, more sensitive to regional circumstances and more effective in the management of the regional order. II. Absolute human rights: developed by the west and disseminated in the world Definition of human rights in term of Western values vs ASEAN In 1753, the English William Blackstone, as well as Locke or Rousseau, emphasized “absolute rights” of individuals natural rights existing prior to the state that the government has to protect. [...]

[...] The acceptance of relative perception of human rights could lead to a minimum interference, increase development opportunities and may result in a better respect of rights around the world in the future. However, this is desirable only within the framework of the respect of the integrity of all people, in the West or in ASEAN countries. [...]