Arquivo de etiquetas: Direitos Humanos

Lectures / Readings

Cultura e Dignidade Humana IV

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Características dos direitos Humanos I

Universais e Inalienáveis

Os direitos Humanos são universais e inalienáveis. A sua universalidade decorre da Convenção Universal dos Direitos Humanos, proclamada pelas Nações Unidas em 1948, na Carta de São Francisco, sufragada por todos os seus membros, que se comprometeram a verter para o seu direito interno. Como princípio, a afirmação da sua universalidade, no plano do direito internacional, foi sendo consecutivamente reafirmada ao longo dos diversos tratados, convenções e resoluções. Em 1993 na Conferência Mundial de Viena sobre Direitos Humanos, por exemplo, declarou-se que é dever dos Estados promover e proteger todos os direitos humanos e liberdades fundamentais, independentemente de seus sistemas políticos, econômicos e culturais.

No mundo, todos os Estados subscreveram e ratificaram pelo menos um dos Tratados sobre Direitos Humanos e pelo menos 80% dos Estados-Membros ratificaram quatro ou mais dos principais tratados de direitos humanos. Todos os estados do mundo, de um modo ou outro, criaram obrigações legais para dar uma expressão concreta aos direitos humanos, em formas e extensções diferenciadas, mas a partir duma raíz comum.

As normas fundamentais de direitos humanos asseguram uma proteção aos indivíduos e grupos no âmbito do pelo direito consuetudinário internacional em todas as fronteiras e civilizações. Ainda que nem sempre esse direito seja respeitado, ele existe, e quem o não pratica é, ou pode vir a ser censurado pela comunidade internacional.

Para além da sua universalidade eles são inalienáveis. Não devem ser retirados, exceto em situações específicas e de acordo com o devido processo validado pelo direito. Por exemplo, o direito à liberdade pode ser restringida se uma pessoa for considerada culpado de um crime por um tribunal de direito.

Lectures / Readings

Cultura e Dignidade Humana II

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Heranças Globais e Memórias Locais

A partir destas problematizações fomos reconstruindo e alargando a nossa reflexão no campo da teoria crítica. O projeto de Pós-doutoramento na Universidade de Coimbra[1] expressa essa vontade de alargamento do campo teórico, abrindo a reflexão em diferentes direções, testando metodologia, disseminando resultados.

No ano de 2015, e a propósito dum conjunto de questões globais, as discussões sobre os Objetivos de Desenvolvimento Sustentável, propostos pelas Nações Unidas, e de um conjunto de questões locais, entre as quais se salientava o “lugar da cultura”, levamos a cabo um conjunto de seminários sobre a relação “cultura e desenvolvimento”.[2] Uma reflexão que parte do propósito de discutir esta relação, dez anos depois da Convenção sobre a Promoção e Proteção da Diversidade Cultural, num contexto do contributo da cultura opara os tais ODS das Nações Unidas.

O ponto de partida dessa discussão centrava-se na aparente contradição entre o contributo da cultura como 4º pilar do desenvolvimento sustentável, a par com a economia, sociedade e ambiente, e a sua ausência como objetivo ou medidas concretas no campo da cultura, ainda que muitos defendam a presença de conteúdos culturais de forma transversal em vários dos ODS. Defendemos então, em diferentes fóruns, a necessidade dos profissionais da cultura se afirmarem de forma ativa na discussão dos ODS em cada território. A inclusão duma agenda de aculturar nas diferentes agendas nacionais. Deste proposta teórica global, atuamos, localmente em diferentes lugares, como seja a plataforma da sociedade civil para os ODS, promovemos diversos debates, em Coimbra, no Porto, na Universidade Lusófona e em algumas associações de intervenção local.

Ao longo de todo este caminho, de intervenção e reflexão problematizamos a necessidade de partir da discussão dos direitos culturais como direitos humanos. O por aqui regressamos a esta discussão.

Partimos então de relação intersubjetiva entre os seres humanos com os objetos socialmente relevantes, num determinado contexto. Duma proposta de encontro e duma metodologia de investigação-ação de partilha de espaços e inclusão de saberes. Um quadro de trabalho sobre a diversidade cultural, no qual o museólogo atua como mediar. Um mediador que dinamiza processos participativos, com base em objetos socialmente relevantes. Objetos patrimoniais, que se projetem dum tempo passado como memória coletiva, como narrativa ou simplesmente como vontade de futuro. E foi nesse contexto de propusemos “Um projeto que se pode construir com base na herança dos Direitos Humanos e que se pode constituir como uma plataforma de diálogo entre cidadãos em função do desenvolvimento da comunidade”.(Leite, 2012b).

Basicamente a questão poderá ser colocada da seguinte forma. Conhecer melhor, fazer melhor. A ideia na altura era partir da problemática dos Direitos Humanos para criar processo patrimonial crítico com base na criação de redes transcalares criadoras de solidariedades e potenciadoras de uma cultura de paz. Partimos das problemáticas da Escravatura, criamos o museu afro-digital, e podemos afirmar que avançamos em diferentes domínios. Importa agora refletir sobre os termos de partida: os Direitos humanos e a Cultura, com o objetivo de ultrapassar as limitações do saber e do conhecer e alargar o campo de conhecimento e de ações sobre os objetos patrimoniais e museológicos em processos transitivos: Uma museologia nómada.

Procuramos na altura integrar o conceito dos Direitos Humanos nos processos museológico no estudo do património a partir da criação de praticas solidariedades para emancipação do ser humano, onde o passado e as suas heranças serve de pretexto para a construção do futuro. Um futuro que todos queremos. Essa reflexão continua vális mas necessitamos de a melhorar. Nos próximos postais vamos alargar essa reflexão, sobre o que são os direitos humanos e a sua relação com a cultura

[1] http://www.ces.uc.pt/investigadores/index.php?action=bio&id_investigador=677

[2] Leite, Pedro Pereira (2015), “Cultura e Desenvolvimento?”, Informal Museolgy Studies, 11, 11, 66.

Lectures / Readings

Universal Health Coverage I

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The Human Right to Health

Good health stands at the very center of sustainable development. It is one of the most important goals of humankind, in and of itself. And good health is also vital for everything else we hold dear. It’s vital for economic development through a productive workforce through the ability of children to not only survive disease, but also to flourish, to learn to make their way through school.

911For the ability of a community to be able to undertake economic activities or to attract investment. So health has always been  regarded as central to basic human rights, basic human needs, and to the aspirations of ending extreme poverty. It’s notable that in the millennium development goals, for example, of the eight goals about ending extreme poverty in all its forms, three of the goals, absolutely centrally, are about health. MDG-4 is about reducing child mortality. MDG-5 is about reducing maternal mortality. And MDG6 is about controlling the mass, killer epidemic diseases like AIDS and malaria. And one can absolutely say that, all of the other goals as well, ending poverty and hunger, having children in school, gender equality, a safe natural environment. Are also goals in which health plays an important role.

Both as a determinant of outcomes and also, as one of the main objectives. It’s also an area where there’s progress. And the science of public health breakthroughs in modern medicine and breakthroughs in other areas, such as in food production or in clean water from safe infrastructure in urban areas, have contributed to important gains. But we know that the challenges of achieving health for all as it’s often called, or universal health coverage, when we see a picture of this young child, sick with malaria and remember that hundreds of thousands of children like this one, will die, of malaria unless the control measures that are effective and accessible are actually implemented. We’re reminded of the kind of challenge that we still face. Millions and millions of children, especially in the very poor countries, die each year of utterly preventable, or treatable causes that could be ended.

912These lives could be saved. Children who are dying today, or are left with lifetime disabilities could, with proper organization of our response, have happy lives and safe lives, that would give them the opportunities that of course, they want and we yearn for on their behalf. Since the beginning of the United Nations itself, the priority of health has been clear. And in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights back in 1948 it was already made clear that health is a human right, a part of our basic needs. As we know about the basic declaration, those were rights, are not the kind of rights that can be achieved all at once. They are to be progressively realized. But time is going, and we could move faster. When the World Health Organization was created as well, right in its central constitution, in 1948, it was declared that health the highest attainable standard of health, is a fundamental human right. Quote without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition. Health for all, universal health coverage. One of the really notable global efforts to achieve health for all started in 1978 in Alma Ata now called Almaty Kazakhstan. When world health officials, the health ministers from around the world gathered and made a very important Alma Ata declaration. That called for health for all by the year 2000, a notable specific objective dated for 22 years after that event. Unfortunately, when the year 2000 came, it wasn’t health for all. Unfortunately, it was pandemics for many, many parts of the world almost contrary to the aspirations two decades earlier. The AIDS pandemic was running rampant millions and millions of people infected with the HIV virus. More then 20 million, millions dying every year. Malaria which is a tropical killer disease had risen tremendously in in number of infections and in number of deaths. Because the first line medicine used in Africa to treat malaria had lost its efficacy the parasite had become drug resistant to chloroquine and so 2000 was very bleak for malaria with a surging death toll.

The year 2000 was also bleak for tuberculosis another horrific scourge of humanity that claims millions of lives each year. With tuberculosis there was a surge partly riding on the HIV/AIDS pandemic, because immuno compromised individuals suffering from AIDS died in very large numbers from tuberculosis infection. There was also as with malaria, the crisis of drug resistance and new lethal very difficult to treat strains were spreading of what we called then, multidrug-resistant TB, tuberculosis bacteria that were resistant to way wide spectrum of traditional medicine. And this also became extreme multi drug resistant TB when even the rescue medicines lost their effectiveness as the bacteria continued to evolve resistance. In other words the year 2000 did not meet the hopes and aspirations of the health ministers who had assembled in 1978, nor did it fulfill the promise of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, nor the Constitution of the World Health Organization. So, it was notable that in the year 2000, the Millennium Development Goals put three of the eight goals so centrally on health and took up the challenge of fighting these scourges that were spreading malaria, TB, AIDS, and other killer diseases. We’ve made a lot of progress since then. The distance from 2000 till now is a period of tremendous progress. It rekindles for us the hopes of 1978. Indeed we see within reach the possibility of truly honoring the commitment to help as a basic human right. Now health like education is a merit good. Remember that a merit good is a good that should be accessible very broadly or universally in the population. Health is considered to be such a good not only because it’s so vital for individuals that we feel from a moral and ethical point of view that everybody as human beings deserves access to health. But very practically, health is a merit good, because untreated disease is a threat for society and a threat that spills over to the rest of a population when an epidemic is left to fester and to spread. Think of the devastation that comes when a highly communicable disease races through a countryside, races through a continent, as AIDS has done. The death tolls that can result in the cost to the whole community are huge. We’ll see other reasons as well why government has a necessary leadership role, not only to ensure widespread coverage, but to ensure the efficiency and, the results orientation of the health care system. Now when we look at the actual experience, in health, this is like economic development itself, one of the real achievements of the modern era. Back in the industrial revolution, worldwide life expectancy was perhaps 35 years.

913Of course, we don;t have the, records to establish with precision, a world wide number. But something around the order of 30 to 35 years of life expectancy is a reasonable estimate. This does not mean that people were dying at the age of 30 or 35. It means that a newborn on average would reach, an age of 30 or 35 taking in to account that a very large number of deaths would occur within the first month after birth or the first year or the first five years. Once individuals reached an age of 20 or 25 or 30 there would be a chance, a good chance that they might reach 55, 60, 65. So life expectancy at birth is a measure that is made at the start date of life, just at the time of birth. And from there, to estimate statistically how long on average an individual can expect to live within the society. Now from 35 years in, 19, 1800 or so. By the time we got to 1950, just after World War II, there had been some gains in the average in the world. But remember, how much of the world was still mired in poverty and also in the aftermath of war. It’s estimated that during the five year period 1950 to 1955, worldwide life expectancy was perhaps around 46 years. That’s the average as estimated by the United Nations, but if you look at this graph that divides the world according to high income developed regions developing regions and the least developed countries. You can see that, for the developed regions of the world, life expectancy, in the period 1950 to 1955, was somewhere around 65 years already. Of course much lower still around 35 years in the least developed countries. Probably quite close to the health conditions that had existed at the start of the Industrial Revolution. We see from this curve though that the world has made progress and every category of country has made significant progress. By today, world life expectancy is perhaps 70 years, twice the life expectancy, roughly, at the start of the Industrial Revolution.

914This is one of the great achievements of modern humanity, one of the great achievements of modern science and of economic development. But one also sees the continuing large discrepancies between the high income and the low income world. In the high income, life expectancy is, almost 80 years. Whereas in the least developed countries, you can see from the graph,that life expectancy is, is still 60 years or even less. In other words roughly a 20 year, two decade gap in in life expectancy between the richest and the poorest countries. This gives us a, a measure of how much we have to do. Most of the causes of death in the poor countries are in some sense caused by poverty itself, suggesting that from a medical and public health point of view, these deaths are preventable. These diseases that are causing these deaths are treatable in many cases. In this interesting graph that you’re looking at we put on the horizontal axis the per capita income of countries. And on the vertical axis, the life expectancy at birth. And you see, in this graph, a rising curve. Richer countries, naturally, have a longer life expectancy. You also see in comparing the fitted curve for 1975 and for the year 2005, the two shown here with the dotted line for the earlier year, that the whole curve linking income and life expectancy has shifted up. This means that during that 30 year interval, at any given level of income, one expects a longer life in the more recent years.

Now why would that be? The answer is technological improvement, better ways to prevent disease. Better ways to treat diseases, that, that, occur, nonetheless. And the result is that even at the same income level year after year there is an improvement of health that comes from a rise of the productivity of our public health and medical systems, as well as of other parts of our economic life. 915For instance, the literacy and awareness of people themselves, so that they can pursue health seeking behaviors more ably, or they can use their mobile phones to call for emergency help, and this is one of the reasons why life expectancy rises. Now, what I find extremely pertinent about this graph is the very steep part of the curve at very low income. This means that when countries are very poor, small increments of income going from $1,000 per year to $2,000 per year leads to very steep gains of life expectancy. Those gains later on level off so that increases of income say from $25,000 per person per year to $26,000, the same absolute increase, would have a quite small effect on the average life expectancy. Whereas that gain at the very low levels of income have a massive increase. This is to be expect. There are, diminishing benefits of added income to many things including to happiness, but also to human health. But what’s important about this curve, in my view, is, it says that even small increases of income, or I would also argue, small increases in the amounts that we are able to invest in health, can have huge benefits for the level of health. One of the themes that I want to emphasize is that very low cost investments in poor settings can have huge effects on saving lives on extending life expectancy on extending the quality of life and the health of, of people during their lifespans.

916Not surprisingly, when you look at a world map such as this one, showing the mortality rates of under 5s. Meaning, for every thousand births the number of those children out of a thousand who will die before their fifth birthday. We see that the under five mortality rate is by far the highest in tropical Africa. And next is in south Asia. Those are our two locations we constantly see as being the epicenters of the challenge of extreme poverty. And much, much lower under five mortality rates in the other parts of the world. So our challenges in health are heavily focused in the poorest countries. And, that means geographically they’re heavily concentrated in two regions of the world, Sub Saharan Africa and South Asia. The next graph shows you another asp, very crucial aspect of health and this is maternal mortality. This is measured as the number of deaths related to pregnancy of, of women for every 100,000 live births. And so the numerator of this fraction, number of deaths in pregnancy, typically at childbirth, but it could also be pregnancy related has a huge variation between rich countries where very, very few women, thank goodness, die of pregnancy related causes. Compared with countries in the poorest regions, and poorest of all in tropical Sub-Saharan Africa, where maybe 1,000 woman die for every 100,000 births, an astounding risk of death due to pregnancy. Those numbers are coming down. We see that, that the maternal mortality rate in the developing regions is falling sharply. It was around 440 deaths per 100,000 live births back in 1990. And now below 250 deaths per 100,000 live births as of 2010. We see that in the high income regions, the developed regions, the numbers are very, very small, a few deaths per 100,000 live births. The reasons for death in rich and poor countries differ. But for one basic reason, the poor die of the same reasons that the rich die. They die of cancer, they die of cardiovascular diseases, they die of metabolic disorders, say, related to diabetes. But they also die of conditions that rich people no longer die of, mainly communicable diseases such as children dying of measles, or children dying of malaria, or children dying of other kinds of infections which would not kill their counterparts in the rich world. But do kill the children in the poor countries because the children are hungry, they’re undernourished. And one basic principle of health, is that under-nutrition leads to immuno-suppression. What does that mean? Under-nutrition leads to a camping down of the immune system, the ability to resist infectious diseases and so poor kids die of diarrhea or respiratory infections that would not kill a child in a rich country better nourished. But do carry away millions of children, into death in the poorest countries. The disparities between rich and poor and across ethnic groups, another kind of inequality that we’ve examined can apply within countries as well. The United States, we know being the most unequal of all the high income countries for reasons that we’ve discussed, also has very high disparities in life expectancy. This is a map showing the measure life expectancy across counties of the United States and we see that the Northeast seaboard of the United States. Say Boston or New York City have quite high life expectancies, but in the deep south of the United States, in Alabama, in, in Mississippi, in Georgia, in Louisiana life expectancy is several years less. And we also know that minority groups in the United States, especially the African American community, has many years less of life expectancy compared to the white, non Hispanic Americans. And so these gaps cross class lines. They cross racial lines and they have geographic counterparts as well related to ethnicity, race, and perhaps at least some direct effects of geography as well. To measure the variation over time and across countries in health we use a number of statistics. The life expectancy at birth is an example. Under five mortality, another example. Maternal mortality rate, a third example. Infant mortality rate, which is out of a thousand newborns the numbers who will die before the first birthday. There’s also a very important concept that I want you to know because it’s widely used and very useful called DALYs. DALYs is the acronym for Disability Adjusted Life Years. The idea is that a normal lifespan is 80 years, according to the calculations of DALYs[1]. If an adult dies at age 60, this is 20 lost life years. If that adult is sick between age 55 and 60 and not enjoying healthy years even in those final five years of life, that’s an added penalty for disability. Paralysis, blindness, the loss of a limb, other kinds of disabilities can be translated into a partial loss of a life year by making an assessment how much healthy life is lost by the particular disability. What DALYs calculate in any population is on average the number of lost life years plus the number of lost years to disability add up those two components from death and disability and you get dis you get disability adjusted life years. The DALYs. And these DALYs are used to understand the varying disease burdens across the world. An example of this is this rather complicated chart, but a very, very important one. Every bar on this chart is for a distinct region of the world. At the top is the high income countries. Next Europe and Central Asia. At the very bottom bar, of the chart, is Sub-Saharan Africa. What is being shown here, are the disability adjusted life years lost to disease per population. So a large bar means that there’s a lot of lost life years, either to death or to disability. And we see that Africa has, by far, the highest disease burden, and the high income world, not surprisingly, the lowest disease burden. But this bar in each grouping is divided by colors in a quite interesting way. Those colors refer to different disease categories. So take the dark blue, which is most to the left of each of the bars. That is the amount of loss of life years due to HIV/AIDS. We can classify all of the diseases into a few categories and then measure the disability adjusted life years lost to that particular set of conditions, and group that in a category. What do you see when you do this? Very, very important to note this, Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, has by far The highest disease burden of AIDS. This is not surprising. The very epicenter of the AIDS pandemic is in Sub-Saharan Africa. Now compare the bar for Sub-Saharan Africa with the bar at the very top for the high-income countries You can’t even see that the sliver for HIV/AIDS. That doesn’t mean,uh, of course that there are, is no, death and disease from HIV/AIDS in the high income world, of course there is. But it means that the burden of the disease per person in the population is very, very low compared to the massive burden in Sub-Saharan Africa. And look at the part of that bar for  Communicable disease. You have to scrunch your eyes and see a tiny little sliver. Well why is that? It’s because in the high-income world the communicable and parasitic diseases like malaria, like measles, like diphtheria or typhoid are virtually gone, almost not heard of. Many of these diseases are completely and successfully prevented by immunizations. Others are treated by antibiotics. People, and mainly young children in the case of sub-Saharan Africa, suffer these diseases in the poorest countries, but not in the richest countries. And that’s good news in the sense that it means we have tools already to shrink the bar of DALYs, of the disability adjusted life years, in sub-Saharan Africa and in south Asia. So that the disease burden can get under control. So that life expectancy can rise. So that the quality of life lived is higher, and so that a healthy population can also play it’s part in in more dynamic e-, and more inclusive economic development. Let’s see how we can attack the those disease burdens by now going on to look in more detail at the nature of the diseases, and what can be done about them.

[1] http://vizhub.healthdata.org/gbd-cause-patterns/

Lectures / Readings

Human Rights and Gender Equality II

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Major UN Covenants and Declarations

Values underpin sustainable development, and one kind of value approach is the human rights approach. The idea that every human being on the planet within any political system has human rights, and human rights of five sorts as I have mentioned. Civil rights as citizens. Political rights to participate in governance.

721Economic rights that define the right of individuals to meet basic needs. Social rights the right to live in secure families and communities. And cultural rights, the right to participate in one’s culture. And that human rights approach while not universally subscribed to by each person on the planet, has been found compelling across the world by individuals, by activists, by many different kinds of groups, by most governments. And it has become enshrined in a very important way in international law and in the norms of the international political and diplomatic system under the United Nations. When the United Nations was formed at the end of World War Two, one of the first great steps of the United Nations a few years after its founding in 1948 at the urging of Eleanor Roosevelt, the former first lady of the United States and a great champion of human rights, was the adoption by the member states of the United Nations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is a wonderful, remarkable document. A very powerful one that was adopted in the wake of World War Two at a time of hope and also remembrance of the devastation of World War Two and the idea that by meeting the basic rights and needs of all people in the world one would not only ensure their dignity improve their economic well being, but also help to prevent another global war and global disaster. The Universal Declaration is in essence the moral charter of the United Nations. The UN has it’s legal charter which defines it’s institutions, it’s functioning, the selection of the Secretary General, the operations of the security counsel and the General Assembly. It is itself an extremely important document of international law and practice. But the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the moral s, heart and soul of the United Nations. And when the UN takes actions in the area of economic development or protecting the environment, or protecting refugees or addressing natural disasters almost always it’s to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that the eyes are drawn and that the attention is placed. Because that provides an inspiration and a guidance that continues more than half a century later. Well over half a century after the adoption of the Universal Declaration. Coming out of the Universal Declaration were two more detailed international covenants that also helped to implement The Universal Declaration. One is the International Covenant on Political and Civil Rights, the other is the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. So between those two covenants, one covers the five main areas of human rights. Most of the governments subscribed to both of those covenants. Interestingly, the United States did not subscribe to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Political rights and it’s interesting to know why. While many, many Americans including myself certainly agree with the International covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the libertarian streak in the United States which goes back to the founding of the U.S. as it broke away from from Great Britain. The libertarian streak which takes the view that government’s main role is to provide defense, security and and private property, but not to do more than that because of the risks to liberty. That libertarian streak in part of American politics we don’t want to guarantee or to underpin or to encourage the idea of economic rights because economic rights means economic responsibilities to, especially for the rich. And the libertarians say, don’t go there, let markets, let individuals transact. It’s not the role of the state in their view to implement an ethical framework beyond that of the protection of the individual and, and private property. So the US did not sign that, though most of the world’s governments did. Later on, that was in 1966 when those two international covenants were adopted the UN has adopted many more specific ambitious goals around meeting the basic needs. The most important by far we’ve noted have been the Millennium Development Goals adopted in the year 2000. And I’ll note in just a few minutes that those two took their inspiration from the Universal Declaration and from the international covenants, because the Millennium Development Goals were taken from the start as a way to implement, in essence, the human rights to a decent economic life helping the poor to break free at the poverty trap. Let’s go back to the 1948 Universal Declaration that is so important and it is a very moving document which I hope will continue to be honored, respected, read embraced and improved upon in the 21st century. So in 1948 the governments of the world agreed to the following. They said the General Assembly, Proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, the progressive realization of the rights, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction. So that is the preamble more or less to the Universal  Declaration. Saying that all of the Member States should strive to teach, advocate and honour and progressively achieve all of the rights of the Declaration itself. Well there are many rights and it’s a a document that bears study. But I wanted to highlight just a few of them. Article 22 calls for the right to social security. In other words, to a guaranteed base so that human dignity and the most basic needs of water, shelter, clothing and so forth can be met. Article 23 of the Universal Declaration calls for the right to work, to a livelihood, to be able for individuals to support themselves and their families. Article 24 calls for the right to rest and leisure so that one can’t demand work of around the clock and in burdensome and crushing ways. Article 25 says that there is universal right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of the individual himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widow, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control. Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. What a remarkable bold statement. How unmet that remains today we know with more than one billion people still living in extreme poverty. These goals even according to the founders of the Universal Declaration would not be achieved instantly. They would only be realized progressively. But progressive might mean time is time is up. Time to meet these needs and we know as we’ve discussed, that meeting the basic needs of all is within reach. The end of poverty in its extreme form is itself within reach in our generation. Article 26 says that everyone has a right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. A merit good should apply to everyone in the world. And Article 28 I find very, very interesting, it says that everyone is entitled to a social

and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized. In other words, this is not just an empty statement of wishes. This is a call for a political order and a social order in which these rights can be progressively realized. And I think that this is a key point. One could still by cynical and say, doesn’t matter, it’s just words on a page. Governments don’t have to do this. But it really does say more than that, and the effects are more powerful than, just the cynical view that they can easily be discarded. What the document is saying is that only do individuals have rights, but individuals in our collectivity in our nations,and in a grouping of nations at the United Nations, also has the right to a system of government, a system of taxation and spending and delivery of services in which the rights and freedoms set forth in the Declaration can be fully realized. To implement this Universal Declaration, of course, is mainly the responsibilities of each society, but the international covenants which came in 1966 are more detailed documents that describe more specifically the various rights and more specifically how they are to be realized.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights focuses naturally on the rights of citizenship and the protection from abuses of the state. And let me just mention a few of the key points of the civil and political rights that are defined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 6, for example, says that the right to life is protected by law. Government cannot willfully end without a due process, take a life. And of course, in many countries of the world capital punishment has been made illegal and has been eliminated long ago. Yet we do know that governments continue to kill their people that is not realizing the rights of this covenant. Article 7 says that no one can be subjected to torture. Here again we know that governments have violated this willfully. The United States itself engaged in water boarding so called after 9/11 until that was discontinued by the Obama Administration. Or at least we hope and and it was said by the administration that it has been discontinued. But torture, of course, remains a terrible scourge practiced in many parts of the world. Article 8 says that nobody can be held in slavery. And while slavery is illegal throughout the world, we know that there is human trafficking and that people are held in slavery though illegally. Governments have the responsibility to fight to resist that and to free people that are held against their will. Article 9 says that there’s a right to liberty and security of individuals, that government cannot violate the liberty and security of their citizens. Article 16 says there’s a right of citizenship defined as the recognition of all persons before the law. Article 18 declares the freedom of thought. Article 24, the protection of children. And Article 26, the equal protection of the law from discriminatory application. So you can see that these are rights that are not realized to the extent that they need to be. But our rights that are widely accepted, widely regarded, at least on paper, that’s a start and in application, but to be realized and to, to to be struggled for.

Now the companion to the civil and political rights, are the economic, social and cultural rights adopted at the same time in the complimentary international covenant. And let me mention some of those economic and social and cultural rights. And again, as in the Universal Declaration[2], Article 6 calls for the right to work. Article 7 for just and favorable conditions of work decent remuneration and safe working environment. Article 8 declares the right of individuals to form and to join trade unions. Article 9 as in the Universal Declaration, the right to social security. Article 11, the right to an adequate standard of living, to be able to meet basic needs. Article 12, very interesting and very important, very relevant for the Millennium Development Goals and for the sustainable development goals that will follow is the highest attainable, the right to I should say, the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. Very interesting. At first one can’t grant the right to health, per se. People are ill they may suffer from conditions that are not preventable or treatable. So the standard is the highest attainable level of health. Importantly, physical health and mental health, because we know that mental illness is a terrible scourge for individuals and quantitatively a very heavy burden on societies around the world. Article 13, the right to education. And Article 15, the right to take part in cultural lives. And again as in the original Universal Declaration the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights realizes this isn’t all at once. This is a framework, it’s a moral and ethical framework, it is a commitment. And the way that it is defined, is that each state party to this covenant undertakes steps individually, and through international assistance and cooperation, and to the maximum extent of its available resources to, to honor these rights and then quote, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in this covenant. So, this is a call on us. It’s to turn values into practice. And while cynics may say, so what, practice shows differently. These values do reach the heart. They do move governments. They can make a big difference, and I think this has been nowhere more clear than in the Millennium Development Goal effort. Initiated in September 2000, you’ll recall, by the world leaders gathered at the United Nations, and providing a motivation to meet these basic needs in health, in education, in gender equality, in at least a minimum standard of living. And when the MBG’s were launched in September 2000 in the Millennium Declaration which framed them and which looked to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the government said, we will spare no effort to free our fellow men, women, and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty to which more than a billion of them are currently subjected. We are committed to making the right to development a reality for everyone, and to freeing the entire human race from want. Human rights at the core of this development agenda, a motivation, a set of legal agreements and a moral heart of the United Nations, and of the sustainable development efforts in the years ahead.

[1]

Values underpin sustainable development, and one kind of value approach is the human rights approach. The idea that every human being on the planet within any political system has human rights, and human rights of five sorts as I have mentioned. Civil rights as citizens. Political rights to participate in governance. Economic rights that define the right of individuals to meet basic needs. Social rights the right to live in secure families and communities. And cultural rights, the right to participate in one’s culture. And that human rights approach while not universally subscribed to by each person on the planet, has been found compelling across the world by individuals, by activists, by many different kinds of groups, by most governments. And it has become enshrined in a very important way in international law and in the norms of the international political and diplomatic system under the United Nations. When the United Nations was formed at the end of World War Two, one of the first great steps of the United Nations a few years after its founding in 1948 at the urging of Eleanor Roosevelt, the former first lady of the United States and a great champion of human rights, was the adoption by the member states of the United Nations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is a wonderful, remarkable document. A very powerful one that was adopted in the wake of World War Two at a time of hope and also remembrance of the devastation of World War Two and the idea that by meeting the basic rights and needs of all people in the world one would not only ensure their dignity improve their economic well being, but also help to prevent another global war and global disaster. The Universal Declaration is in essence the moral charter of the United Nations. The UN has it’s legal charter which defines it’s institutions, it’s functioning, the selection of the Secretary General, the operations of the security counsel and the General Assembly. It is itself an extremely important document of international law and practice. But the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the moral s, heart and soul of the United Nations. And when the UN takes actions in the area of economic development or protecting the environment, or protecting refugees or addressing natural disasters almost always it’s to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that the eyes are drawn and that the attention is placed. Because that provides an inspiration and a guidance that continues more than half a century later. Well over half a century after the adoption of the Universal Declaration. Coming out of the Universal Declaration were two more detailed international covenants that also helped to implement The Universal Declaration. One is the International Covenant on Political and Civil Rights, the other is the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. So between those two covenants, one covers the five main areas of human rights. Most of the governments subscribed to both of those covenants. Interestingly, the United States did not subscribe to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Political rights and it’s interesting to know why. While many, many Americans including myself certainly agree with the International covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the libertarian streak in the United States which goes back to the founding of the U.S. as it broke away from from Great Britain. The libertarian streak which takes the view that government’s main role is to provide defense, security and and private property, but not to do more than that because of the risks to liberty. That libertarian streak in part of American politics we don’t want to guarantee or to underpin or to encourage the idea of economic rights because economic rights means economic responsibilities to, especially for the rich. And the libertarians say, don’t go there, let markets, let individuals transact. It’s not the role of the state in their view to implement an ethical framework beyond that of the protection of the individual and, and private property. So the US did not sign that, though most of the world’s governments did. Later on, that was in 1966 when those two international covenants were adopted the UN has adopted many more specific ambitious goals around meeting the basic needs. The most important by far we’ve noted have been the Millennium Development Goals adopted in the year 2000. And I’ll note in just a few minutes that those two took their inspiration from the Universal Declaration and from the international covenants, because the Millennium Development Goals were taken from the start as a way to implement, in essence, the human rights to a decent economic life helping the poor to break free at the poverty trap. Let’s go back to the 1948 Universal Declaration that is so important and it is a very moving document which I hope will continue to be honored, respected, read embraced and improved upon in the 21st century. So in 1948 the governments of the world agreed to the following. They said the General Assembly, Proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, the progressive realization of the rights, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction. So that is the preamble more or less to the Universal  Declaration. Saying that all of the Member States should strive to teach, advocate and honour and progressively achieve all of the rights of the Declaration itself. Well there are many rights and it’s a a document that bears study. But I wanted to highlight just a few of them. Article 22 calls for the right to social security. In other words, to a guaranteed base so that human dignity and the most basic needs of water, shelter, clothing and so forth can be met. Article 23 of the Universal Declaration calls for the right to work, to a livelihood, to be able for individuals to support themselves and their families. Article 24 calls for the right to rest and leisure so that one can’t demand work of around the clock and in burdensome and crushing ways. Article 25 says that there is universal right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of the individual himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widow, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control. Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. What a remarkable bold statement. How unmet that remains today we know with more than one billion people still living in extreme poverty. These goals even according to the founders of the Universal Declaration would not be achieved instantly. They would only be realized progressively. But progressive might mean time is time is up. Time to meet these needs and we know as we’ve discussed, that meeting the basic needs of all is within reach. The end of poverty in its extreme form is itself within reach in our generation. Article 26 says that everyone has a right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. A merit good should apply to everyone in the world. And Article 28 I find very, very interesting, it says that everyone is entitled to a social

and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized. In other words, this is not just an empty statement of wishes. This is a call for a political order and a social order in which these rights can be progressively realized. And I think that this is a key point. One could still by cynical and say, doesn’t matter, it’s just words on a page. Governments don’t have to do this. But it really does say more than that, and the effects are more powerful than, just the cynical view that they can easily be discarded. What the document is saying is that only do individuals have rights, but individuals in our collectivity in our nations,and in a grouping of nations at the United Nations, also has the right to a system of government, a system of taxation and spending and delivery of services in which the rights and freedoms set forth in the Declaration can be fully realized. To implement this Universal Declaration, of course, is mainly the responsibilities of each society, but the international covenants which came in 1966 are more detailed documents that describe more specifically the various rights and more specifically how they are to be realized.

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights focuses naturally on the rights of citizenship and the protection from abuses of the state. And let me just mention a few of the key points of the civil and political rights that are defined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 6, for example, says that the right to life is protected by law. Government cannot willfully end without a due process, take a life. And of course, in many countries of the world capital punishment has been made illegal and has been eliminated long ago. Yet we do know that governments continue to kill their people that is not realizing the rights of this covenant. Article 7 says that no one can be subjected to torture. Here again we know that governments have violated this willfully. The United States itself engaged in water boarding so called after 9/11 until that was discontinued by the Obama Administration. Or at least we hope and and it was said by the administration that it has been discontinued. But torture, of course, remains a terrible scourge practiced in many parts of the world. Article 8 says that nobody can be held in slavery. And while slavery is illegal throughout the world, we know that there is human trafficking and that people are held in slavery though illegally. Governments have the responsibility to fight to resist that and to free people that are held against their will. Article 9 says that there’s a right to liberty and security of individuals, that government cannot violate the liberty and security of their citizens. Article 16 says there’s a right of citizenship defined as the recognition of all persons before the law. Article 18 declares the freedom of thought. Article 24, the protection of children. And Article 26, the equal protection of the law from discriminatory application. So you can see that these are rights that are not realized to the extent that they need to be. But our rights that are widely accepted, widely regarded, at least on paper, that’s a start and in application, but to be realized and to, to to be struggled for.

Now the companion to the civil and political rights, are the economic, social and cultural rights adopted at the same time in the complimentary international covenant. And let me mention some of those economic and social and cultural rights. And again, as in the Universal Declaration, Article 6 calls for the right to work. Article 7 for just and favorable conditions of work decent remuneration and safe working environment. Article 8 declares the right of individuals to form and to join trade unions. Article 9 as in the Universal Declaration, the right to social security. Article 11, the right to an adequate standard of living, to be able to meet basic needs. Article 12, very interesting and very important, very relevant for the Millennium Development Goals and for the sustainable development goals that will follow is the highest attainable, the right to I should say, the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. Very interesting. At first one can’t grant the right to health, per se. People are ill they may suffer from conditions that are not preventable or treatable. So the standard is the highest attainable level of health. Importantly, physical health and mental health, because we know that mental illness is a terrible scourge for individuals and quantitatively a very heavy burden on societies around the world. Article 13, the right to education. And Article 15, the right to take part in cultural lives. And again as in the original Universal Declaration the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights realizes this isn’t all at once. This is a framework, it’s a moral and ethical framework, it is a commitment. And the way that it is defined, is that each state party to this covenant undertakes steps individually, and through international assistance and cooperation, and to the maximum extent of its available resources to, to honor these rights and then quote, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in this covenant. So, this is a call on us. It’s to turn values into practice. And while cynics may say, so what, practice shows differently. These values do reach the heart. They do move governments. They can make a big difference, and I think this has been nowhere more clear than in the Millennium Development Goal effort. Initiated in September 2000, you’ll recall, by the world leaders gathered at the United Nations, and providing a motivation to meet these basic needs in health, in education, in gender equality, in at least a minimum standard of living. And when the MBG’s were launched in September 2000 in the Millennium Declaration which framed them and which looked to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the government said, we will spare no effort to free our fellow men, women, and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty to which more than a billion of them are currently subjected. We are committed to making the right to development a reality for everyone, and to freeing the entire human race from want. Human rights at the core of this development agenda, a motivation, a set of legal agreements and a moral heart of the United Nations, and of the sustainable development efforts in the years ahead.

 

Lectures / Readings

Human Rights and Gender Equality I

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The Ethics of Wealth, Poverty, and Inequality

Sustainable development targets three broad goals for society. We’ve seen that economic growth is within reach for all parts of the world. Even those few places that have been stuck in poverty until the early 21st century. The second broad goal is to respect the planetary boundaries, that is, to combine economic growth and the choice of technologies and behaviors and policies so that we don’t trespass the Earth’s boundaries and create a terrible. Environmental crises of climate change or acidity of the oceans, or loss of biodiversity. The third main goal of sustainable development is social inclusion. The idea that an economy should serve all of its people. That the benefits of economic growth should be widely shared. That everybody should have a chance at prosperity, at proper health care, education, and we know that that challenge is also an unfulfilled challenge in many parts of the world. Throughout history, many of the gains of an economy have been concentrated at the top. And throughout most of history, the gains of an economy have been highly concentrated in one half of humanity, the men, with women facing discrimination and an inability to participate equally and productively in society. Social inclusion therefore is like the challenge of ending poverty and the challenge of environmental sustainability: an unfinished goal but one that is within reach. For us to make progress on social inclusion. We need to have a framework of values and ethics. We have to ask ourselves, and analyze, in fact, what are the standards that should apply in terms of fairness in society? Why do we care? Why do most of us feel that when there are vast inequalities of income, or when there are people that have billions of dollars and then there are people who are starving, somethings not right with that seen. In order to understand that we have to not only analyze the nature of inequality and social exclusion. But we have to think about the underlying values that give, at least for most of humanity, and for the governments that have signed many charters and declarations, the motivation for social inclusion in the first place. When we think about the questions of inclusion, there are many dimension of moral or ethical choice that we should face. One set of issues is about income and wealth inequality. There are, even within that category, many different issues. First the question of the existence of extreme poverty in societies of plenty. The question of the huge gaps between the rich and the poor. And the question of social mobility. The chance for a poor child to be able to escape from the poverty of one’s childhood and become a middle class or even rich person and household within the society. So the first category of ethical or value thinking we should look at is inequality from those various dimensions. The second related but not identical issue is the question of discrimination. Even our laws in most parts of the world continued to discriminate and of course in most of human history the legal framework of the state. Allowed for slavery allowed for complete discrimination against women’s rights to hold property or to inherit property. In other words the law itself builds in discrimination. And so a second dimension of our ethical or value thinking should face the question what do we mean, what should we mean by equality before the law, by equal protection of the laws, by the role of the state that respects civil and political rights. A third aspect of our values is about cultural norms. Sometimes things are not strictly illegal, but the attitudes in society, discrimination against minority groups, not hiring particular kinds of people, particular races, ethnicities people from different parts of society is often a cultural attitude sometimes backed up by the force of the state, but sometimes prolonged mainly by our cultural and social views. What should be done about that? How should we think about the relationship of morality or ethics and culture? So, there are many different aspects of values and value systems that we really should explore when we investigate first and then promote the concept of social inclusion. Of course, throughout human history and human thinking, there have been many schools of thought about these questions. It’s important for us to understand some of those schools of thought, though in a brief foray into philosophy we can only just touch the surface of some of this thinking. But let me mention five different kinds of value or ethical approaches to the questions of social inclusion. If you look back to the ancient sages, I like to look back to the Buddha, to Aristotle to Confucius as three examples of ethical thinking. The Buddha of course with influence all throughout south and east Asia, Confucius with a huge and lasting influence to this day on ethics in China. And with Aristotle having a long and deep legacy of influence on western thinking about values. We could say, that in all three of those great sages thinking. We find a kind of virtue ethics, as the philosophers nowadays call it. Virtue ethics means that ethics from the point of view of the Buddha or of Aristotle or of Confucius is about how we, as individuals, should act virtuously. For Aristotle, the idea of virtuous living was the key to happiness and was the key to being a good human being. For Buddha, it was the key to escape suffering. For Confucians it was the key to social stability. So virtue and a right kind of living, was the core and part of that virtue was the way that individuals should approach others. For example, in a spirit of compassion as the Buddha emphasized. And it’s true, that lends a virtue that we can try to glean some notions of what a true kind of social inclusion might mean. Now, a second kind of philosophical approach comes from the great religions. Of course, many of those draw upon the secular or non religious philosophies as well. But, if you think about the philosophical underpinnings of ethics in the great monotheistic religions Christianity, Judaism Islam. At the core is the notion of the golden rule. To not do to others what you would not want them to do to you. And that also is a major theme for example, of Confucius. But the golden rule underpinning many religious doctrines basically is a principle of equality. And sometimes it’s put in that negative way, don’t do to others what you don’t want them to do back to you, sometimes put in the positive way, do to others what you would like them to do to you. Be charitable to the poor because, if you were in need, you would want that help from others. And of course, these great religious traditions deepened that core principle into ethical systems in Christianity and especially in the social doctrines of the Catholic church the idea of the preferential option for the poor is emphasized. Which means that we should direct our attention and our help and policies according to the social teachings of the Catholic church to the poor. A third kind of ethical system is a secular kind that came much more recently at the end of the 18th century. But very important because it is part of a lot of current day thinking and it has a lot of interest, and that is the philosophy called utilitarianism. This is a philosophy that was propounded first by a a political activist and philosopher, named Jeremy Benton at the end of the 18th century.  He said that the goal of society is happiness.  And the goal of an ethical system, and a moral philosophy, and politics should be the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. And so, Jeremy Bentham said that society should maximize its utility, the word that he used as a term, to mean, in essence, happiness of the people. Now utilitarianism gives many different motivations for social inclusion and I’ll look to those shortly. A fourth philosophy that arose also in the Western world in the 19th century, with strong roots in England first, and, then especially strong political roots in the right-wing I could say of the U.S. political spectrum. Is a philosophical idea called libertarianism. Libertarianism is a little bit different than utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is the greatest good for the greatest number. Libertarianism in shorthand, is a philosophy that says, leave me alone. I don’t want the state, the government imposing on me. I don’t want others imposing on me. I have my rights to liberty, that’s the preeminent right in that philosophy. And don’t interfere. So libertarianism is a in extreme free market, or laissez-faire philosophy, leave me alone. You can see that is has it’s attraction in the context of authoritarian or totalitarian government, because the main doctrine of  libertarianism is liberty. And when liberty is being wholly violated, that’s a denial of basic rights and it becomes a very powerful doctrine. But libertarianism goes farther in some ways in our society to what many, including myself, regard as an extreme conclusion. It says that it’s not even right to say that a rich man should give a small part of his wealth to a poor and starving person, because it’s his liberty to do what he wants. And so libertarianism tends to oppose the use of taxes for example, to redistribute income in society. A fifth philosophy, very much part of our international culture in the 20th century and now 21st century, is a human rights philosophy. This is yet another approach to the question of social inclusion. The human rights approach, which one can see, has its roots in some of the religious traditions as well, says that every human being on the planet has basic human rights. Political rights, civil rights as a citizen. But also economic, social and cultural rights, so five categories of rights. And the idea is that because a person is a human being, being a human being is enough to say that human being has rights including the right to a decent life, the right to be able to meet basic needs in society. The right to call on society to ensure that those basic needs are fulfilled, you see the difference for example, with the libertarian idea. The libertarian idea says government has no right to impose on any citizen, even a rich citizen. Government’s only right is to create a framework of law and order and security, not to redistribute income or property, for example, for the benefit of the poor. Whereas the human rights approach says, No. A poor person has rights, some basic rights to health, to education, to a means of livelihood. And society must be organized, including, for example, through taxation, to help meet those basic needs. This I think helps us to see in thinking about those five different dimensions and of course one could mention others, that throughout human history we’ve thought about these ethical issues in quite different ways. The great sages thought about us having the responsibility to be virtuous in our behavior. The religions about our responsibility to others according to the Golden Rule. Utilitarianism to our responsibility as a society or collectivity to maximize happiness within the society. Libertarianism emphasizing the dangers of an over reach of government. And human rights as part and parcel of the global legal environment. As defining basic standards that should apply to every human being on the planet, no matter what kind of political social system he or she lives in. I want to pursue this issue of the human rights because it is our dominant framework, It’s the one that the member states of the United Nations have signed onto. It says that we should meet the basic needs of everybody on the planet, at least progressively meet them. If we’re not able to because of technology or other limitations there should be what is called a progressive realization of those rights, in other words we should strive to end extreme poverty, even if we can’t do that all at once we should strive to ensure that everybody has access to education. We should strive to ensure that everybody has access to decent healthcare. Economist sometimes give a name to some of the targets of those basic needs, calling them merit goods, education and health are merit goods in the language of economists. Because everybody in society merits them. They merit them in the human rights approach, simply by virtue of being human beings. They may merit them in an economist’s broader approach by saying that society benefits by ensuring that everybody has that kind of access or coverage. Let me give you an example. Adam Smith, who we mostly think of as a free market economist, said that education is a merit good. Now, the human rights community would say, right on, it’s the right of people to have education. But Adam Smith said it’s also a good idea for society because it will produce better outcomes not only meeting the rights of individuals, but produce more social stability let me just quote what Adam Smith said in 1776. He said the state meaning the government and the society derives no inconsiderable advantage from the peoples instruction, in other words education. The more they are instructed, the less liable they are to the delusions of enthusiasm and superstition. So he’s saying by educating the population, society is safer, it doesn’t go off in crazy ideas of superstition or or other kinds of delusions. And Adam Smith went on to say that the expense of the institutions for education and religious instruction, is likewise, no doubt beneficial to the whole society, and may therefore without injustice be defrayed by the general contribution of society. He’s saying that since education is a merit good, society should pay for it. In other words public education. We have tended to view healthcare in the same way. It’s a merit good partly because individuals have a basic right to health. But also because helping people to remain healthy helps other people too we don’t want to say aw doesn’t matter whether those people are vaccinated or not. Because when a significant part of a population does not have a basic vaccine, then an epidemic disease can spread through the community and endanger everybody.

And so, health is a merit good in the individual sense of a right but also in the sense of providing a broad benefit to society. One could say therefore that the focus on basic needs especially health and education, can be viewed as a human right according to the human rights approach. Or it could be viewed as a wise and useful kind of policy. A bit like the utilitarian idea of producing the greatest good for the greatest number. I want to underscore the role of ethics and values and the need for us to have more discussion, more public awareness, more debate about these underlying ethical choices, because sustainable development, as a set of goals, depends on ethics. It depends on how we view the right thing to do. We have thousands of years of deep human thinking on this. We can draw upon it, we can draw upon these different facets and approaches. And I believe we need to, to help mold a global ethic for the 21st century.

 

Lectures / Readings, museologia informal, Peace Studium

Árvore das Memórias VI – Direitos Humanos em sociodrama

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Realizou-se em Peniche a VI sessão das Árvores das Memórias a oficina de museologia social com aplicação da metodologia do sociodrama. O tema proposto pelo grupo relacionou-se com os Direitos Humanos

IMG_0777 Após o aquecimento dos membros da turma de sociologia do 12º ano lançaram-se desafios de debater as questões dos direitos humanos e as suas formas de aplicações.

O grupo escolheu como questões para debater como direitos a Vida, Liberdade, Saúde, Habitação, Educação, Sexualidade, Igualdade, Fraternidade, Religião, Trabalho e salário e a Paz. A partir da listagem de direitos criaram-se três grupos, o azul, o vermelho e o verde. Cada cor correspondia a uma geração de direitos. A partir de cada grupo discutiu-se as razões e os limites do direitos, as questões de deveres que os direitos trazem implícito. As distinção entre as declarações dobre direitos e as práticas do direitos. O desafio geracional de manter os direitos e praticar os deveres  associados. O dasafio de assumir compromissos públicos e de co decisão. Os desafios dos direitos sociais e das minorias.

No final do debata, nas conclusões falou-se sobre o que a experiência trouxe a cada um. A dramatização ficou, nesta sessão, submergida pela palavra. Há que melhorar as questões sobre o axiodrama.