HRE

'Even admitting that human rights are both highly desirable and far more respected in 'our' countries than elsewhere, three fundamental conceptual problems remain. The first is the problem of transition. How can a society pass from a feudal or colonial situation, in which the very idea of human rights is not formulated, to a situation comparable to what we know in our societies today? And do we have something to teach the rest of the world in this matter? The second problem stems from the inclusion in the U.N.'s 1948 Declaration of two types of rights: individual and political rights on the one hand, and economic and social rights on the other. To what extent are these rights compatible with each other, and if they are not, are there priorities between them?

(Press release from their site)

Our Organization - one of the most active human rights organizations in the Russian speaking space "International Youth Human Rights Movement" has been declared "inactive" and was deprived of legal personality by court decision in Nizhy Novgorod, Russia on demand of the Federal Registration Service.

The judgment has been passed on Jun.13 but organization learned about it just a few days ago – the hearings took place behind closed doors with YHRM not notified.

International organization, which unites more than a thousand activists from 22 countries, was de jure declared non-existent.

This case is one of the consequences of the much criticized new Russian legislation on NGO that severely hinder activities of NGOs and give controlling bodies extended powers of sanctions. Ironically, YHRM is quite active in supporting freedom of association and has been one of the most vocal critics of the new legislation.

The International YHRM is going to appeal the decision and is calling for support for all civil society actors, facing increased pressure and extensive control from the authorities in Russia.

Letters of support are much welcome, send to the address of organization
39400, Russia, Voronezh-center, box 152,
by fax: +7 4732 54 55 30 (preferably)
or by e-mail int@yhrm.org

More details on the case, as well as the call of solidarity are available on the website of YHRM (soon updated into English)
History of YHRM: http://www.yhrm.org/eng/about/history
More about the work of YHRM: http://www.yhrm.org/eng/direction

Additional information (in Russian and English):
Honorary President of YHRM Andrey Yurov +7-916-113-51-81;
Coordinator of legal programs Dmitri Makarov +7-916-537-13-67;

"...criticising the lack of sincerity of those in power or of the secular priesthood should be done with precision: the problem is not that they are lying or that they are consciously hiding their real aims, but that they spontaneously adopt a distorted view of the world and history that enables them to profit from their privileged position with a perfectly clear conscience. This is a phenomenon that can be observed in daily life: generous words and speeches about values often go hand in hand with an analysis of reality that conveniently makes it possible to identify personal interest with moral imperatives. Genuine sincerity is not simply a matter of believing what one says, but of honestly asking whether the actions one undertakes really serve the noble aims one claims to pursue"

From Humanitarian Imperialism, by Jean Bricmont

more on this...

Measuring others according to moral standards becomes tormenting when (as is often the case) people you love and respect do things you cannot understand and would judge harshly if you had done them yourself. So can we avoid judging them (harshly), should we avoid judging them at all, or ought we to judge them just as we judge ourselves?

Suppose I judge the behaviour of the super-rich to be selfish and damaging to the structure of society, to the state of human rights around the world, to the potential for improvement and change, and to the system of predominant values. Then I suppose I have to judge friends or relations in that way too, if they approximate, or head towards the realm of the super-rich. There seem to be few other options.

Here are some possible let-outs:

1. Reverse my judgement

I could try to stop making the judgement at all - by trying to persuade myself to think as they do - that is (in this case), to believe that the super-rich have no negative impact on all those things; and that if individuals were to change their behaviour the world would not get better, but worse (or only stay the same). If I became able to persuade myself of all of that, presumably the judgement would cease to apply to myself (hypothetically) as well. In which case I could go and get as rich as I wished; could stop feeling guilty as I walked past homeless people in the street; could consider myself generous if I shared any part of my worldly goods with others; and could stop worrying that my hourly income might exceed the daily (monthly? annual?) income of people in other parts of the world.

I suspect that is the easiest path to take - I mean in terms of getting rid of the guilt and anger that can otherwise come to dominate one's life; and in terms of feeling better about oneself and feeling better about others. But it depends (in this case) on altering one's view of -

a) economics
b) personal responsibility (and guilt)
c) (I think) human nature.

So I need to look at all those 3 at some point...

Apart from that, and if I can't quite come to share their point of view on a), b) and c), or when it comes to other questions - how else do I react?

Perhaps I could isolate the 'judgement' so that it only applies to myself. For myself, it might be shaming to be super-rich, might 'feel' wrong, perhaps it might even be wrong: could it still be 'right' for others, or at least none of my business whether it is right or wrong?

Those are 2 different positions:

2. Different standards

'It is wrong for me but could be right for others'. In other words, different standards may apply to me - for example, because I am a different person, have different expectations and different possibilities for action. So according to this view: I cannot make a judgement on someone else's behaviour (because I don't know which standards to use)

This position is very suspect, although in a weak sense it is obviously true. As long as we make the standards general enough and put the bar high enough - for example: 'Torture is wrong', or even 'Deceit for personal gain is wrong' - then there is no earthly reason why they should not apply to everyone, as much as they apply to me. In fact there needs to be a very good reason why they should not apply to some particular person.

3. None of my business

'It is wrong for me, but I am in no position to judge whether it is right or wrong for others - because I cannot understand their point of view, because I am not them, and because it is not my role (right? responsibility?) to judge others.'

This is a cop-out: why is it not my role? It is obvious, again, if we take a universal standard, such as the case of torture, that on this issue, it is irrelevant why someone behaved in such a way: the act is still wrong. We do not need any further information in order to decide whether a torturer did the right thing or not (except, possibly, whether they can be said to have been forced to do it).

This non-committal stance has 2 close relations:

4. Judging the act but not the person

'What x did was wrong, very damaging, should never have been done... but I pass no judgement on x him/herself. The act was wrong but I make no claims about x, although s/he carried out the act deliberately and knowingly.'

Another cop-out - with the proviso that we should obviously be very careful about passing 'judgement' on people, and these should almost never be judgements extending beyond the concrete act, the specific instance on the basis of which they were drawn up. So, for example, we might say that x has a violent streak, as evidenced by the fact that s/he appeared to derive some satisfaction from applying torture on several occasions; but we would not want to say that x is bound always to be violent in all his/her activities and interrelations with other people (let alone that s/he is out-and-out evil).

5. Turning a blind eye

'It is wrong for me and may be wrong - or right - for others, but I am not going to make that judgement. I could make the judgement, quite justifiably, but I am not obliged to. I can shut my eyes to that issue (for example, in order to retain x as a friend, in order to keep my job, or in order not to stick my neck out and be judged for judging).'

This is my favoured position in cases of non-judging - the only one I think is really honest, and not too cowardly (as long as it is not applied universally). Perhaps, then, one could even apply that sort of reasoning towards oneself:

6. Never passing judgement

'I am not going to judge myself or others: what will be, will be; we do what we can and should not torment ourselves that we could not do otherwise. I shall not look at whether I or anyone else might have been able to act differently, and to different effect.'

This clearly goes too far, and is anyway disingenuous. I don't believe there are really people prepared to give up completely the moral discourse - which is what I think it amounts to.

The middle 3 positions seem to be common among the HRE-ers, to a lesser extent the last two as well. My suspicion is that in fact, those who are unwilling to look at other people's behaviour from a moral standpoint are nearly always doing so on according to the 5th position. In other words, although HRE-ers (and others) tend to hide behind positions 2 and 3, I think that what they are really doing is deliberately turning a blind eye (often in order not to stick their necks out, lose their jobs or - heaven forbid - appear to be moralistic and superior).

Position 5 is fine, and almost inevitable in certain cases - in fact I see it as the only hope of retaining our sanity and friends in a complex and corrupted world. But I wish people would be clear that they are refusing to make a judgement not because they think that moral standards cannot be applied to others, nor because they do not feel they ought to engage in moral evaluation - but because they want to retain friends, keep their jobs or not be seen as being judgemental. It is a personal and pragmatic choice, and not a moralistic one.

So how do we teach the next generations to behave?

What about...

Set yourselves high standards: do not intentionally deceive, harm, undermine or otherwise disadvantage others. Explore the likely consequences of your actions before embarking on them, weigh up the likely good and harm that may be caused by anything you do and never undertake actions which violate, directly or indirectly, the basic human rights of others.

Look around you constantly for behaviour which violates these principles - in particular the last. Be ready to withdraw your support from such behaviour, to express publicly your disapproval and to lend your positive support to any actions meant to put an end to violations.

Try to take small steps towards a world where instances of deception, harm, or undermining and disadvantaging others are made less likely and more difficult to bring about.

... as a bare minimum. But it would be kind to the next generation – and more honest as well – if we added a few notes of caution to this list.

So here we go ...

Expect to find a world where there are far too many instances of deception, harm, intentional undermining and disadvantaging of others for you to be able to be aware of them all, let alone to take a stand on all. Do your best to allocate your time and energies between these issues, while still retaining enough optimism and sanity to have the drive to carry on.

Be aware that you will meet small and large instances of corruption and deception around every corner, and that mostly the rest of the world will not stop in its tracks to be shocked, let alone to address them. Be aware that unless you too are prepared not to stop in your tracks, you are likely to be left behind by the steaming engine of world progress.

Proclaim the noble principles above with passion and with eloquence, by all means: you will be generally revered if you do so. But do not expect to take them seriously or follow them to the letter. In fact, it is probably advisable, for your own security and sanity, to follow the crowd, rather than the principles.

If in doubt: compromise. You are certain to have to do so if you want to get anywhere in the world, at least in a worldly sense. Be ready to turn a blind eye to injustice, to tolerate deception, to venerate the wealthy and the powerful, and to court those in positions of power or influence. They are likely to return the favour - and you may need those favours.

Above all: never doubt or undermine the unwritten rules that keep the system going and the engine of world progress steaming forward. Hold the written rules up to inspection, one by one; doubt them a little and even undermine them, mostly with your tongue in cheek. But do not try to halt the engine of progress; do not seek to undermine the institutions that the engine put in place; do not wonder if the place might be a better one without the institutions; and do not even entertain the thought that the unwritten rules were unwritten according to the wrong unwritten principles.

Medialens, the excellent media-watchdog, is having another go at George Monbiot - the excellent environmentalist and Guardian correspondent. On the environment, and probably on most other issues, you couldn't put a rizla between them. And that is not something you could say about almost any other mainstream journalist.

So why fight? Why pick on the differences between the positions rather than joining forces on the common issues? Why not - for the moment at least - tolerate the differences in order to win the bigger battles?

This is not just about Medialens and George Monbiot - or even about Medialens and the Guardian, which is the real battleground. It is about anyone working for social change, how we work with institutions or individuals that do not fully share our values, and how much we compromise on what seem to be fundamental points of principle. Why, for example, does antarchia criticise the ngo-businesses and human rights educators, all of whom are apparently working towards the same good and noble goals?

The ngo-businesses, just like the mainstream media, have numbers on their side. The BBC (and probably the Guardian) reaches millions; Medialens maybe reaches thousands. Save the Children, Amnesty International, the Council of Europe (a business, if not an ngo-business) reach out to - and spend - millions (mostly on themselves). A lone ant reaches tens or hundreds at the most.

So should we join the colony?

Not easy to answer, and it depends partly on what you are fighting against (or maybe for). In the new world, for example - do we want huge ngo-businesses, based in London, Strasbourg or New York, eating up the vast majority of the resources we manage to squeeze out of governments or individuals for those in dire need? Do we want media corporations, dependent on advertising revenue from the aviation and motor industries? If we do - then we should probably work with them now. If we don't, then we need to ask whether their existence now is actually the best way of ensuring an end to the status quo; whether it is the best way of ensuring their non-existence some time in the future. That seems unlikely, but maybe it is worth discussing.

Another question is whether we have an alternative model that would work better. We can admit that SCF, Oxfam, AI, the COE are massive resource drains, often compromising on points of principle in order to retain their influence; but they do some good, undoubtedly, and what can we suggest instead? That point needs answering, and I shall (not now). For the moment, let's also note the 'bad' that a lot of these structures encourage as well: partly in terms of monopolising the resources for their London offices and European salaries, but also in terms of propping up and failing to challenge the very system they rely on for their own existence.

A third question is whether, given the dominance of the ngo-businesses (and the media corporations) the lone ants can actually do anything to dilute their might - even if they can propose a different model once the might is gone. Medialens - and programmes like Democracy Now or FAIR in the US - appear to show that in the world of media, they can. I am less sure at the moment if that is true for the ngo-businesses - but time may tell.

And then perhaps the biggest question is whether our energies are best spent fighting the people or organisations closest to our own ideals; whether we spare them, let them do their good (and their bad) and move to other battlegrounds; or whether we try to swallow the differences and work with them.

No answers, really, and I suspect that every case needs to be decided individually. Three tentative responses to that last general point:

Sometimes the 'collaborators' in the opposite camp - the Monbiots in the mainstream press - can do more damage than the right-wing idiots we can simply laugh off. The Monbiots give credibility to the mainstream media, and promote the idea that no opinions and no issues are out of bounds. In that way, they (possibly) sustain the mainstream media. And in the same way, human rights educators working with the government give credibility to the government; the good work done by Amnesty campaigners gives credibility to the enormous and extravagant executive structure sitting in East London; and Oxfam's good work in reducing poverty gives credibility to Blair's pretence that he was trying to do the same.

Secondly, sometimes these huge ngo or media corporations themselves do more damage than good. That is clearer in the case of the media corporations - but I do wonder if we are looking at the balance sheet correctly in the case of the ngo-businesses. The question is not: what if Amnesty International disappeared and there was nothing? It surely ought to be: what if AI disappeared, or became leaner, or moved its operations, and resources were transferred to other efforts?

Finally - and this may in the end be the decisive point - there is always the question of whether, if we join the colony, we can continue to look at ourselves in the mirror (Michael Albert's expression, from here). Sometimes those compromises are just too difficult to make. Should we force ourselves to make them? Should we try harder to work with or for organisations whose overall values we cannot quite share, just because they have the might, and because our presence may make their mighty impact less bad than if we were to refuse to cooperate.

No answers. But I tend to think not.