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I wanted to reply on the general topics being discussed in Zac’s and Tim’s blog posts since they discuss some issues that also came up in tutorial with Marta this past Tuesday. Specifically, I am intrigued by the discussion of the role power plays in the actual practice and domain of human rights. 

Zac argues that the natural-rights and political-pragmatist formulations of human rights seem to open the door to colonial intervention masquerading or “geopolitical pragmatism” as humanitarianism. There is a long list of human rights claims, abuses, and actions taken by the United States—a prime example in Zac’s blogpost—that seems to serve as an effective record for judging the US’ commitment to human rights. Taken in context, it seems to tell a stronger story about the pursuit of strategic interests than it does about mere arrogant hypocrisy on the matter. 

This also dovetails with Zac’s concerns that the right of intervention “always lies with colonial powers” which is related, but a distinct issue, from the concern that the overall practice/system of human rights is simply reifying the hegemony of colonial powers over unwilling subject states. Here, though, I think our analysis of the question will turn on how we deal with and define the terms we discuss. I don’t want to strawman Zac so I’ll make explicit what I take as pers operative definitions. The right of intervention seems to be more than just the mere fact of a state’s ability to intervene but also its “blessing” in some way by the international order. By colonial power, I take it to mean a country with “colonies” in a broader sense of the word. While certain countries do exert more political control over some states than others do, I sense that Zac may also be referring to colonial powers which dominate their subject states in less direct and overt ways than, say, the British Empire of the 19th century did. Alas, I think Zac will be able to illuminate Zac’s use of definitions the best. Regardless, what are we to make of the widespread condemnation of Russia by international actors? Perhaps, Russia is not properly regarded as a colonial power in the sense that Zac wants to use it, so the definition doesn’t really apply. Or, perhaps, it just doesn’t have a ‘right’ of intervention since it’s clearly in the wrong. Notably, Putin did appeal to some conception of human rights in his justification for the invasion but maybe his failure of recognition on the international stage is a result of his lack of “colonial power” status. 

However, then it seems like the definition of the word “colonial” refers to any state which has a dominant, or at least highly influential, role, status, or voice in international affairs. But I think the problem of human rights enforcement or the un-intervene-ability of a country that Zac points out later in the blog post applies to Russia too. Indeed, at its most elastic, I think the un-intervene-ability of a country applies to any nuclear armed at a minimum or any reasonably large or powerful country at the maximum. But then I don’t really see how we colonialism is more apparent than geopolitical pragmatism. It still seems like powerful, non-colonial countries can still try to pursue their own strategic interests under this guise, if they’re ignored by, too difficult to challenge, or ‘strategic partners’ of the colonial powers. 

Despite the imperfections of the emergent practice of human rights as constituted in its current form, I think some of the key, problematic features that characterize international relations a bit intractable. The large differences in power, size, and influence of states will always vary—unless some levelling happens to equalize them to a certain degree. I think the fact that the US, USSR, and other larger powers initially opposed the human rights regime while smaller countries and blocs supported it gives some credence to the idea that even non colonial powers believe the system will better constrain human rights abuses by dominant states. I don’t mean to suggest this is an ideal model, but given some of the constraints of international relations, I think the emergent practice of human rights is as robust as system as we have to work with. I also think this problem is related to the tension between the human rights aim of protecting individual/social rights and the aim of preserving international peace and stability. Since even on this model, it still seems like smaller states have a far stronger incentive to pursue the latter, perhaps ever at the expense of the former. In which case, we still seemingly lack a robust model for defending human rights.