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Human rights and development

Ranabir Ray Choudhury

A RECENT news report from Geneva says that India has opposed any attempt to place conditions on development aid in the garb of pursuing a ``rights-based approach to development''. On the contrary, the point has been made that the need of the hour is to a dopt a `development approach' to human rights which, among other things, would not increase the burden of the poor countries.

In other words, the debate is over whether developing countries should be persuaded and cajoled, perhaps even forced, to improve their human rights record if they want to be assisted by the developed nations in their fight against poverty, or whether the y should be given all the support they need to improve their economies on the assumption that economic development will automatically lead to an improvement in human-rights standards in the developing world.

In many ways, this resembles the debate on whether there is a need for poverty removal-specific growth measures in the Third World or just those measures which will suffice to increase the economic growth rate which, in turn, is expected to affect the en tire population through the ``trickle-down'' effect. This debate is an old one and there are little signs of it subsiding. Similarly, the human rights puzzle promises to be an equally sensitive and contentious issue mainly because it is liable to be mixe d up with complaints from the poor that the rich, by virtue of their economic strength, are applying brute economic pressure on them to have their way in areas of social policy which are a sovereign responsibility of the poor countries.

Seen from the perspective of the poor countries, the rich simply have no right whatever to interfere in domestic policy spheres which are not directly connected with the areas covered by assistance for the purpose of economic development. For example, We stern economic assistance and trade ties vis-a-vis India should not be linked in any way to the political situation prevailing in Jammu and Kashmir, the argument being that because of so-called human rights violations in the troubled region, there may be a decline in development assistance.

From the perspective of the donor nations, however, the outlook is radically different. Why should economies which have surplus investible resources agree to help out countries which (according to the rich) do not observe the basic rules of living a dece nt human life? That is, development-assistance can never be divorced from the human-rights conditions prevailing in the recipient economies on the ground that such assistance should be provided only if it can effectively help to make human life richer in ``civilised'' content, from the West's point of view.

As is clear, this is an extremely complex issue. On the face of it, it is easy to agree with those who suggest that only Governments which protect and promote human rights are worthy of economic support in the international arena. But who will certify th at human rights are (or are not) being protected in a particular country? It is extremely difficult to have an absolute yardstick for what constitutes the protection and promotion of human rights and what constitutes otherwise. This is because the defini tion of human rights varies from society to society. Secondly, the historical perspective of each such society is crucial for arriving at a judgment on whether there has been progress over time or a deterioration on the human rights front.

To take the example of Jammu and Kashmir, it has often been argued that New Delhi's record on human rights has not been exemplary in the region, a point that has been used with great effect by India's opponents in international fora. But, of course, the allegation is without basis because the actions of India's security forces (which presumably form the basis of the charge) are a direct consequence of the unrestricted anti-social stance adopted by Pakistan-aided terrorists and militants in the Valley, w hose main objective is to destabilise the political and social situation obtaining in the region by precipitating headline-hogging acts of violence leading to loss of life.

Clearly, defensive and prohibitive actions by India's security forces in the Kashmir Valley (which cannot be implemented with the help of a kid-glove policy because of the nature of the enemy) cannot be treated on a basis of equality with the disruptive actions perpetrated by the militants. If this is so, should human rights ``violations'' committed by India's security forces be reason enough for a choking off of development assistance to India? If indeed this does happen, it merely reveals the inadequa cy of the human-rights argument for controlling the flow of economic assistance, underscoring at the same time, the danger that exists of mixing up the approach with political and diplomatic factors that have no connection whatsoever with the status of h uman rights in the area concerned. (The case of human rights violations in China and the Clinton Administration's policy of giving precedence to economic cooperation is another example which shows up the complex nature of the subject under discussion.)

The human rights approach to development, therefore, is fraught with trapdoors which makes the fair implementation of the idea problematic. But does the Indian suggestion -- that the ``development approach'' to human rights be given a serious try -- make any more sense, apart from the fact that it solves a great many problems when seen from the perspective of the assistance-receiving countries?

For a parliamentary democracy such as India, there is no doubt that this is the approach that should be followed because no consistent and deliberate violation of human rights perpetrated by the authorities can escape the notice of Parliament for any con siderable length of time. But it could be a different story altogether for, say, a military dictatorship such as Pakistan where development assistance can be an unending stream without any beneficial impact on the status of human rights in that country.

This implies that the Indian stand adopted at the session of the UN Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights cannot be implemented blindly because there is simply no automatic and positive correlation between economic development an d the state of human rights, especially in a poor country where participative democracy is yet to strike root. This only means that there can be no rigid rules governing the link between human rights and development aid, the only sensible means of tackli ng the connection being the adoption of a judicious and fair policy by the assistance-givers in which political and diplomatic interests play a minimal role. Cynics will rule out the possibility that such donor Governments still exist. But, in all probab ility, they still do, which generates the hope that a ``rights-based approach to development'' may not increase the already-heavy burden of the developing world.