Il diritto umano di dominare

by Nicola Perugini, Neve Gordon

Che cosa sono, oggi, i diritti umani? Uno strumento di giustizia, garanzia del diritto e moderazione della violenza elaborato dalle democrazie liberali per tutelare i soggetti piú vulnerabili? In realtà, se guardiamo alla fisionomia di chi se ne occupa, accanto a istituzioni internazionali, corti di giustizia e ONG, troviamo anche agenzie di sicurezza nazionale, organismi militari e organizzazioni portatrici di interessi specifici e omogenei alle strutture di potere. Attraverso l’analisi di casi concreti che vanno dalla tutela dei diritti dei coloni israeliani alla guerra legalizzata con i droni, dagli omicidi mirati agli scudi umani, gli autori mostrano come le categorie di abuso, colpevole e vittima si scambino continuamente di posto, a seconda degli obiettivi di chi si appropria del discorso dei diritti umani: che possono essere anche una preziosa risorsa di legittimazione per rafforzare la dominazione, sancire gli squilibri consolidati e giustificare guerre e occupazioni – non uno strumento universale e neutrale di emancipazione. In questo saggio, emergono senza appello tutte le contraddizioni dell’ordine “morale” globale, insieme all’invito a ripensare l’odierno impoverimento dei diritti umani, rivitalizzandone la funzione antiegemonica, la reale rappresentatività e la forza di resistenza.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, Political Science, Law, Sociology

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2015

About the author

Nicola Perugini is Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Edinburgh. He is the coauthor of The Human Right to Dominate.

Reviews

[Yupa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Libro breve e denso, ma molto efficace, sa provocare valide riflessioni anche quando dice cose non proprio condivisibili.
Suo pregio principale è mettere in discussione e quindi mettere sull'attenti quando ci si trova di fronte a discorsi che parlano di oppressi e oppressori, vittime e carnefici, persecutori e perseguitati, per riflettere su quanto queste categorie possano essere molto più malleabili e scivolose di quanto si creda e non vadano sempre accolte in maniera ingenua.
Se il focus del libro, dopo una breve introduzione teorica e generale, è sulla questione palestinese, l'approccio che propone può essere applicato ad altre situazioni politiche e non solo, anche a situazioni più circoscritte che diventano comunque argomento del discorso mediatico, in cui il discorso pubblico spinge a incasellare dei gruppi umani nelle categorie di chi opprime e chi è oppresso. Quindi, anche se il libro assume una posizione molto netta sul suo caso di studio, la lettura può comunque aiutare a porsi dei dubbî su altri casi, grandi e piccoli che siano.
Il libro sconta un po' il difetto di un'eccessiva teoricità, di un richiamarsi ai principî e di un linguaggio non sempre immediato, tutte cose tipiche delle pubblicazioni che parlano il linguaggio chiuso dell'accademia, ma poi riporta fatti ed esempî, sa tornare alla concretezza e a confrontarsi con la realtà. Molto attuale (purtroppo) da questo punto di vista il capitolo sull'uso degli scudi umani nei conflitti armati.
Nelle conclusioni si percepisce il collocamento degli autori in un'area politica ben precisa. E qui mi chiedo se, nell'entusiasmo combattivo con cui assaltano quello che chiamano "dominio", gli autori finiscano tra quelli capaci di vedere solo il dominio a stelle e strisce, certo criticabilissimo in molti suoi aspetti, ma poi rimangano ciechi di fronti ad altri dominí altrettanto se non di più discutibili: quello cinese, quello russo, quello delle teocrazie islamiche, e altri ancora.

[Mostafa · Rating 3 out of 5]

جنبًا إلى جنب مع كتب "غزة: بحث في استشهادها" لفلنكستيّن و"اليوم نبني الجسور وغدًا نرمي القنابل" لبيتر غيل و" الدروع البشريّة" لهذان الكاتبان.. يُعد هذا الكتاب مُهمًا في لفت النظر على القضايا التاريخية والسياسيّة التي نعايّش يوميّاتها ولكن من منظور قانوني يتعلق بسيميّاء اللغة القانونية في المؤسسات الدولية وكيف تتعاطى مع القضايا المُثارة بطريقة أشبه بالآية القرآنية -ولقد آتيّناك سبعًا من المثاني- وتُعد القضية الفلسطينية هي محور هذا الكتاب لتطبيق الكاتبان فكرتهما عن تطور مفهوم حقوق الإنسان وكيف انتهى بها الحال إلى أن تنتهي لتلك المفارقة اللغوية المُدهشة التي يحملها عنوان الكتاب ذاته "حق الإنسان في -الهيّمنة-" وفي سيّاق ذلك يتعرض الكاتبان لسياقات عمل وتطورات منظومات المجتمع المدني، وتطور ظاهرة "الأنجزة" وكيف أصبح "الأنجوزيّ" يُعبر عن طبقة جديدة جعلت من حقوق الإنسان حكرًا على نخبة معيّنة تمتلك حق الكلام نيّابة عن المقهورين

[Sam Crisp · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Human Right to Dominate is a critique of human rights arguing that human rights are used across the political spectrum to legitimise colonialism, killing and domination. Using predominantly case studies from the occupation of Palestine, Perugini and Gordon give examples of how liberal NGOs confer legitimacy to the state of Israel by appealing to their courts. These NGOs provide examples of violations of international humanitarian law to the courts, such as indiscriminate bombing of civilians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The narrow horizon of this approach is to urge for lawful killing to be carried out with all necessary precautions instead. In practice, this means that the law privileges the colonial force because of their access to more sophisticated weapons.

Israel is able to symbolically respond to these individual cases by paying reparations and choosing a scapegoat to punish, distracting from the larger pattern of domination which remains unchallenged, and making them seem lawful and legitimate in international eyes. Through their isolation and putting through the legal framework, rights violations become normalised and routine. The convergence of NGOs and the perpetrators as part of the system of occupation provides Israel with a method of gauging how far they can push things at any given time. It is like that tweet from dril, somehow always apropos:

turning a big dial taht says "Racism" on it and constantly looking back at the audience for approval like a contestant on the price is right

Furthermore, more conservative parties are able to retaliate against the so-called politicisation of human rights, arguing that this kind of 'lawfare' is a threat to the state of Israel and position themselves as victims, repurposing human rights to protect their settler sovereignty.

Since the years of the Oslo peace process, many conservative settler NGOs have been established in Israel such as Yesha for Human Rights and Regavim, who aim to use the tactics of liberal NGOs to maintain Jewish settlement in the occupied territories. When Israel's police evicted Jewish settlements in the West Bank, these NGOs spread the rhetoric that framed settlers to be the victims of displacement. They invert the relationship between coloniser and colonised to make their domination look like self-defense. Although these groups are fighting against the government, they are ultimately aligned with them in their mutual desire to expand the colonial project.

Despite those who would frame human rights as being universal (applying to all humans innately) and apolitical, the subject of human rights is always being created and recreated by whoever wields them. The argument of the book is not that human rights are inherently good or bad, or only able to do good or bad, but that to use them to empower the weak, one needs strategies which can use them to undermine greater systems of power.

[Muhammed Nijim · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book suggests a new understanding of human rights rhetoric. Almost everyone takes human rights for granted as it advocates the oppressed and resist domination and hegemony. The authors challenge this view in the book and deconstruct the conventional perception of human rights, and rather suggest that human rights rhetoric is now completely inverted and deployed to advance political agenda. To illustrate their view, they apply this theory on Palestine/Israel conflict.

The authors demonstrate that Jews had no state to advocate their rights in the past, and that was culminated with the genocide committed against them before and during the World War II by the Nazi who striped their rights. Jews employed this discourse to spur the sympathy and attention of the International community, which brokered with the British - who by then were colonizing Palestine- about an alternative home for Jews. The UN sent representatives to Europe to observe closely the living conditions of Jews who were scattered in refugee camps across Europe. A report was written and concluded that Jews have to be evacuated to Palestine, after a consent from Britain who agreed on their migration.

In 1947, the UN made the partition plan which gave 43% of the land to Palestinians, and 57% to Jews. Following that, the state of Israel was established in 1948 and thus they had a legal body who will advocate their rights now on, unlike in the past. Israel has constantly employed the Holocaust discourse to expand their state and legitimate the killing of Palestine. The Holocaust trope is often raised when actions are taken against Israel, which rarely happens. For instance, when some UN representatives demanded that Israel should withdraw to the pre-1967 borders, some Israeli officials protested that a comeback to the past is tragic, referring to the Holocaust.
The emergence of nation states represents a radical change in the course of human rights because, ever since the state is the body which is solely entitled to ensure the application of human rights. That is a challenge, because state is the absolute power which can enforce laws, change them when it sees necessary, escape from applying them when it sees necessary. It is the power which decide who live and who dies, and thus the rights to live is confined the state. The state is the only entity who can kill without being questioned, but it will question others who implement killing, because states had social contracts with their citizens.
Jews, after the foundation of their state, have become citizens with rights. They have a comprehensive state with institutions to advocate them. Jews have often inverted human rights to advance national and political benefits for their own and marginalized Palestinians who are the indigenous inhabitants of the land. For instance, settlers have established their own NGOs to defend any attempt to demolish their houses in the West Bank, of these NGOs are Yesh and Regavim. When the Israeli police interfere to demolish these illegal houses, these organizations interfere and invert the discourse, describing the construction of Palestinian houses is illegal since they are built on a Jewish land. They described the demolition of settlers’ houses as an ethnic cleansing of settlers. In parallel with that, other organizations that were established to counter these illegality of building houses on a Palestinian land such as Peace Now, have used the same rhetoric of human rights to deconstruct the allegations of settlers.
On the other hand, the authors explained how Israel employed international law, especially Geneva convention to justify killing. They constantly misuse Human Shielding and apply it erroneously. Israel suggest that Hamas hide its weaponry in houses, mosques, tunnels and hospitals which means everywhere in Gaza. Therefore, Hamas is using these places as human shields, which permits Israel to target them because that does correspond with Geneva convention, which prohibits applying human shielding in wars. This law puts Gaza as a whole under Israeli targeting lawfully.
I can keep writing for many hours about this interesting book. In conclusion, authors pointed out that International Human Rights organizations such as Amnesty and HRW are reinforcing domination and hegemony. HRW’s mandate, for instance, does not shed light on violations that are made by the US such as the drone attacks conducted in Yemen and Afghanistan. There are no clear standards and rules for the use of drones, which is considered lawful by HR organization since it targets precisely. The authors condemn these orgs because the reduced the range of human rights to professionals only. only those with background in human rights and experts have the privilege to speak on behalf of the vulnerable, and those oppressed are excluded by these orgs, there voice is not heard. The authors suggest that these orgs are rather reinforcing domination because states always can manipulate laws to advance political agenda. They conclude that the system should be challenged, because old successful movements succeeded because they challenged the system and deconstructed it. The change of law may change reality for a short term, but the change of the system is fundamental for a long-term change.

[Faaiz · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting case study approach, using Palestine, to showcase and explicate how the discourse on human rights operates in the global arena. Far from what is purported, that "more human rights equals less domination", the authors demonstrate that it is much more complicated than that and that the human rights discourse has been adopted by both the right-wing and liberal NGOs and actors to further domination in the context of Palestine and collude with the State.

I found this book to be accessible for the most part but the short length of the book probably contributed to the authors having to keep things succinct and brief. The concluding chapter was successful in tying it all together and addressing the "so what?" question and offers some good frameworks for thinking about human rights and the extent to which they can be salvaged from their current dilapidated state.

[Cherry Cheesman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Deeply fascinating, well-researched, well-written. Felt like it needed another chapter or two.

[rabble.ca]

http://rabble.ca/books/reviews/2015/0...

Review by Azeezah Kanji

For many of us, human rights are somewhat like puppies: fluffy, benevolent things, a source of unalloyed happiness and good (although perhaps somewhat lacking in the tooth department). All upsides, no downsides; the world is an incontestably better place with them in it.

Critical scholarship on human rights, however, raises a host of serious questions about the ability of human rights to achieve or promote justice.

Are human rights actually a valuable tool for the marginalized? Or are they simply another weapon in the arsenal of the powerful?

How do we understand the invocation of human rights in support of military ventures in Afghanistan and Iraq (especially given the long history of appeals to international law to rationalize colonialism and warfare)?

Read more here: http://rabble.ca/books/reviews/2015/0...

[George Pepios]

An eye-opening and immensely thought-provoking, new conceptualisation of the human rights discourse and its appropriation by a legalist framework centred on professionalisation.