Human Rights

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Human Rights Global Affairs (PSC 354.001)

• February 25, 2009 (W)

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Today

• Hand-outs
• Mid-term study guide
• Genocide scenarios
• Readings
• james ron, howard ramos, and kathleen rogers,
  what shapes the wests human rights focus?

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Prosecution, promotion, persuasion
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The power of principles

• Campaigns are a central means for social change.
  In campaigns, activists identify a problem
  (issue creation), specify a cause (mobilization),
  and propose a solution (suggest a policy).
• If NGOs have become agenda-setters in the human
  rights area, are they picking the right targets?

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Ron/Ramos/Rodgers The question

• Research questions
• Are human rights groups biased?
• How do NGOs select issues?
• Why do similar abuses receive dissimilar global
  attention?
• Possible Explanations
• Racism no, p. 24
• National interest yes, relevance to Western
  foreign policy, p. 25.

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Ron/Ramos/Rodgers The answer

• Core claim
• HR NGOs do not necessarily focus on the most
  severe violations.
• Factors explaining NGO campaigns
• Likely media attention
• Relevance to Western foreign policy
• The Economist and Newsweek Magazine, 1986-2000

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Some examples of biased reporting

• Serbia vs. Congo-Brazzaville, p. 24
• Turkey and Uzbekistan, p. 25
• Top Ten list of human rights coverage (p. 26)
• China
• Russia/USSR
• Indonesia
• U.S.
• Chile
• Turkey
• Serbia and Montenegro
• Colombia
• United Kingdom

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Coverage explained

• What independent variables increase likelihood of
  reporting?
• Western policy relevance
• Violations of civil and political rights
• Wealth (the richer a nation)
• Number of registered NGOs
• Conclusion There is an inverse relationship
  between the level abuse and the level of
  reporting.

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Rebecca Evans, promise and limitations

• Review of Breaking Silence (Richard Alan White)
• The power of images (symbolic politics), 91
• The role of the boomerang (91/92, 94)
• Information politics (92/93)
• Leverage politics (92)
• From the boomerang to the spiral model
  (93/94)
• Shaming gt Denial gt Concessions gt Acceptance gt
  Rule consistent behavior
• Limits of transnational human rights activism
  (94, bottom)
• The role of traditional power politics (U.S.
  pressures, 95)
• Targeted governments still increase repression
  and ride out the storm