If humanity had to travel with human rights (past, present and future), what might be pivotal dates interplaying with our destiny? 1993, 2005, 2023 and 2033 might well be candidates for testing our recent chronology.
1993 was the year of the most recent World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna. 2005 was the year of the most recent UN reforms, 2023 is the year of the Summit of the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and preparation for the Summit of the Future projected for next year. 2033 is a premonitory date to prepare for what might happen in the next decade, inviting caution and precautions.
To reminisce about the World Conference on Human Rights, there were four salient "pluses" and four evident "minuses". The period was a burgeoning of freedoms after the end of the Cold War in many regions. The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action ensuing from the conference settled the debate between universal human rights standards and national/regional values (voiced through "Asian Values") by converging on the position that while national/regional values or "particularities" are to be borne in mind, it is the duty of states to uphold fundamental rights and freedoms; universality prevails over particularities.
The second bonus from the Vienna setting was the emphasis on "women's rights are human rights". It also paved the way to establish the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. It opened the door to national human rights commissions and regional mechanisms, such as the Asean Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights.
However, the first "minus" was that it failed to recognise the rights of indigenous peoples (with the important plural "s") as the basis of self-determination. There was also overemphasis by non-democrats on economic rights, such as the right to food, to the detriment of political rights, such as freedom of expression. Moreover, the UN human rights arm was distant from the field and not much was said on emerging environmental crises. Ensuing threats of terrorism would then result in unbalanced measures constraining rights and freedoms.
As for the reforms of 2005, the period saw the demise of the UN Commission on Human Rights and the rise of the UN Human Rights Council. In addition to various UN human rights treaties and special procedures such as UN Special Rapporteurs, the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) was set up to assess the human rights performance of all states without exception, although with soft peer-related monitoring.
The UN Peacebuilding Commission was established to help recovery after warfare, as well as a UN Democracy Fund open to civil society. There would also emerge UN human rights field presences such as the regional offices in Bangkok, Beirut and Fiji to cover parts of the Asia-Pacific, as well as country offices, units and human rights advisers.
The notion of "Responsibility To Protect" whereby states are obliged to protect their populations from four serious violations, namely genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, was then accepted internationally, opening the door to assistance and protection from the UN in the case of deficits.
However, there were at least four loopholes in 2005; most famously, the failure to reform the UN Security Council and veto power of the five permanent members. There was not yet much action on threats posed by climate change, while the variable impact of the internet, especially on the right to privacy and securitised surveillance by authoritarian elements, was not yet well responded to. Towards the end of the decade, aspirations of democracy in the form of the Arab Spring were impeded by setbacks in the Middle East, exemplified by the armed conflict in Syria.
This year 2023 represents the present, with a wake-up call for both "plus" and "minus" issues. The first bonus is the broad UN human rights system today in the form of nine main human rights treaties, nearly 60 special procedures, and the UPR, the latter enjoying much support from states. There are a host of national human rights commissions worldwide and various regional mechanisms such as in Europe, the Americas, Africa and South-east Asia, with a more ambivalent system in the Middle East and gaps in South and Northeast Asia.
Digitalisation is now in full swing and was an essential communication tool during the recent Covid-19 pandemic. SDGs are now more complemented by climate change and global warming related commitments -- with more efforts to mobilise and decarbonise.
However, negative angles include the Russia-related war, Afghan upheaval, Myanmar armed conflict, and other situations of violence. The flipside of the internet is digital disruption-cum-disparity, peppered by peep-holes and peep-in surveillance. The self-evident rise in temperatures and natural disasters is ominous, despite global standard-setting to protect the environment. In Asia, the world's biggest democracies are also paralleled by nearby countries with "shrinking, shrunken, shrunk" civic and political space.
What of 10 years on from now, in the prophetic 2033? Already, there is some prospecting for the future, especially to protect the planet to enable next generations to survive and prosper. There is and will be a spread of personal data protection laws to cope with the wave of digitalisation. Artificial intelligence (AI) will yield benefits in key areas, such as medical services. A variety of stakeholders are to be brought on board to tackle potential discrepancies in human rights implementation, including business-related due diligence.
The converse is the need to tackle digital negatives which might be abusive and exploitative and include more technicians with a precautionary approach. The rise of generative AI also calls for some regulation from states and self-regulation from platform industries to ensure that people know when their fate is being decided by robots, to access and counter systems which might foster discrimination through social profiling, to regulate self-automated killer technologies, and to integrate into the learning process of robots via their "attention algorithms", respect for copyrighted data and protection of children from consumerism. The world must also endeavour to prevent resource conflicts, such as access to water, to ensure a shared existence.
A critical challenge will thus be to ensure that humans and other animate subjects are not subservient to non-humans and inanimate objects.
Vitit Muntarbhorn is a Professor Emeritus at Chulalongkorn University. He has helped the UN as UN Special Rapporteur, Independent Expert and member of UN Commissions of Inquiry on human rights.
