Are human rights just another form of western cultural imperialism?

Human rights was developed as a concept in Europe during the mid-17^th century. The 18^th century French and United states declarations provided guided aspects of the language and content of the cornerstone of modern human rights. Since the makers of human rights were brought up in the west the foundations of human rights often represent the basis of western culture (AT EL. ABDULLAHI AN-NA’IM (1992, 23)) and influenced from the Cristian value system which dictates the focus on individual men and all humans as a whole. Due to the violence committed against the nations and the individuals during the world wars I and II UN moved to establish a declaration guiding states’ treatment of their citizens. This declaration was based on existing concepts of human rights existing in the west during that time.

However, during early civilizations eastern cultures often practiced the moral code illuminated by eastern religions and its value system. The Indian subcontinent during the Maurya empire (322 BC - 187 BC) observed a value system based on Jannisam and Buddhism which promoted dharma. The dharma could be defined as many virtues such as compassion, liberality, truthfulness, purity and the abolishment of sins such as harshness, cruelty, anger and pride. The precepts of non-violence practiced during this time were often extended towards animal welfare which only been recently observed in the western culture. Similarly, the Persian empire (Achaemenid period 550 BC – 330 BC) practiced Zoroastrianism which consists of the moral code of Good Thoughts, Good Words, Good Deeds as the basic tenets of the religion.

With the industrial revolutions in the 16^th century European nations such as Portuguese, Dutch English and French conquered lands in Asia, Africa and south America. These conquests introduced the western culture, Christianity and destroyed the value system, culture of the conquered lands.  The British empire created the largest empire world has ever seen and spread the Anglo Cristian culture throughout the world. The looting the wealth in the occupied lands and forcing of the western culture is often seen as cultural genocide by the descendants of these occupied nations. Due to the colonial past, the introduction of human rights mandate is often seen as a new form of imperialism (or a Colonial Syndrome) crafted by the western nations to dominate the former colonies. Addition to this the previous colonies of the western nations believes the west is yet to apologize for the human rights violations and massacres they have committed during the occupation of hundreds of years during the colonial period. Thus is whitewashing the blood soaked cloak of imperialism with human rights. Therefore, the rest of the world is not obliged to follow the western culture (god, church, empire, western civilization, science, modern technology, etc.), and it does not have the monopoly, or the privilege of possessing a universal value which entitles them to be spread over all the earth.

In the other hand many recent examples such as the Japanese occupation of Korea and china demonstrate there is little meaning to human rights if the states sovereignty is not upheld. Similarly, dictatorships use similar arguments to prevent influence from foreign governments involvement in domestic matters. The example of Panamanian Dictator Manuel Noriega provides a classic example of using state sovereignty to prevent foreign involvement in domestic matters. The USA intervention in panama could be explained as using human rights violations as a scapegoat to get involved in a domestic power struggle.

In the other hand most Asian societies are organized around duties not rights where the individual is less important than the group as a whole. The Confucian tradition stressing pursuit of harmony at all levels, differs from the fundamental of pursuit of happiness for individual. Thus the value system based on social relations are fundamentally different from a system based on equal and autonomous individuals. Therefore, sacrificing civil and human rights to achieve rapid economic development is justified with the explanation the western nations looted the wealth of Asia, Africa, and south amerce. The development in south Korea, Japan and china provide examples for economic development preferred over human rights where civil and human rights not often respected. However, governments need to be constantly reminded that sacrifices on human rights are tragic necessities that should be resort to an absolute minimum.

In Asian countries such as Japan and Korea it is possible to see an improvement of the human rights record with the advancement of the financial capability of the society. Furthermore, I believe with globalization and trade within countries continue to expand, counties with known human rights violations could be influenced to follow and respect the human rights of all citizens. This could be achieved by forcing human rights to be respected if the trade is the continue with counties. I firmly believe such measurements using soft power would be much effective in spreading the human rights mandate throughout the world while respecting the sovereignty of each country.