Beyond Human Rights

I

As Leftists, how should we approach the struggle for human rights? Currently we live in a society where killings have become the norm. Anybody can just kill, as long as he is in a possession of a marker and a cardboard. Likewise, anybody can just be killed.

Sectors of the Philippine Left have so far led the staunchest opposition to the killings. As early as July, the coalition In Defense of Human Rights and Dignity Movement or iDEFEND was formed. iDEFEND describes itself as "a coalition of non-government organizations, people’s organizations, individual HRDs, human rights lawyers, religious sector and members of the academe." 

Leading Filipino intellectual and iDEFEND leader Walden Bello has provided the clearest theoretical guide on how to struggle for human rights in his article "An Administration in Search of an Opposition," which was originally published in the Rappler.

This piece is meant to comment on Bello's "An Administration in Search" essay, and proposes a different view on how the Radical Left can effectively struggle for human rights under Duterte's killing regime.

II

According to Bello, human rights should be defended because these are the foundation for all other sorts of rights. Without recognition of such "basic" rights as the right to life, freedom, and due process, the attainment of other rights such as the right to be free from poverty and to a life with dignity cannot follow.

Accordingly, Bello said an Opposition movement to Rodrigo Duterte should come from the position of defending human rights. In his condluding words, "a strong opposition based on the defense of universal human rights is the best way to ensure the future of Philippine democracy."

There are a number of potential problems with this formulation, especially from the standpoint of an openly radical Socialist and anti-Capitalist politics. But then, this is perhaps precisely the first point of divergence.

In his writings, Walden Bello often champions progressive values in front of a broad political audience. Even in his essential work on political economy, The Anti-Development State, Bello has avoided talking directly about Socialism. This is understandable, considering that even in his Rappler piece, Bello argues that even concepts supposedly as basic as "human rights" are far removed from the Filipino consciousness. How much more socialism? Thus, even while critiquing the neoliberal economic framework of Capitalism, Bello's recommendations end up taking the form of pro-"Economic Development" and "Democracy" rhetoric.

But we all understand that economic development under Capitalism is economic development only for the ruling elites. And a formally "democratic" (neo)liberal regime cannot guarantee an appreciation for human rights among the public. Something else is needed.

III

But perhaps the key difference between the Bello formulation and other radical Leftist assessments is one around the notion of universality and the supposed inherent sacredness of "human rights." Bello appears to approve of this latter type of formulation.

A radical Leftist take on this question can go like this:

Human rights are not innate or universal or true at all times and at all places. They do not in fact belong to human beings just by the mere fact of being born. Human rights are not attributes belonging to human beings which the community is then encouraged to observe and respect.

Rather, a more effective use of the concept would be to present human rights as exhortations for each and every single member of society to recognize -- and struggle for -- the betterment of their fellow members in society.

Formulated this way, we do not have "innate" rights. What we have is a promise -- or a conviction -- that the community will be able to provide us with a world that will allow each of us to reach our full potential as human beings. But what guarantees this promise is nothing else than the social and political order we have built for ourselves to realize these very goals.

Without a society that guarantees the betterment of each and every single member, no human rights can exist. And without a politics that allows us to distinguish the oppressor and the oppressed in society, no human rights consciousness can advance.

At present, this politics is the politics of Socialism.

IV

Thus, a more effective human rights campaign in the country can be carried out with a reinvigoration of radical Leftist politics. This is the sort of politics that will categorically state that the achievement of life's fullness under Capitalism is a dead end.

Given that the overwhelming characteristic of the Philippine society is grave economic inequality, a meaningful struggle for human rights must place poverty – by the destruction of the capitalist order which  propagates this inequality – at the forefront of its agenda.

What actually killed any appreciation of human rights in this country is the mass poverty that our people suffer day by day. In a society where poverty riots, people will not value life. In such a society, life is in fact cheap. That the mass of Filipinos do not find the daily loss of life alarming speaks directly of the value of life to them. In a situation of mass poverty and misery, what difference would it make if some scalawag that has taken a bit of drugs will be gunned down by the police, when people who don't do drugs don't have much of a life to show for anyway?

In struggling for positive rights -- the main content of Socialist politics -- we can most effectively give life to the notion of human rights. From a strategic standpoint, this would also make more sense to the Filipino masses as it speaks more closely to their own day-by-day concerns. Instead of telling them to recognize such a grand concept as “human rights,” we can show them that the very struggle for a decent wage, for regular employment, for land reform, for an end to discrimination -- constitute the very best promise of the human rights concept.

Besides, arguing only for fundamental rights makes the Left no different from bourgeois liberals who campaign just as tirelessly as the Left in this arena. And yet, as Bello himself said in a recent interview with Jacobin Magazine, the Left should exercise caution not to fall into the trap of being led by the traditional bourgeois elites in being in opposition to Rodrigo Duterte.

Already, we are seeing the increasing voice of entities like the Church, the New York-based Human Rights Watch, and, sadly, the Americans and other international "human rights groups" – actors who have not uttered a peep about the mass social inequality that has plagued our country for years. (Indeed, actors who may have directly or indirectly contributed to our society's present state.)

The proposal is thus to aim for a socialist society where poverty is not the overruling factor that determines an individual's life, where one can attain not only the dignity of living as, but also living with fellow human beings whose lives are not determined by the contingencies of want. Hopefully, by this, we can revive a new struggle for Socialism.