Interview with Claire Mallinson

'Rights and wrongs’
Matthew Clayfield, The Australian,
10 December 2008, p. 13

ELEANOR Roosevelt called it the "international Magna Carta". Pope John Paul II described it as "one of the highest expressions of the human conscience of our time". The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, one of the most influential documents in the world, was adopted 60 years ago today.

The UN General Assembly voted 48-0 (with eight abstentions) on December 10, 1948, to endorse the declaration, the first international expression of equal rights for all.

According to former South African archbishop Desmond Tutu and former Irish president and UN high commissioner for human rights Mary Robinson, the document remains "the single most important reference point for discussion of ethical values across national, ideological and cultural divides".

At the time of its adoption, it was an expression of hope and a willingness to do better. The wounds of World War II were still raw and details about Nazi atrocities in Europe were still coming to light.

Everywhere you looked in Europe, there were vivid signs of the past. Even the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, where the declaration was adopted, carried with it echoes of war: it was here, across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower, that Adolf Hitler had his picture taken eight years earlier.

The declaration came about as the result of courageous leadership, says Amnesty International Australia's national director Claire Mallinson, and the document is as relevant today as it was 60 years ago.

"It's the driving force behind almost all human rights standards and humanitarian work in the world today," she says.

"And I think what's really exciting is that we have an opportunity in 2008 to renew our commitment to it.

"There's a new generation of leaders coming through - whether that's in Australia, the United States and Europe, or in Asia, Africa and Latin America - and the optimist in me thinks this generational change will provide us with a real opportunity to turn the words and the ideals (of the declaration) into action all over again."

She points at improvements in human rights over the past 60 years as evidence of the declaration's influence.

"I never thought I would see peace in Northern Ireland in my lifetime," Mallinson says. "That's happened. People didn't imagine the Berlin Wall coming down. It happened. People didn't think apartheid would end in South Africa, and people were very sceptical about Barack Obama making it to the White House. Change does happen."

She points to the adoption by the UN of various covenants and conventions - including those recognising the rights of refugees, women and children - and the establishment of the International Criminal Court in The Hague as further cause for celebration.

"We have seen significant improvements in people's lives because of these measures," she says.

Mallinson thinks determination and courage are required to turn the world into a better place. Such qualities were evident when work on the document began in early 1947. The task of drafting the document fell to a team of diplomats led by Roosevelt.

On its adoption, Roosevelt noted: "This Universal Declaration of Human Rights may well become the international Magna Carta of all men everywhere." One of her fellow members on the committee, Lebanese philosopher Charles Malik, declared: "It will be an international document of the first order of importance and it will be read and pondered by our children's children."

However, the declaration has not always been the most popular of documents. Back in 1948, members of the Soviet bloc abstained from voting on the declaration on the grounds that the final draft did not explicitly condemn fascism and Nazism. Saudi Arabia abstained because the document upheld equal marital rights for men and women, and endorsed a person's right to change their religion. South Africa attributed its abstention to philosophical differences: the country's minority government had introduced apartheid that year and was fully aware that the system violated the declaration's conventions.

More recently, the declaration has come under fire from various directions: Islamic countries have been particularly vociferous, claiming it is a culturally and religiously insensitive document that expresses Judeo-Christian beliefs about the individual in secular form.

On August 5, 1990, member states of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference adopted the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam as a response to the universal declaration.

Perhaps a more reasonable criticism might be that the declaration's non-binding nature means the document's 30 articles can be disregarded and abused. There is, some have argued, no obligation or incentive to abide by the contents of the declaration.

However, although the declaration indeed cannot be enforced, it has nonetheless manifested itself over the past 60 years in treaties and laws the world over, as well as in various international and national institutions. It has influenced the tone and tenor of most national constitutions since 1948 and has inspired a way of thinking about international relations that places human rights at the forefront.

It was for this reason that Roosevelt was adamant the document be adopted as a declaration rather than as a treaty. In her speech on the evening of its adoption, she urged the UN to "keep clearly in mind the basic character of the document".

However susceptible the declaration may be to occasional - sometimes flagrant - abuse, it is also flexible and imbued with what Italian diplomat Marcello Spatafora once described as "creative force".

"Individuals, governments and corporations need to use the declaration as a reference point and make it a living, breathing document," Mallinson says.

But improving people's lot is not always an easy task. Patrick Naagbanton has repeatedly been arrested for his work in Nigeria, where he co-ordinates the Centre for Environment, Human Rights and Development. In addition to keeping an eye on human rights abuses, he monitors the movement of arms in and out of the country. Speaking from the Niger Delta, Naagbanton says while the work is dangerous, it is also necessary.

"I'm not one of those Nigerians who wants to seek comfort in Europe," he says. "We need to stand up here and fight to achieve these fundamental rights and our freedom.

"My approach to human rights is very practical. Human rights and an open society can only be achieved through struggle.

"If people just sit down and expect a miracle to come from somewhere else, well, I don't think that will happen in this country. The (declaration) plays a very important role in all this."

For Somchai Homlaor, who has spent 25 years campaigning in his native Thailand and now works to ease tensions between Muslim militants and Buddhist security forces in the nation's south, the declaration has a similar instrumental value, serving as a model for a society that still has a way to go on human rights. It doesn't matter that its articles are not legally enforceable, he says, for human rights are not only or even predominantly a legal matter.

"Human rights cannot be implemented through the law. Human rights are a cultural thing," Homlaor says.

"Talk to the poor. These are people who feel that human dignity has not been afforded to them. This is very important to understand: human dignity is important. And you can't have dignity without economic, social and cultural rights. These rights have been recognised in the declaration. Now they have to be recognised by Thai society. They have to become the norm."

In an opinion piece for The Scotsman this week, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Tutu and Robinson wrote that discrimination, oppression, injustice, ignorance, exploitation and poverty remain resistant to many humanitarian efforts to alleviate them.

"The declaration's enlightened vision of individual freedom, social protection, economic opportunity and duty to community is still unfulfilled," they write.

Mallinson admits there is room for improvement. "Torture is still happening in 81 countries. Prisoners of conscience are still detained in 45.

"We had a horrendous situation in Somalia only a few weeks ago when a 13-year-old girl, who had gone to the authorities to say she'd been raped, ended up being accused of adultery and was stoned to death."

And there are problems in Western countries as well. She praises US president-elect Obama's plans to close Guantanamo Bay, noting the US military's use of so-called extraordinary rendition and waterboarding, a form of torture.

Australia is not without its shortcomings. "Sadly, when it comes to violence against women, the stats are horrific in this country. And when you look at issues involving the indigenous population we're clearly not where we ought to be," Mallinson says.

Is the world getting better? Does she feel hopeful? "I'm always hopeful," she says. "I'm an optimist."