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Social versus Political Rights

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

C. Michael MacMillan
C. Michael MacMillan
Affiliation:
Mount Saint Vincent University
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Abstract

In the past century, the notion of human rights has expanded significantly to include a variety of social rights. The introduction of this new category of human rights inspired a lively debate concerning the authenticity of such claims, focussing particularly on the ways in which social rights differ from political rights. This article examines the major points at issue in the debate. The important differences emphasized to date are those relating to costs, universality, and the correlativity of rights and duties. In each of these major areas of dispute, analysis indicates that the allegedly fundamental distinctions between social and political rights are in fact differences of degree, not of kind and, in fact, social rights conform both to the broad logic and the established practice of human rights.

Résumé

Au siècle dernier, le concept des droits humains s'est amplifié d'une manière significative au point d'englober une grande variété de droits sociaux. L'introduction de cette nouvelle catégorie des droits humains a inspiré un débat animé concernant l'authenticité de ces revendications, cela démontrant tout particulièrement de quelle façon les droits sociaux different des droits politiques. Cet article examine les points important à discuter dans ce débat, notamment les coûts, l'application universelle, et la double corrélation des droits et des devoirs. L'analyse indique que les prétendues distinctions fondamentales entre les droits sociaux et les droits politiques ne reflètent que des différences minimes: les droits sociaux s'accordent en principe à la pleine logique et à la pratique établie des droits humains.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 19 , Issue 2 , June 1986 , pp. 283 - 304
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1986

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References

1 This term is basically synonymous with what others have called “welfare rights,” “social and economic rights,” “rights to well-being” or “positive rights.” I would take issue only with the latter term, because it suggests an erroneous distinction between social and political rights, namely that social rights impose duties not required by political rights.

2 Laqueurand, WalterRubin, Barry (eds.), The Human Rights Reader (New York: New American Library, 1979), 197–200.Google Scholar The various historical documents are conveniently presented in this text. It is worth noting that some social rights have been included in earlier documents, so that the Universal Declaration is not a novel contribution to the concept of social rights.

3 The former position is advanced by Maurice Cranston and the latter by Macpherson, C. B., Raphael, D. D. and Schneider, Peter in their respective articles in Raphael, D. D. (ed.). Political Theory and the Rights of Man (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1967).Google Scholar

4 Friedman, Kathi V., Legitimation of Social Rights and the Western Welfare State: A Weberian Perspective (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. 1981). 139. 139.Google Scholar

5 Nagel, Thomas, Mortal Questions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 114.Google Scholar

6 Cranston, Maurice, What Are Human Rights?(New York: Basic Books, 1962), 36.Google Scholar It is worth noting that I do not wish to suggest that Cranston's definition is better than others. 1 use it principally because, as a prominent opponent of social rights, it is particularly instructive to note that his definition of human rights does not automatically exclude social rights.

7 Ibid., 40–41.

8 Relevant examples here include Raphael, D. D., “Human Rights. Old and New,” in Raphael, D. D. (ed.). Political Theory, 65:Google ScholarPeffer, Rodney. “A Defense of Rights to Well-Being,” Philosophy and Public Affairs 8 (1978), 85;Google ScholarNickel, James W.. “Are Human Rights Utopian?” Philosophy and Public Affairs 11 (1982). 263.Google Scholar

9 Shue, Henry, Basic Rights: Subsistence, Affluence and U.S. Foreign Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1980), 19.Google Scholar

10 Ibid., 23.

11 MollerOkin, Susan, “Liberty and Welfare: Somelssues in Human RightsTheory“, in Pennock, J. Roland and Chapman, John W. (eds.), Human Rights (Nomos 23) (New York: New York University Press, 1981), 244.Google Scholar

12 Downie, R. S., “Social Equality”, in Rosenbaum, Alan S. (ed.), The Philosophy of Human Rights: International Perspectives (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, Contributions in Philosophy, No. 15, 1980), 134.Google Scholar

13 While not addressing the issue explicitly. Nozick argues that social expenditures are in principle a violation of our property rights. See Nozick, Robert, Anarchy, State and Utopia (New York: Basic Books, 1974).Google Scholar For a cogent critique of Nozick's views, see Scheffler, Samuel, “Natural Rights, Equality and Minimal State”. in Paul, Jeffrey (ed.), Reading Nozick (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1981), 148–69.Google Scholar See also the article on redistribution by Judith Jarvis Thomson, “Some Ruminations on Rights”, ibid., 130–47.

14 Friedman, Legitimation of Social Rights, 154.

15 Fried, Charles, Right and Wrong (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), 122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Ibid.

17 Walzer, Michael, Spheres of Justice (New York: Basic Books. 1983), 66.Google Scholar The issue of defining human needs is more extensively treated in Leiss, William, The Limits to Satisfaction (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976).Google Scholar In particular, Leiss emphasizes the artificiality of separating biological and cultural components of needs.

18 The emphasis on human nature as the basis of the definition of human needs is articulated in McCloskey, H. J., “Human Needs, Rights and Political Values”, American Philosophical Quarterly 13 (1976), 1–4.Google Scholar

19 See Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) and, for the most recent major statement of the general approach, Flathman, Richard E., The Practice of Rights (London: Cambridge University Press, 1976).Google Scholar

20 Fried, Right and Wrong, 114.

21 Ibid., 124.

22 Walzer, , Spheres of Justice, 75Google Scholar.

23 Cranston, Maurice, “Human Rights, Real and Supposed,” in D. D. Raphael, (ed.), Political Theory, 49Google Scholar.

24 Nickel, , “Are Human Rights Utopian?” 251Google Scholar. Some important problems concerning the implementation of economic rights in the developing world are addressed in Charles Beitz, R., “Economic Rights and Distributive Justice in Developing Societies,” World Politics 33 (1981), 321–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25 Cranston, , “Human Rights, Real and Supposed,” 49Google Scholar.

26 Nickel, , “Are Human Rights Utopian?” 260Google Scholar.

27 Ibid., 261.

28 Peffer, , “Rights to Weil-Being.” 84Google Scholar. It is noteworthy that the broad category includes both social and political rights (to life, to sustenance, forexamplejasdoesthe narrow sense) (education, fair trial).

29 Cranston, , “Human Rights, Real and Supposed,” 49Google Scholar. This approach is consistent with the understanding embodied in Article 22 of the Universal Declaration, which states that “Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realisation, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organizational resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality” (emphasis added). Clearly the language commits each state to an effort commensurate with resources, rather than to a specific, identical content of social rights.

30 One notable exception is Peffer (“Rights to Weil-Being,” 81–82), who takes as axiomatic that a billionaire has a duty to donate his wealth to save a nation from starving. One might well challenge this suggestion, however, on the grounds that the billionaire is excused from such a duty on Peffer's own martyr exception rule, which states that we are not required to engage in significant self-sacrifice.

31 Raphael, , “Human Rights,” 65Google Scholar.

32 Cranston, , “Human Rights: A Reply to Professor Raphael,” in Raphael (ed.). Political Theory, 97Google Scholar.

33 Mayo, Bernard, “What are Human Rights?” in Raphael (ed.). Political Theory, 72–74Google Scholar.

34 Feinberg, Joel, Social Philosophy (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1973), 56, 58Google Scholar.

35 Ibid., 62.

36 Ibid., 66–67.

37 Lyons, David, “The Correlativity of Rights and Duties,” Nous 4 (1970), 48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38 Donnelly, Jack, “How are Rights and Duties Correlative?” Journal of Value Inquiry 16 (1982), 293.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

39 Locke, John, Two Treatises of Government, rev. ed., Laslett, Peter (ed.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960)Google Scholar, II, para. 6. Locke's views on natural rights are amply treated in Simmons, A. John, “Inalienable Rights and Locke's Treatises.” Philosophy and Public Affairs 12 (1983), 175–204Google Scholar: Tully, James, “The Framework of Natural Rights in Locke's Analysis of Property: A Contextual Reconstruction.” in Parel, Anthony and Flanagan, Thomas (eds.). Theories of Property: Aristotle to the Present (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1979), 115–38.Google Scholar

40 Locke is certainly not alone in recognizing some form of social right. Even the redoubtable Hobbes acknowledged a right to those things necessary for life. More generally, the question of the essential features of human rights has been actively debated throughout the history of the concept. For an analysis of these broader issues, see Tuck, Richard, Natural Rights Theories: Their Origin and Development (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

41 Carr, E. H., “The Rights of Man“ in UNESCO, Human Rights: Comments and Interpretations (London: Alan Wingate), (1949), 22.Google Scholar It is worth noting that the subsequently enacted Universal Declaration asserts, in Article 29(1), that ”Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.“ The more recent International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights expands upon this in its Preamble, which declares,” Realising that the individual, having duties to other individuals and to the community to which he belongs, is under a responsibility to strive for the promotion and observance of the rights recognized in the present Covenant....” While this does not specify the correlative duties for each of the enumerated rights, it does make clear that there is a duty of positive action toward their realization.

42 Shue, Basic Rights, 60.

43 Ibid., 62.

44 Fora recent effort to make a case for the priority of rights-based duties to compatriots before foreigners, while accepting the universality of duties, see Dagger, Richard, “Rights, Boundaries and the Bonds of Community: A Qualified Defense of Moral Parochialism,” American Political Science Review 79 (1985), 436–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

45 Feinberg, Social Philosophy, 57.

46 Flathman, The Practice of Rights, 92.

47 Ibid., 93, 94. It should be noted that Flathman acknowledges that the “active support” of Ds is important to the maintenace of rights, and ultimately concludes that D's role is “comparatively indeterminate” in the actual practice of rights (ibid.. 97, 98). It is worth recalling that such positive duties of Ds are embodied in the major international documents on human rights, a fact which surely suggests significant movement toward a wide currency in the practice of rights.

48 Locke's assertions that the role of government is to preserve Mankind and to enforce the Laws of Nature provide the foundation of a rationale for government action. Here the Law of Nature is the source of government duties in relation to such rights. Thus the government's responsibility for enforcing individual rights is more indirect with social rights than for political rights. With the relative demise of Natural Law theory, the link becomes quite obscure. For Locke's discussion of the rights and duties of sustenance, see Treatises, I, 42, and 11, 6, 25, 26; on government, see II, 134, 135. See also, Tully, “Locke on Property,” 127–29.

49 Peffer, “Rights to Weil-Being,” 87.

50 Bowie, Norman E. and Simon, Robert L., The Individual and the Political Order (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1977), 72;Google Scholar Nickel, “Are Human Rights Utopian?” 259; Shue, Basic Rights, chap. 6.