Human rights: Food for a thought we often ignore  ‘HR and equality’

Human Rights Reader 558

-Just so that you do not forget: Inequality is a much more serious problem than poverty.

[TLDR (too long didn’t read): This Reader helps you understand the differences between inequity, inequality and injustice and the implications this has for human rights. For a quick overview, just read the bolded text].

1. Key to this Reader is to understand that equality an equity are not the same.* In common usage, unfortunately, equity and equality are being wrongly used interchangeably. All there is is that there are mutually reinforcing pathways between inequitable processes and unequal outcomes. (Jody Harris) Let me explain.

*: As per WHO, “equity is the absence of avoidable or remediable differences among groups of people, whether these groups are defined socially, economically, demographically or geographically.”

2. Equality is focused on human rights (HR) outcomes. Equity tends to be wrongly interpreted as inclusion, meant to mean that those who live at the margins are the ones to receive basic social services and/or slightly higher incomes. But this interpretation does not even pretend to see any of the badly needed changes in the underlying power dynamics. ** (Stefano Prato)

**: We keep forgetting: Equal relations between un-equals reinforces inequality! (Yash Tandon) [I add this to my iron laws].

3. Equity is actually founded on distributive justice, i.e., the socially just allocation of goods and services. In this allocation, it is not about the final distribution, but about how that distribution is undertaken. So, equity is focused on process; it requires a fair distribution according to need. Many of the disadvantages claim holders live-under  come together and accrue into self-sustaining patterns of inequity (processes) and inequality (HR outcomes). (H. Jones)

4. Human rights activists are sometimes accused of jeopardizing economic growth when insisting on focusing on equity and equality. But more equity and equality need not hamper growth; they can indeed reinforce it. There is actually a strong negative link between highly unequal distribution of assets and subsequent rates of growth. [Note that equity and equality proponents are critical of the political viability/survival of economic growth].

5. What these activists call for is what are called equity modifiers that pertain to, just to mention a few, processes of: -geographic targeting, -targeting subsidies, -land reform, -greater investments in education, -water and sanitation, -health, -nutrition, -family planning, -employment, -aid to rural women, as well as -participation in setting priorities, -development of the non-farm economy and -taxing polluters and degraders… (Peter Hazell) So, to be equitable and HR compatible, the composition of public expenditure called for must increase expenditures on the preceding processes, as well as on other social services specifically directing them at those rendered most vulnerable.

Inequalities and injustice must first be defeated ideologically (T. Piketty)

6. Everywhere and every time, if a socio-economic force succeeded or failed it was in the realm of the ideas at play. The evolution of inequality is thus determined by the evolution of ideologies.*** [It is thus fitting to ask: Can an intellectual elite come up-with and impose top-down left wing ideas and thus defeat the ideas from the Right in an effort to defeat capitalism? (T. Piketty) Probably, as this Reader has always said, no, not top-down!].

***: Every aspect of our daily life can be and is influenced and distorted by power inequalities. Multiple inequalities actually overlap to create mutually reinforcing cycles of disadvantage that impinge on HR and are transmitted across generations. (UNDP)

7. To reinforce here then, inequity can be defined as unfairness of opportunities (processes) that result in inequalities (i.e., HR outcomes) --defined as preventable disparities in individuals’ dignity and living conditions. (UNDP) Inequity thus adds the moral dimension, i.e., the way in which wealth is unfairly distributed. (O. Northeim)

8. Inequalities in our world are of such a magnitude that reallocating a relatively small part of the income of the 10% richest social group (e.g., through progressive taxation, property taxes, luxury goods taxation, a Tobin-type tax, land reform) can potentially make a big dent in the income of the poorest 20%. I ask: Is this a left-wing idea?

9. It is the asymmetries of power created by the market that aggravate inequality. (R. Ricupero) Self-interest (the soul of the market) is the culprit; we have to put some heart into this self-interest, i.e., add a solidarity component, a HR component: A pipe dream?

10. Perhaps it all ought to start with looking at extreme poverty, not as a ‘necessary background condition’, but as a question calling for the discharge of solemn state obligations. If so, we urgently need to focus our demands on the roots of inequality (that often lie in the global order) and this requires us weaving the-human-rights-praxis-for-true-social-change into the broader social struggles the HR movement is carrying out everywhere.

11. Let us be clear: The state is, more and more, becoming an agent of private interests. It is no longer enough (if it ever was) to just ‘name and shame’ violations/violators of HR within the status-quo without challenging the fundamental design of the global economic architecture. Nor is it enough to set out ‘HR-based approaches’ without addressing the inequalities-in and contradictions-with the dominant neoliberal paradigm. States are too often either complicit or shackled (or both) by macroeconomic and policy prescriptions. But fighting austerity and economic growth or the role of the private sector requires a different praxis of HR (that these Readers keep insisting-on…).  (Alicia Yamin)

12. But beware: The concept of inequality as a HR violations outcome is indeed being slowly adopted by not-really-politically-involved intellectuals and some politicians, as well as by some development institutions. Far from this being subversive, it is becoming an organic part of the bourgeois ideology that, to save itself, desperately tries to hide the true machinations of capitalism. (Maciek Wisniewski)

Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City

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