INTRODUCTION: HUMAN RIGHTS AS A PROBLEM

Today it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that if abuses such as torture, state violence and oppression in general are to be prevented, then the implementation of human rights calls for a radically new point of departure. In this regard, it is crucial that we face up to the problems of the past that have often rendered human rights impotent.

Despite being compromised, so that they are, as often as not, honoured more in the breach than in the observance, we still need to consider why human rights are at the same time implicated in many aspects of global politics today. Why is it still possible to embarrass nations with regard to their human rights record? Why is it that human rights are used as a spearhead for global economic expansion? Why are they still used as a justification for one nation-state violating the sovereignty of another, as was the case with the American intervention in Iraq? Why did Nelson Mandela once say that human rights were central to international relations?

A possible and pragmatic response might be that human rights, which are really only enforceable within nation-states, also confirm the privileging of the individual over society and the state – over the broad collectivity, in other words. Being tied to the principle of individualism implies that human rights enhance the expansion of market relations, as individuals seem to slip neatly into the shoes of the consumer. Individual rights, it can thus be claimed, are de facto consumer rights, and it is the Western market system which stands to gain most here.