Abstract
The expansion of human rights provisions has produced an increasing number of human rights practitioners and delineated human rights as a field of its own. Questions of who is practicing human rights and how they practice it have become important. This paper considers the question of human rights practice and the agency of practitioners, arguing that practice should not be conceived as the application of philosophy, but instead approached from a sociological point of view. Whatever the structuring effect of political institutions, human rights is being defined more expansively by practitioners. The weakness of international institutions and the interpretive scope of human rights discourse produce significant opportunity for practitioners to interpret the meaning of human rights. Our exploratory interviews of a small sample of practitioners reveal widely varying histories, in which they interpret their own work as “human rights” practice in differing ways. Practitioners who in the past thought of themselves differently, now identify as human rights activists. They are also becoming more professional, but concerned about professionalization. Their self-interpretations reflect these concerns and also respond to the necessities of career events. Through the conscious and unconscious aspects of their practice, practitioners exercise considerable agency in adapting human rights discourse to their own concerns while also being critical of it.
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Notes
In response to a question about the question of practice during the International Studies Association 2010 Conference in New Orleans, the philosopher Charles Beitz affirmed that he did indeed consider himself a practitioner.
In any area of policy making, even actors involved in only the implementation of policy can have an effect on the meaning of the policy; see Lipsky (1980) on “street-level bureaucrats”.
On human rights rhetoric taking on different vernacular forms in different locations, see Hauser (2008).
The claim was reviewed and rejected by the parliament. See House of Lords, House of Commons Joint Committee on Human Rights, Legislative Scrutiny: Financial Services Bill and the Pre-Budget Report. Third Report of Session 2009–10, HL Paper 21, HC 184. The Stationery Office Limited.
For an alternative view, that the sovereignty of states is being transformed by transnational human rights norms, to which states must increasingly subscribe in seeking legitimacy, see Levy and Sznaider (2006).
See, for example, Johnstone (2003) on how, in the international context, the UN Secretary-General relies primarily on the power of persuasion to exert influence.
On the development of human rights discourse in domestic settings, see Gordon and Berkovitch (2007).
The identity of all interviewees has been changed to protect their anonymity. We have permission from each interviewee to report direct quotations and the names of their organizations.
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Acknowledgments
Many thanks to our anonymous referees for their insightful comments; our interviewees for their time and candor; to Joe Hoover and Marta Iniguez de Heredia for organizing the ISA Panel at which we presented an earlier version of this paper, and to Kirsten Ainley for her helpful comments as discussant.
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Redhead, R., Turnbull, N. Towards a Study of Human Rights Practitioners. Hum Rights Rev 12, 173–189 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-010-0180-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-010-0180-9