rights three broad connections

There are basically three broader terms in which I see the documents connected. The first one is their dependence of the historical context from which they emanated. Although, rights are often described as abstract and legal entities, there is a sense in which those legal and abstract entities are tied to specific historical contexts. In other words, most of the declarations of rights are preceded by the wrongs that prompted their existence. The other point is that although there are constant references to the universality of rights, that universality is dependent upon the acknowledgement and responsibility of States and once one of those States refuses to comply, the supposed universality and self-evidence of the mentioned rights is questioned. The third point is that it is almost unavoidable to see the declarations of rights as rules of chess, or rules that should be followed inasmuch as one wants to play a certain game; the game of life in community one could argue.

1- Most of the declarations of rights seem to be tied to specifically historical contexts, like the Magna Carta, the US Constitution and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Even when those historical contexts are made explicit as in the case of the Magna Carta or the US declaration or when they are made implicit, as in the Canadian Charter, those texts are more like road maps, a plan which dwells on the reasons for its existence, a point of departure, a wrong that they are meant to redress.

Usually when people talk about rights, one thinks of a fairly abstract figure to which one only appeals when one does not have rights; however, reading those declarations of rights one after the other brought to light the fact that none of them can escape their local specificity. If rights are so self-evident, why each of those declarations dwells so much on the conditions of their coming to light? Sometimes when one reads constitutional documents there is a point at which it is really difficult to see  the ‘nationality’ of the document. It may refer to previous laws, or constitutional amendments, but there are not historical references in the text. But in most of the declarations of rights, there are historical references done through the text that locate it historically, either through an overt exposition of the context as in the case of the Magna Carta, or through an acknowledged of a quarrel, which the text is meant to correct.

In the particular case of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms it is truth that there is not implicit reference in the body of the text about the social tensions that the text is trying to resolve. Perhaps because of that lack of reference, perhaps due to a lack of knowledge of the context in which the Charter is written, the sections on language tend to be seen as obscure and unnecessary. However, when one looks closely at the historical context, one could argue that the Charter is a piece of a broader intent within Canadian politics to try to ground the legal basis that could unite the country to something other than its dependency to the British Crown. But not only to unite into something other than the consciousness of a colony; at the same time the Charter wanted to integrate the demands of the Quebec population, which had served as the argument for their interest in independence. In other words, most of the provisions on language in the Charter, are a response to the complaints from the Quebecois about their perceived threats to the existence of their language and it is that context that the text is written. So even if the context is manifestly put forward as in the case of the Magna Carta, even within the legal abstractness in which rights are written, those rights are tied to historical contexts that determined them.

2- Declarations of rights are dependent upon the states that are supposed to enforce that universality. So they are not so much universal, they are only pretended to be universal, but that universality is only attained through the compliance of each State and as soon as one of those States decides to transgress the act of faith that rights entail, there is a conundrum and a whole ethical debate about how to resolve the violation of rights. In other words, declarations of rights are statements of good faith that are dependable on the good faith of the signatories. Perhaps that is one of the biggest difficulties of rights; they are too grandiose to be declared and too feeble to be enforced.

3- To a certain extent I cannot avoid thinking of rights as one thinks of the rules of chess. Certain rules that one is supposed to follow in order to “play” a “proper game”, but there are instances when a proper game is not precisely what is sought and there seems to be shortage of alternatives to enforce those proper rules of play, once one of the players decides not to abide by those rules. Sure it could be argued that diplomacy and moral coercion can eventually serve the purpose of persuade the non-complying states to agree with the ‘universal’ declarations of rights, but history is full of examples where neither diplomacy, not moral coercion have been enough to guarantee the universality of human rights.