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Do states have an obligation to intervene to protect human rights? Why or why not

AaRON4

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Do states have an obligation to intervene to protect human rights? Why or why not
 
Why should any State be concerned with the "human rights" of people who aren't its citizens?
 
It is my understanding that the defense of our rights is the very purpose of the state.
 
It is my understanding that the defense of our rights is the very purpose of the state.

Well, except for not agreeing with you, I think you made my point right there-- our rights.
 
Well, except for not agreeing with you, I think you made my point right there-- our rights.

Care to explain why you disagree?

I thought that the defense of our rights was the purpose of a military, law courts, the police, and the very reason UHC advocates try to claim that its a right. But perhaps I don't understand Republics and Constitutions and you could enlighten me?
 
KTR means that a country should only be concerned about the rights of its own citizens, not the citizens the citizens of other countries. You both agree, unless Lachaen you mean that, for example, the United States should intervene to prevent human rights abuses in (insert name of third world country here).
 
Care to explain why you disagree?

I believe the purpose of the State is to support the orderly operation of society. I don't even believe in the concept of "human rights" as expressed by liberals and Libertarians; human beings have only those rights which they are capable of demanding and enforcing.

But perhaps I don't understand Republics and Constitutions and you could enlighten me?

Not every State is a Republic or has a Constitution. Yet, every Republic is a State.
 
Care to explain why you disagree?

I thought that the defense of our rights was the purpose of a military, law courts, the police, and the very reason UHC advocates try to claim that its a right. But perhaps I don't understand Republics and Constitutions and you could enlighten me?

If it isn't defined as a right by law then it isn't a "right" but rather a "privilege" which is often confused with a right, especially confused with real civil rights.

Likewise, "the state" is only obligated to intervene within government entities. Private entities are not always covered by federal laws or may in fact be a "right" of an individual guaranteed by law which may conflict with "human rights" which are often philisophical at best.
 
It is my understanding that the defense of our rights is the very purpose of the state.

The purpose of the state is to grant certain benefits to society. It is these benefits and the historic liberties and duties which flow from the inception of a particular state that it is its duty to uphold not any abstract "natural" rights" if that is what you mean. The "natural", if that is an accurate word for them come only from society and the state.

Far am I from denying in theory, full as far is my heart from withholding in practice (if I were of power to give or to withhold) the real rights of men. In denying their false claims of right, I do not mean to injure those which are real, and are such as their pretended rights would totally destroy. If civil society be made for the advantage of man, all the advantages for which it is made become his right. It is an institution of beneficence; and law itself is only beneficence acting by a rule. Men have a right to live by that rule; they have a right to do justice, as between their fellows, whether their fellows are in public function or in ordinary occupation. They have a right to the fruits of their industry and to the means of making their industry fruitful. They have a right to the acquisitions of their parents, to the nourishment and improvement of their offspring, to instruction in life, and to consolation in death. Whatever each man can separately do, without trespassing upon others, he has a right to do for himself; and he has a right to a fair portion of all which society, with all its combinations of skill and force, can do in his favor. In this partnership all men have equal rights, but not to equal things. He that has but five shillings in the partnership has as good a right to it as he that has five hundred pounds has to his larger proportion. But he has not a right to an equal dividend in the product of the joint stock; and as to the share of power, authority, and direction which each individual ought to have in the management of the state, that I must deny to be amongst the direct original rights of man in civil society; for I have in my contemplation the civil social man, and no other. It is a thing to be settled by convention.Edmund Burke
 
No. They do not.
Quite the contrary. In my opinion, in any intervention regarding human rights abuses within a state the burden is upon the interviener to ensure that any such intervention undertaken in fact bought an overwhelmingly enhanced situation for the society involved.

This is to say, that if there is a high chance that all you will do is make it worse, let them work it out amongst themselves. You cant always save everyone, even if that is the desire. I think were the world has a genuine capability to intervene in genocide, that it can theoretically be undertaken. But with strict stipulations. Ive only been able to think of a few ways to do this effectively, and they are very situationaly dependent.

Foreign interventions can create more harm than good, in my opinion.
One needs to be very careful, and ward of opertunistic urges when dealing with such matters. As once things go sour, one loses the capability to act constructively.
 
No. They do not.
Quite the contrary. In my opinion, in any intervention regarding human rights abuses within a state the burden is upon the interviener to ensure that any such intervention undertaken in fact bought an overwhelmingly enhanced situation for the society involved.

This is to say, that if there is a high chance that all you will do is make it worse, let them work it out amongst themselves. You cant always save everyone, even if that is the desire. I think were the world has a genuine capability to intervene in genocide, that it can theoretically be undertaken. But with strict stipulations. Ive only been able to think of a few ways to do this effectively, and they are very situationaly dependent.

Foreign interventions can create more harm than good, in my opinion.
One needs to be very careful, and ward of opertunistic urges when dealing with such matters. As once things go sour, one loses the capability to act constructively.

How about Kosovo?
 
How about Kosovo?

It is not my area of expertise. But I think there were significant problems with how it was handled. On the one hand, large portions of the local muslim population ressents what it percieves to be a western deprivation of arms to resist serb agression. On the other hand, I am under the impression that serbian populations greatly ressent the brutal air campaign that was conducted aggainst them, and the indiscriminance of airial bombardment from millitants/combatants, and civilian populations (many of whom wanted NOTHING to do with what was going on). I do not have an opinion upon the disintegration of the yugoslav state by an international coalition. I do know that it is problematic, and a source of anti western resentment to many.

In short, despite (in my opinion) acting primaraly to avert tragedy (in my opinion), that results have been mixed.

This conclusion re: yugoslavia and kosovo more particularly fits within the above quoted (by you) statement, that such matters are extremely problematic.
 
If we made the ability to topple an autocratic government and establish a democracy one of the main focuses of our military spending, I promise you we would get very very good at it very very fast. That's why we spend the trillions.
 
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