Torture: political, cultural and economic relativisms: the clash of convictions

“We must bevery clear on one fact: growth cannot always generate equality. Growth doeswhat it does, which is growth. It is thereafter the responsibility of publicpolicy to provide the necessary responses ensuring that the benefits fromgrowth are, as much as possible, shared equitably.”

Relating to the questionof informal settlements, whether they should be razed or upgraded:

“..the ministersays the government cannot do anything about it (ed. note. a large slum)because the people are adamant to be relocated. They want cheap housing closeto the industrial areas where they earn a living. Besides, Non-GovernmentalOrganisations encourage the squatters so they can keep advocating for them andmaking money from international donor agencies.”

Thesestatements were made in May 2008 at the African Development Bank’s AnnualMeeting in Maputo, Mozambique. The first was made by Dr. Donald Kaberuka,President of African Development Bank, and the second in a press interview by aKenyan Minister.

Both areshocking to the extent that they clearly subordinate respect for basic humanrights to economic development “imperatives”. That of the Bank’s President iseven more shocking in that it clearly ignores years of policy research in theacademic world and by the World Bank and others that demonstrates theimportance to social cohesion and to people’s economic wellbeing of the type ofeconomic development chosen. It must be mentioned, however, thatthese statements were in contrast to many others at the Meeting underlining theneed to fight poverty and inequality and respect human rights.

As shocking asthey are, those two statements illustrate two challenges to ensuring respectfor all human rights that are found in many countries throughout the world andthat are fostered, in part, by a very specific development theory based onunfettered markets that ignore human rights.

The firstchallenge is the view that economic growth is good in itself and should beviewed in isolation from other values, when it has been clearly establishedthat the kind of economic growth selected can, in fact, create poverty andinequality.

Thesecond maintains that valuable development projects are stymied by the claimsof people to have basic rights respected and thus by implication thatdevelopment must override their rights. In both, the human person’s rights aresubordinated to other interests.

The verynegative consequences of these two approaches have been clearly illustrated byOMCT in its work on the economic, social and cultural root causes of tortureand other forms of violence. Macro-economic policies that neglect human rightscannot avoid leading to increased poverty and inequality. This poverty andinequality leads people to demand respect for their rights and this, in turn,is met with violence, including torture and cruel, inhuman and degradingtreatment and widespread state repression. Tragically, this violence andrepression leads to more poverty and inequality; it is a vicious circle.

Individualprojects in the area of mining, dam building, clearance of informal settlementsand the establishment of economic export zones outside protective legislationalso lead all too often to violations of the basic human rights of the poorestsectors of society. Here again, peaceful protests and resistance are often metwith violent repression and that violence has a serious negative impact onliving conditions.

Unfortunately,this can lead much further. In countries like Uzbekistan, Egypt and thePhilippines, reports by the UN and other organisations have explicitly linkedthe desperation of some to increased poverty and inequality and the lack ofavenues for peaceful opposition to armed rebellion.