Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
main 'drivers' of development, are difficult to hold to account. Further
criticisms of RBD include the limited support for the Declaration on the
Right to Development by key donor countries including the UK, US,
Germany, Japan, Sweden, Denmark; and concerns that the legalistic
approach of RBD will result in a neglect of the poorest people and a
devaluing of grassroots work (Tsikata, 2007).
Culture and Rights-based Development
A number of tensions emerge when rights-based approaches to devel-
opment are considered in relation to the notion of culture. The rights
discourse is premised on the idea that there are fundamental univer-
sal human rights that affect all human beings around the world,
regardless of culture, and that these can be defined, protected,
respected and fulfilled through the legal mechanisms of international
human rights instruments. This universalist approach directly con-
tradicts more cultural relativist positions that argue that the mean-
ings associated with the idea of people's rights and obligations are
socially- and culturally-constructed, and hence vary according to the
historical and geographical context. Critics of the rights discourse
have argued that the concept of universal human rights is based on
Western liberal notions of subjecthood that emerged in Europe during
the Enlightenment period in the eighteenth century (Schech and
Haggis, 2000). At this time, new discourses of science and universal
reason, linked to colonial expansion and racial ideologies, were replac-
ing previous world views. Some commentators have thus argued that
the notion of universal human rights, as defined and implemented
through the United Nations legal framework, is an ethnocentric con-
cept that emerged from a distinctly 'Western' or 'Judeo-Christian'
cultural imperialist discourse (Preis, 2002).
Furthermore, the individualistic nature of the legal discourse associ-
ated with human rights conflicts with the communitarian values evi-
dent in many countries in the global South. Here, people are viewed as
having reciprocal rights and responsibilities to their families and com-
munities, rather than viewing an individual as a rights-holder who can
make particular claims against the state. Indeed, disenfranchisement
with the universalist and individualistic nature of the UN rights dis-
course led to the establishment of African regional charters on human
rights, such as the African Charter on Human and People's Rights
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