Human Rights Self-Monitoring:A Proposal for the Northern European Democracies

Abstract

This report recommends that Human Rights in Developing Countries adopt a radically new approach to monitoring human rights. The "old way" is to monitor aid-recipient governments' violations of the human rights of their own citizens. The new way, called herein "self-monitoring", entails careful monitoring of Northern countries' own contributions to, or violations of, human rights in the South. The new way responds to concerns about historical and cultural sensitivity, and about moral and political consistency. The contributions of Northern governments to human rights through bilateral and multilateral activities, including the arms trade and involvement in international financial institutions, could be monitored. But so also could the effects on human rights of transnational actors (such as multinational corporations and NGOs) and even private citizens of Northern countries. Self-monitoring will focus on the areas where likelihood of impact is greatest – at home. Jack Donnelly, Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 1982, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of International Relations, Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver (Colorado, USA) has written extensively on human rights issues. Rhoda E. Howard, Ph. D. McGill University 1976, Professor of Sociology, McMaster University (Ontario, Canada) is working on human rights with an emphasis on Africa.