ICON S Conference 17 – 19 June 2016 Humboldt University Berlin

23 BEYOND THE INDIVIDUAL: EXPLOR-
ING COLLECTIVITIES WITHIN THE
FRAMEWORK OF HUMAN RIGHTS
Emerging from the liberal tradition, human rights law
has been crafted to reflect an individualistic focus.
Over the years a growing awareness to the problems
of disadvantaged social groups and minorities brought
about changes in theory as well as in social and legal
practice. These changes include a re-interpretation of
what constitute discrimination and the acknowledgment
of minority rights. Despite these changes, the
individualistic focus still prevails, and doubts about
the compatibility of the existing framework continue to
occupy scholarly attention. This panel will explore new
perspectives that might contribute to accommodating
human rights law and practice with social realities. Four
different examples of how a collective dimension has
been or can be incorporated into human rights theory
and practice will be presented. Panelists will present
works dealing with human and collective rights, analyzed
in its socio-economic and political implications.
Participants Tamar Hofnung
Bruck Teshome
Limor Yehuda
Gabriele D’amico
Name of Chair Tomer Broude
Room DOR24 1.403
Tamar Hofnung: Translating inequality: Affirmative
Action Policy as a collective project
The question of how public policy is consolidated
has long fascinated political science inquiry. While
scholars agree that the way problems are constituted
determines the type of state intervention, how people
come to conceptualize social issues as problems
that deserve a particular state response remains a
puzzle. This paper shows how translation within the
initial phase of issues rising to public awareness can
play a key role in determining policy directions and
outcomes. Through examining the implicit role of metaphors
and heuristic procedures, the paper sheds light
on the subconscious manner through which heuristic
processes shape concrete understandings. Utilizing
the case of affirmative action in the United States, the
paper examines how the issue of inequality has been
translated to define statistical discrimination, through
the notion of disparate impact, as the problem of the
gap between black and white employment rates. This
definition then transformed policy focus from the initial
focus of equality of opportunity to that of equality of results.
The paper illuminates the social conditioning that
led to this understanding of the issue, and how, once
translated in this manner, these ideas gained ideological
prominence, leading to the continuous crafting of
affirmative action policy.
Concurring panels 52
Bruck Teshome: “Development” as the Common
Good: Towards a deeper understanding of the
collective aspects of the Right to Development
Ever since the Declaration on the Right to Development
came about 30 years ago, the concept of the
right to development has attracted criticism as much
as willful disregard in academic circles. The self-determination
component of the right, which alludes to
the collective aspect of the right, has been put aside
to make way for an interpretation of the right through a
“value addition of human rights” that emphasize the individual
aspects of the right. There is room to argue that
the current understanding of the right could be further
enriched through a broader interpretation and application
of the right to self-determination, encompassing
cultural, political and economic self-determination.
Could viewing development as a common-good lead
to a better understanding of the various components of
the right and towards a better balance of the individual
and collective aspects of the right?
Limor Yehuda: Beyond Anti-discrimination and
Minority Rights: “Collective Equality” in Ethno-
National Conflict Resolution
Since the end of the cold war, ethnonational
conflicts have been acknowledged as one of the
dominant causes of political violence. Many such
conflicts are settled by peace agreements most of
which incorporate new constitutional arrangements.
Despite growing recognition of the applicability of
International Human Rights Law (IHRL) to such peace
agreements, the individualist orientation of IHRL and
its inadequate treatment of the group dimension
make existing IHRL norms insufficient in the context
of the special circumstances of ethnonational
conflicts. My central argument is that this problem
can be addressed by adding a concept of “collective
equality” between rival groups to the normative
framework applicable to the transformation of such
conflicts. Building on the practice of ethnonational
peacemaking and contemporary ideas in political
philosophy, the presentation will outline the components
of such “collective equality” and suggest what
might justify it as a normative obligation.
Gabriele D’amico: Human rights integration:
Olivetti’s model for blending communitarianism
and human rights
This paper will showcase the significance of the
Olivetti model in understanding the relationship
between human rights fragmentation and charities’
sub-efficient (aggregate) performance in facing sociocultural
externalities. Many charities and private foundations
invest their money with the exclusive goal of
maximizing return on investment; paradoxically this
often worsens the problems their charitable activities
seek to relieve. I argue that this results in part from attempting
to implement human rights without taking into
consideration their indivisibility and interrelatedness.