Values and interests

They say there is law that applies everywhere, because the law is the law, and is supposed to mean the same to everyone, no matter where. The law is certain, black and white, and protects the weak against the strong.

And there are values... idea(l)s, perhaps, that certain people (or states) cherish that should be protected and developed because it is seen as necessarily 'good', indisputably 'moral' and 'just'. Contrast this with interests... a self-motivation which everyone (and every state) tries to pursue so that they benefit most, and mostly at the expense of others. It is these values and interests which often makes the law appear more like a tool for those who are willing and able to (ab)use it to their own ends.

In the last couple of days I've come across two things that have made me, more than ever, more skeptical about the 'nieceties' of law, especially the interantional kind, which we lone human beings are almost powerless to influence, yet which affects us all in so many, many ways. One was some of the readings I've had to read about the so-called 'universal' human rights, and the other was a lecture I attended last night, given by an influential (and refreshingly critical) international lawyer from the University of London.

Why is international law so influential? Because through the countless number of international, multinational, bilateral and multilateral treaties and agreements there are, our lives are being regulated, to a large extent also protected, but to some extent also limited. Our fundamental rights and freedoms to life, to speech, to work and to found a family are subscribed by international law... as are our responsibilities should we commit certain heinous crimes like torture or genoicide. The environment, and how to save it from further deterioation and certain extinction, is governed by numerous agreements to cut greenhouse gases, to stop mining, overfishing, and to promote so-called 'sustainable development'. The global economic and capitalist network composed of markets, media and coporations is held in place by a complex regime of free trade and flow of goods and people. And international law regulates war and peace, it says that certain behaviour like aggression will not be tolerated, and international law has set in place security arrangements to ensure that 'aggressors' are dealt with under the banner of 'collective peace and security'. And if there is to be war and conflict, international law underwrites the standards of what you can and cannot do in armed conflict, and provides the bare minimum amount of protection for civilians and property.

Yet... international law is made predominantly by states, and the skeptic, like me, would say mostly by states which are big and powerful. How fair is it that certain states are able to sit in the Security Council just because they were 'winners' from a world war sixty years ago and wield almost unchecked authority over world affairs, and be armed with the veto power if certain events or decisions don't suit their interests? How just is it that certain states are able to wage war against whomever they see fit, supposedly in the name of promoting freedom and democracy, but actually pursuing and protecting their economic and geopolitical interests? How is it that certain states claim the right to preach and champion certain values, and if necessary take action to 'intervene' to make all other states a mould of themselves? And how can transnational corporations, many as influential and affluent as states, control and monopolise so much of the world's wealth and production, while so many countless are left out of the most basic resources for survival, let alone the benefits of the supposed progress and comforts that the age of post-modernity is to usher in?

There is much talk of principles and idea(l)s like the "international community", "democracy", "perpetual peace", "global prosperity"... but in truth the world is any thing but a community, anything but democratic, while peace and prosperity are reserved for the few lucky enough
to have been born in the Western/Northern hemisphere. True, much progress has been made because of an ever closer cooperation between states and peoples the world over, in the area of combating disease, scientific advancements, cultural exchange and political goodwill. Yet, behind these apparent successes lie the reality that the international system as a whole, and the international legal order in particular, is appalingly predjudiced and shockingly fragile to the manipulation by the few at the expense of the many.

I don't want to pinpoint certain states and people for all the faults...I don't want to criticise for the sake of criticising, but in truth, from a historical point of view, the 'west', embodied firstly by Europe alone, later by the United States together with Europe, and now more or less by the US alone, has been most focal in championing the concept of 'the international'. The ages of discovery, empires, slavery and trade, and the late age of colonialisation led to the expansion of 'western' ideas and influences to those places and people deemed savage and god-less. Religion, under Christianity, was used as a 'civilising' mechanism to convert natives into subjects sharing similar, if not same, ideologies, while trade, under trading companies, was used as a 'marketising' tool to transform natives into consumers to satisfy the unsatiable market of production and consumption. And laws, exported and implemented wholesale, were used to legitimise imperial rule, to justify territorial acquisitions and defend against local rebellions. The international was thus first a result of the European (and later America) going beyond their own continents; a direct result of the 'west's' infusion of markets, power, culture and guns into the rest of the world's territories and populations.

Thus we have the idea of the 'civilised nations', originally coined in the age of colonisation, as a way to distinguish European states and peoples from the 'rest'. The idea developed into 'international community', through the League of Nations and United Nations frameworks, under which supposedly all states enjoy sovereign equality and dignity. Though the decolonisation of the 1960s and 1970s changed the balance of power, as well as voting behaviour and direction of the 'international community', the established order of powerful (winner) states is still unbroken. 'Civilisation' turned into something home-grown and cultivated as a result of the 'west's' shared history of ideological, social, economic and political developments from the age of Enlightenment to the liberitarian and Industrial Revolutions. Today, talk of 'civilisation' is frowned upon, and mention of its clash is discredited. Yet, other slogans and notions are used in its stead, notions like 'democracy', 'human rights', 'rule of law', and 'good governance'.

As virtuous as desirable as they are, and I do agree they are the next best alternative to the worst excesses of tyranny, these idea(l)s are far from being neutral and universal. If anything, 'democracy' and all the other catch phrases, are being used as yardsticks by the 'west' to measure other states against, as a means to classify, justify, divide and rule the world, as they did centuries ago. Speak of alternatives, act in the alternative, and the policing actions of sanctions, isolation, and worse, military force, strike down hard on any one or any state that dares to differ. 'Good' and 'evil', 'us' and 'them', 'friend' and 'foe'... all so simple, simplified and all so black and white. Either you are for, or against the new world order. For there is no other alternative, no middle way.

It makes someone like me, who has been studying and working and hoping for a better world in a better tomorrow, disappointed. Really, really disappointed.