Human rights and the rhetoric of injustice
Shelley Walia

The Umbrella of US Power: The Universal Declaration of
Human Rights and the Contradictions of US Policy
by Noam Chomsky.
Seven Stories Press, New York. Pages 78. $ 6.95.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights theoretically fits in well with America’s longstanding democratic institutions. As Noam Chomsky argues, “It has long been as good a model as one can find of a sociopolitical order in which basic rights are upheld. And it is commonly lauded, at home and abroad, as the leader in the struggle for human rights, democracy, freedom and justice.”

But this Wilsonian idealism is an attitude of an overreacher theoretically giving the impression of upholding the democratic principles worldwide, a vision that the realists reject on the ground that this global ambition adversely affects the national interests. The prevailing orthodoxies in Great Britain, for instance, that Orwell speaks of in the preface to Animal Farm, precisely apply to the corporate sector in the US and its stranglehold on the media, as well as on the education system that together disallow any challenges to the system; surprisingly, this is achieved without the promulgation of an ordinance.

Chomsky observes in this book that though the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was a “path to a better world”, the US has done little to show its adherence to it. There are glaring contradictions between the state and its authority on the one hand and the aims and motivations of most popular movements. Chomsky openly unveils the official political rhetoric to show how the US violates the UDHR and uses the policy of expediency to exploit its enemies.

Clearly, the two examples of genocide against the Native Americans and the heartrending suffering of slaves are examples of its merciless approach to any antagonist. The Filipinos, the Haitians, the Vietnamese and the Muslims have experienced the same fate; human rights in all these cases stand ignored, with priority always laid on material benefit.

The “umbrella of American power” sees to it that under the self-promoting Marshal Plan, transnational corporations work on the strategies of bringing all profits home, even though this involves economic upheavals of the nature that bring about catastrophes on the national scale. The rule of justice is disregarded, and ensuing poverty is of no concern or worry. Pumping aid into Latin America indicates that it has “tended to flow disproportionately to Latin American governments which torture their citizens.” Chomsky goes on to elaborate: “More wide-ranging studies by economist Edward Herman found a similar correlation world-wide, also suggesting a plausible reason: aid is correlated with improvement in the investment climate, often achieved by murdering priests and union leaders, massacring peasants trying to organise, blowing up the independent press. And so on.”

All “inconvenient facts” are kept in the dark; interestingly at the World Conference on human Rights in Vienna in 1993, the US Secretary of State Warren Christopher emphasised his country’s support, for the “universality of human rights” at the cost of “cultural relativism”.

He argued that “the worst violators are the world’s aggressors and those who encourage the spread of arms,” stressing that “the universality of human rights set[s] a single standard of acceptable behavior around the world, a standard Washington would apply to all countries.” However, in favour of universality, successive American governments have successfully opposed the challenge of relativity.

Though Warren Christopher, Chomsky goes on to argue, criticised the aggressors of the world who are the suppliers of arms, he conveniently overlooked his own country being the leading supplier and its allies, the UK and France, the major suppliers of weapons to Indonesia and Rwanda.

The International Court of Justice has accused the US for the unlawful use of force in its invasion of Nicaragua and elsewhere.

Repeated resolutions of the Security Council and the General Assembly are ignored. Right to self-determination and freedom are outrightly being violated in Iraq in the same way that the client regime in Panama was being kept in check. The invasion of Vietnam is an example that forms the backdrop of America’s suspect adherence to the UDHR, which specifically considers foreign occupation an infringement of human rights.

Supply of weapons to Indonesia or keeping Nicaraguan Tachito Somoza’s National Guard in power after it had killed 40,000 adds to the US record on its rejection of resolutions by all international bodies on peace and protection of human rights.

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