<div dir="ltr">Hello Parminder and All,<br><br>All the heat is about the connotations of the term "collective rights". I tried to understand the distinction between individual right and collective right and this is what I <a href="http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/5357/ihr6a.html">found:</a><br>
<br><i><font size="2">Individual Rights apply to the generic individual without regard to his or her identity.... These rights are determined with no knowledge of what our actual
economic standing, educational level, gender, or ethnic origin would
be. Most international and national formulations of human rights are
drafted in such a way as to apply to a generic individual.</font></i>
<p><i><font size="2">Collective rights, however, do not start with the
individual but rather with a specific group. Individuals are defined by
their membership in that group, which thus differentiates them from
others in society. Some collectives are formed by choice (religious
affiliation in the United States, for example). Others are
predetermined (the traditional understanding of gender, for example).
Collective rights begin with the premise that the group has a claim to
make. Historically, we can see numerous examples of group treatment
(generally negative). In the Roman Empire, for example, Jews possessed
the status of a <b>religio licita</b>, and as such enjoyed
specific rights as Jews--the right not to work on the Sabbath, or to
recognize the divinity of the Emperor. Such rights were granted to the
Jewish collective and thus to the individual Jew of the Empire by
virtue of being Jewish and thus distinct from Greeks or Syrians or
Celts in the Empire. The Ottoman Empire was governed under the <b>millet</b>
system, by which each group in the Empire was defined via their
religious community. Thus, people living in the same town but belonging
to different faiths had different rights and obligations on account of
their group membership. A vague notion of collective rights also lay
behind the concept of extra-territoriality, that people, by virtue of
their citizenship, in foreign lands should be governed, not by local
law, but by the laws of their originating state. ---- from a </font><font size="2">Lecture of Dr. Nikolas K. Gvosdev, </font>Editor of </i><i>The National Interest and a Senior Fellow in Strategic Studies at The Nixon Center.</i></p>
<p><font size="2">Internet Governance Caucus can propose Collective Rights if we would like to see different bandwidth plans for men and women, priority access for "backward and "most backward" classes as invented in India, publishing space discrimination between different </font>churches, and free DVD movies for those who live in mountains.<br>
</p><p>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy.</p><p>India.<br></p><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Sep 8, 2008 at 10:41 PM, Tapani Tarvainen <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:tapani.tarvainen@effi.org">tapani.tarvainen@effi.org</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div class="Ih2E3d">On Mon, Sep 08, 2008 at 10:02:20PM +0530, Parminder (<a href="mailto:parminder@itforchange.net">parminder@itforchange.net</a>) wrote:<br>
<br>
> 'Collective rights' is obviously an analytical category and not a right as<br>
> such. So when I speak of collective rights I am clearly meaning specific<br>
> rights like rights of indigenous people, linguistic rights, cultural rights,<br>
> minority rights, right to development etc.<br>
<br>
> To say that one doesn't believe in collective rights one must be able to say<br>
> that one doesn't believe in the above rights.<br>
<br>
</div>It does not follow if one does not agree that those rights are collective.<br>
<br>
I suspect one or maybe the key problem here is that the term indeed<br>
carries different meanings, and people want to reject some of them.<br>
<br>
In particular, probably few (?) people would oppose collective<br>
rights as justification of individual rights - rights individuals<br>
would have because of their membership in a group.<br>
The opposition stems from the other meaning, where collective<br>
rights would justify depriving individuals of their rights.<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
> In fact I am fine if one is ready to accept a long list of all these rights,<br>
> and not mention the terms negative, positive and collective rights. That<br>
> merely would mean one thinks all these rights, along with those that may be<br>
> considered negative and positive rights are in the same category, and need<br>
> not be differentiated. I could in fact be happier with such a position.<br>
<br>
</div>That might be a useful approach.<br>
<br>
--<br>
<font color="#888888">Tapani Tarvainen<br>
</font><div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c">____________________________________________________________<br>
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</div></div></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><a href="http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy">http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy</a><br>
</div>