Week 2: Critique of Human Rights
- Patricia Williams ‘The Pain of Word Bondage’ in The Alchemy of Race and Rights (1991)
Patricia Williams writes on the relationship between race, critical legal studies (CLS) and the human rights law. Her reflection accounts for her personal journey in a traditionally patriarchal profession. she explores her experiences of colour, class, and gender through the narrative. “The Pain of Word Bondage” lies at the heart of Alchemy, and directly addresses the mix of race and rights .
The chapter ‘The Pain of Word Bondage’ in The Alchemy of Race and Rights (1991) focuses on her experience contrasted with her colleague, Peter Gabel’s experience when renting a house in New York. In her account, Gabel, who is described as a founding father of CLS, gives up his perceived/actual authority as a white man as to make agreements seem more informal. His privilege as a white man in the profession is starkly contrasted with Williams expectations as a black woman. She says people dismiss her “black femaleness as unreliable, untrustworthy, hostile, angry, powerless, irrational and probably destitute” (147). She contends that her credibility is based on the colour of her skin and is often biased, “rooted in race and in the unconsciousness of racism” (152), despite her many professional accomplishments The two scholars disagree on whether formal or informal relationships are more effective in establishing trust. She claims, the less powerful often desire formal mechanisms, such as clearly written contracts, to neutralise the inherent institutional bias and structural violence.
Williams insists on a transformation of the language of a rights discourse, although the problem is not in the rights language itself. Instead, the issue lies in the relationship between rights bearers and non-rights bearers, as the latter is subordinate of the other. The language of “meeting needs”, rather than “of engaging in politics”, and basing claims on needs can sometimes be more disempowering than empowering. Once, the rights language presented African Americans with an avenue for change. Nonetheless, a needs-based strategy has failed to reduce inequality within America, particularly for African Americans.
A “rights rhetoric has been and continues to be an effective form of discourse” and a source of hope. (149). The critical issue is not to assert needs but “to find a political mechanism that can confront the denial of need” (152). “one consequence of the broader reconfiguration of rights,” Williams writes, “is to give voice to those people or things that, by virtue of their object relation to a contract, historically have had no voice.” For Williams, “rights … elevates one’s status from human body to social being”
In my opinion, the author oversimplifies the relationship between “human needs” and “human rights”. While, human needs are obvious and understood by all like food, water, shelter etc. There is no single answer to the question: what are human rights? The answer depends on whom you ask. Generally, Human Rights, as a “field can be characterised as a legal regime: zeitgeist, discourse or ideology” (Rosemblum). While universal human rights are expressed and guaranteed by law, One’s sense of entitlement and “one’s sense of empowerment defines one’s relation to the law, in terms of trust/distrust, formality/informality, or rights/no-rights (‘needs’)”(148).
