Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 The Vital Importance of Protecting Individual Rights Individual rights protect the freedoms that

many citizens of Western countries today enjoy. These rights allow the economies of these countries to be very efficient, their landscapes to suffer a relatively low amount of environmental harm, and their borders to remain secure. An increase in the protection of individual rights is the best way for all countries of the world to better their citizens and their own power. This will be shown through discussions of the relative importance of social justice and individual rights in international relations, the exact meaning of individual rights, and the historical implications of protecting these rights. Most of the many problems that plague international relations today can be resolved by a concerted effort to focus on the issues of social justice and human rights. Specifically, a respect for individual rights is absolutely essential for any group of people who wish to minimize conflict in the other areas of their lives. While the other great issues of international relations are undoubtedly of grave importance, they all stem from the problems that arise when social justice and individual rights are ignored. The decisions made regarding warfare, environmental problems, and economic crises depend heavily on how the makers of those decisions view and value individual rights. If a state leader disregards the individual rights of their citizens, they will be inclined to start conflicts that will not be beneficial to their citizens. Likewise they will find no problem in conscripting these people, seeing them merely as additional weapons of war to be brought to bear against the enemy. If a state leader disregards the individual rights of the citizens of other states aggressive territorial expansion and war crimes are

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 sure to result. Those who live outside the borders of the leaders country are seen as only potential resources to be gained or faceless antagonists. These consequences of one or more state leaders failing to recognize individual rights are the largest causes of warfare related conflict in international relations. In the same vein, a lack of recognition of individual rights from those in power contributes to the major issues among states regarding environmental problems. A nonrights-respecting state leader would force their citizens to abide by laws and regulations that would inhibit the ability of these citizens to conduct their businesses and live their lives freely. The same type of state leader would expect other states to enforce similar laws upon their own populations and would use diplomacy to pressure any states hesitant to do so. The same is true for economic crises which are often the result of state leaders ignoring the individual rights of those that they govern. Such a state leader would extensively regulate their countrys economy; reducing the ability of their citizens to trade freely and limiting the durability of the economy were a recession to occur. In the midst of an economic crisis, a state leader intolerant of individual rights would allow inefficient corporations to continue running by paying for their mistakes with the citizens money. Actions like these most often occur in a relatively rights respecting capitalist style country. In more oppressive socialist countries, the lives of the citizens and the strength of the economies are much worse due to increased interference of such governments into their economies.

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 Because of the aforementioned effects on the other problematic areas of international relations, the issues of social justice, especially respect for individual rights, are the greatest areas of concern at the present time. The best way to discuss the need for greater respect for individual rights is to do so from a supranational perspective. Every nation will benefit greatly from protecting these rights, and so limiting the arguments to focus on one state will only minimize the scope of the current problems and potential solutions. Because social justice and individual rights are matters that directly affect every person in the world, they must be viewed from a world level scope. While the call for a greater respect for individual rights fits a liberal perspective of international relations, it is essentially a moral question. Quite simply it is an evil act to deny someone their rights and it is a good act to defend ones own individual rights and the rights of others. It is also true that there are many benefits to acting morally in addition to the inherent goodness of such behavior. A society that embraces individual rights will see a better quality of life in areas such as decreased crime and higher average incomes. It will also enjoy better ratings among realists in a more efficient economy and a more dedicated government and military. A failure to protect individual rights will likewise bring about a decline in such important areas. Practical incentives such as these can be used to support the protection of individual rights, but the core of the argument in their favor is the philosophical one that it is proper and good to protect individual rights.

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 One must first understand exactly what individual rights are before they can realize the impact that these rights have on the world. The philosopher Ayn Rand gives a broad understanding of the term rights in her book The Virtue of Selfishnes: Rights are a moral conceptthe concept that provides a logical transition from the principles guiding an individuals actions to the principles guiding his relationship with othersthe concept that preserves and protects individual morality in a social contextthe link between the moral code of a man and the legal code of a society, between ethics and politics. Individual rights are the means of subordinating society to moral law. (Rand, Virtue, 92). Essentially, people require a formal concept of the actions that they can and cannot morally take in order to properly and peacefully coexist. These concepts of how a person should be able to live their life with respect to themselves, other people, and the world around them are the basis of the term rights. It is necessary to understand that rights are a basic human need, not some lofty goal that should be attempted but can be acceptably out of reach. Rights govern the actions and lives of people just as the laws of nature do. Rand clarifies this point in her work For the New Intellectual: The source of mans rights is not divine law or congressional law, but the law of identity. A is Aand Man is Man. Rights are conditions of existence required by mans nature for his proper survival. If man is to live on earth, it is right for him to use his mind, it is right to act on his own free judgment, it is right to work for his values and to keep the product of his work. If life on earth is his purpose, he has a right to live as a

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 rational being: nature forbids him the irrational. Any group, any gang, any nation that attempts to negate mans rights, is wrong, which means: is evil, which means: is antilife. (Rand, Intellectual, 182) The protection of a persons rights protects their very existence because rights are determined by and allow human survival. What is important to understand here is the point that people, like any animal, must take certain actions in order to live. If denied the use of these actions people will wither and if fully deprived they will die. A persons rights define and enumerate these basic and vital actions for life. This is the reason why limiting someone by depriving someone of their rights is morally wrong. It is an attack against them of the same magnitude as any physical blow. Without a universal understanding of this moral way to live through the medium of rights, any hope for coexistence is lost. Even with common understanding, common agreement on what rights actually exist and can be claimed by people as well where these rights came from is essential for true protection of any set of rights. So what then are individual rights exactly? What freedoms must be protected in order for people to live their lives fully? As Rand describes them: There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a mans right to his own life. Life is a process of self -sustaining and selfgenerated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and selfgenerated actionwhich means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.) The concept of a right pertains only to actionspecifically, to freedom of action. It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men. Thus, for every individual, a right is the moral sanction of a positiveof his freedom to act on his own judgment, for his own goals, by his own voluntary, uncoerced choice. As to his neighbors, his rights impose no obligations on them except of a negative kind: to abstain from violating his rights. (Rand, Virtue, 93). It is clear then that individual rights have a very narrow definition. Only the ability to take the actions necessary for ones life to prosper are protected by these rights. And, in addition, none of those actions may violate another persons rights. Essentially, individual rights do not grant people physical protection in the form of basic survival necessities such as food and shelter (some add education and healthcare to this improper list) but they allow people to use their rationality to achieve these things for themselves. The difference between rights granting a physical entity and the ability to strive for that entity is illustrated by Rand: There is no such thing as a right to a jobthere is only the right of free trade, that is: a mans right to take a job if another man chooses to hire him. There is no right to a home, only the right of free trade: the right to build a home or to buy it. There are no rights to a fair wage or a fair price if no one chooses to pay it, to hire a man or to

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 buy his product. There are no rights of consumers to milk, shoes, movies or champagne if no producers choose to manufacture such items (there is only the right to manufacture them oneself). There are no rights of special groups, there are no rights of farmers, of workers, of businessmen, of employees, of employers, of the old, of the young, of the unborn. There are only the Rights of Manrights possessed by every individual man and by all men as individuals. (Rand, Virtue, 97) This distinction exists because it is impossible to claim a right to something that must be created by another, such as a job. If you are guaranteed that job as you would expect to be, then someone must provide the job for you. Whether this is the government of a country creating the job through the money from its taxpayers or a private citizens or group of citizens providing the job with their own money the violation remains the same. Someone is being forced to give up their own resources for you without any need for approval or consent. The act is essentially the same as stealing from the employer and thus violates the employers rights. This leads to the other side of a failure to protect individual rights. In most cases, the rights of the lower classes are violated through lack of free speech, freedom of religion, conscription into the military, or any other common form of repression. It is, however, equally evil to deprive what would have in the past been known as the higher classes but today is increasingly becoming the average citizen through entrepreneurship. Those businessmen, bankers, and store owners who are vital to any economy are often overlooked when it comes to social justice as their lives seem relatively well off. This, though, does not excuse the infringements upon their individual

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 rights that come in the form of excessive regulation and laws restricting business practices. While removing rights impeding laws such as the minimum wage does not have popular support in the countries that hold such laws, doing so would be both a moral and beneficial act in line with a liberal view of international relations. The removal of a minimum wage law would allow the citizens who own companies to live their lives with one less restriction on their freedom and increase the efficiency of the economy as more worker and hirers are able to agree on flexible wages. Individual rights are being neglected at varying levels across the world. In America historically, the transgressions against rights can be seen as relatively minor in comparison to those enacted by more restrictive states. Indeed, the culture of this country demands that at least a certain level of rights is respected. This can be seen in the vast protest movements that occurred during the 1960s and 1970s. Two specific goals of these movements can be identified: one was an end to the Vietnam War and the other was the expansion of civil rights for black Americans. The draft imposed during the Vietnam War was a very obvious breach of any citizens individual rights. It was offensive to Americans in the moral sense of being vulgarly anti-life in the way that a man could forced to both kill others and risk being killed himself. It also hurt the country by creating internal strife, disrupting the economy, and making the military less effective. The war itself did not protect the rights of Americans nor did it serve their interests. The long time denial of equal civic status for blacks in America also had both moral and non-moral offenses. Morally, the so-called Jim Crow laws directly stopped

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 countless people from furthering their lives through their rational faculties. These laws also had negative impacts on the economies of the states that upheld them and created much civil unrest. Whether the protest movements were spurred on to a greater extent by the moral or non-moral sides of these arguments against them, the abuses of individual rights in both cases were ultimately stopped due to public demands. While many other violations of Americans individual rights continue today, they do not have the popular support to be ended. Some, such as taxation, are held in favor by popular opinion and cultural norms and are unlikely to be ended in the foreseeable future. On the other hand, some longstanding breaches of individual rights have been recently challenged in the Arab Spring movement. Protests emerged in the populations of Mediterranean Muslim countries that called for a greater recognition of individual rights, specifically in regards to creating representative democratic governments. Any government may restrict individual rights if not corrected but non-representative governments like the ones that ruled these states are much more prone to do so. A multitude of laws and cultural norms existed that made achieving true success and happiness very difficult for the average citizen of these countries. Again there were moral and non-moral downsides to these laws, the moral negatives being the inherent evil in depriving someone of the means to live their lives to the fullest. The practical implications were less than productive economies and ultimately the very civil unrest that caused the protests to begin in 2010. More than two years later, these movements for increase individual rights have met with varying levels of success. Warfare has been involved in the transitions for

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 several of these states, showing the impact that social justice has on armed conflicts. Egypt provides an interesting case for analysis because while it did elect a somewhat representative government, it failed to formally protect the rights of its citizens in a constitution. Now the countrys citizens seem to fear that their hard won chance for more freedoms may not come to pass. These events show the importance of a strong dedication to the protection of individual rights. This has been the custom in America since the countrys beginning and although there have been many increases in the protection of individual rights since then, all such changes have been permanent and built upon. This commitment to individual rights is exactly why America can be considered the best county to live in today. Because social justice and individual rights are the most pressing issues in international relations, because individual rights are essential to protect for prosperity and well-being to occur, and because of the historical conflicts that boil over when individual rights are not protected, countries of the world today act morally and serve their own interests best by protecting the individual rights of their citizens. America has been the leader in this regard since its creation, and although it does not do the job fully, it does it to the best degree at this point in time. The leaders of other nations need look no further than Americas current and long term success to see the result of population acting on their guaranteed freedoms.

Jay Johnson 12/10/2012 Works Cited

Rand, Ayn. For the New Intellectual. New York: Signet, 1961. 182. Print. Rand, Ayn. The Virtue of Selfishness. New York: Signet, 1964. 92,93,97. Print.