unachievable, let me say that globalizing forces make such a prospect less unlikely now than in any other period of human history.
First, the increasing mobility of the human race and the de-spatialization of culture in the form of dispersed cultural diasporas as well as the emergence of a global public square make property rights and narrow territorial interests at least less important in human affairs than in the past.
Second, the contours of vulnerability have changed dramatically for the human race. In ancient times, when life was lived in local space and time, vulnerability of all kinds was similarly local. Threats to one’s survival and security were generated close to home. The surrounding wild, warring lords, and disease and pestilence rarely had effects beyond the region. For this reason, the political institutions needed to provide a sense of security were local and regional. In the modern era, when improvements in communication and transportation brought people together across greater distances and in more dense patterns of activity, threats to one’s survival and security also expanded. Commercial activity extended to broader geographic markets, human mobility increased dramatically over far greater distances, and the pace and flow of human activity quickened. Vulnerability, in turn, expanded in direct proportion to the compression of space and time and the acceleration of human interactivity. Local principalities and city-states were too parochial and narrow in their reach to protect their subjects. The result was the formation of nation-states.
Today, the compression of space and time is giving rise to a global flow of human activity. The dramatic increase in the density of human exchange, in turn, is creating new threats to security whose effects are often immediate and global in scale. Terrorism, the threat of nuclear war, global warming, computer viruses, the cloning of human beings, the death of the oceans, the loss of biodiversity, the growing ozone tear, a scandal in regional trading markets, and any number of other events can tip the world into chaos.
Nation-states are too geographically constrained to effectively deal with global threats and risks. Moreover, nation-states are designed to protect property and defend territory. They are exclusive, not inclusive, governing institutions. They were never conceived of as vehicles to manage global risks and threats.
What would happen, however, if millions—even billions—of human beings were to really believe that global threats to their security were at least as real and dangerous as the more localized threats that they face each day? Addressing these threats would require a new covenant among human beings that extended their commitment and allegiances, as well as their sense of security, beyond the narrow limits of territory, and the more limited protection afforded by property rights and civil rights.
Universal human rights is the next political chapter in the evolving history of our species. Some champions of universal human rights mistakenly believe that support of human rights ultimately stems from altruism and is motivated by goodwill alone. While altruism and goodwill play a role, there is another side to human rights—one that finds cause in a sense of vulnerability and the need for security. David Beetham writes that “it is as much the exposure to common threats as the sharing in a common humanity that justifies the claim that the human rights agenda is universal.” 1
The first real awareness of humanity’s shared vulnerability came with the dropping of the atomic bombs on the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945. We quickly came to realize that our common humanity was at risk in the event of an all-out nuclear war. Ulrich Beck writes that “with nuclear . . . contamination, we experience the ‘end of “the other.” ’ ” 2 Today, we are subject to a host of global problems that affect all of humanity. Solutions,
First, the increasing mobility of the human race and the de-spatialization of culture in the form of dispersed cultural diasporas as well as the emergence of a global public square make property rights and narrow territorial interests at least less important in human affairs than in the past.
Second, the contours of vulnerability have changed dramatically for the human race. In ancient times, when life was lived in local space and time, vulnerability of all kinds was similarly local. Threats to one’s survival and security were generated close to home. The surrounding wild, warring lords, and disease and pestilence rarely had effects beyond the region. For this reason, the political institutions needed to provide a sense of security were local and regional. In the modern era, when improvements in communication and transportation brought people together across greater distances and in more dense patterns of activity, threats to one’s survival and security also expanded. Commercial activity extended to broader geographic markets, human mobility increased dramatically over far greater distances, and the pace and flow of human activity quickened. Vulnerability, in turn, expanded in direct proportion to the compression of space and time and the acceleration of human interactivity. Local principalities and city-states were too parochial and narrow in their reach to protect their subjects. The result was the formation of nation-states.
Today, the compression of space and time is giving rise to a global flow of human activity. The dramatic increase in the density of human exchange, in turn, is creating new threats to security whose effects are often immediate and global in scale. Terrorism, the threat of nuclear war, global warming, computer viruses, the cloning of human beings, the death of the oceans, the loss of biodiversity, the growing ozone tear, a scandal in regional trading markets, and any number of other events can tip the world into chaos.
Nation-states are too geographically constrained to effectively deal with global threats and risks. Moreover, nation-states are designed to protect property and defend territory. They are exclusive, not inclusive, governing institutions. They were never conceived of as vehicles to manage global risks and threats.
What would happen, however, if millions—even billions—of human beings were to really believe that global threats to their security were at least as real and dangerous as the more localized threats that they face each day? Addressing these threats would require a new covenant among human beings that extended their commitment and allegiances, as well as their sense of security, beyond the narrow limits of territory, and the more limited protection afforded by property rights and civil rights.
Universal human rights is the next political chapter in the evolving history of our species. Some champions of universal human rights mistakenly believe that support of human rights ultimately stems from altruism and is motivated by goodwill alone. While altruism and goodwill play a role, there is another side to human rights—one that finds cause in a sense of vulnerability and the need for security. David Beetham writes that “it is as much the exposure to common threats as the sharing in a common humanity that justifies the claim that the human rights agenda is universal.” 1
The first real awareness of humanity’s shared vulnerability came with the dropping of the atomic bombs on the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945. We quickly came to realize that our common humanity was at risk in the event of an all-out nuclear war. Ulrich Beck writes that “with nuclear . . . contamination, we experience the ‘end of “the other.” ’ ” 2 Today, we are subject to a host of global problems that affect all of humanity. Solutions,
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