Human rights

Human rights (права людини; prava liudyny). Fundamental claims which are, or should be, legally recognized and protected to secure the fullest development of each and every individual’s personality. Usually such rights are regarded as inherent in humans, ie, not conferred by positive law, and hence inalienable. The theory of human rights, first conceived of as natural rights, originated with the Greek and Roman Stoics and was developed by the Fathers of the Church, the medieval theologians, and Protestant thinkers. They were asserted in the Petition of Right (1628), the Bill of Rights (1689), the American Declaration of Independence (1776), and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789), and played a decisive role in the English Civil War and the American and French revolutions. In the 19th and 20th centuries some basic rights have been enshrined in the constitutions of many states and have been translated to varying degrees into legal rights. Classical rights (to life, liberty, security of person, equality before the law, private property, freedom of thought, speech, and assembly, right to representation) tended to be negative—they placed restraints on the state for the sake of individual liberty and political equality. The new rights demanded in the 20th century (to work, rest and leisure, adequate standard of living, education, social security, and participation in culture) are positive—they require the state to provide certain goods and services to ensure social equality and economic security. Since individual rights can be realized only within a given people’s culture and tradition, the concept of human rights must include the rights of peoples. The right of all peoples to equality and self-determination has been widely recognized in the 20th century. The mass terror inflicted by states on their own citizens and the two world wars in the 20th century have made human rights a leading concern of individuals, governments, and international organizations.

The League of Nations did not come forth with a comprehensive statement on human rights, but it did attempt to protect certain human rights through its Covenant and the mandate system. Some peace treaties after the First World War contained special provisions for the rights of racial, linguistic, and religious minorities (see National minorities). A more concerted approach to human rights was made by the United Nations (UN). Its charter demands respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms as a guarantee of international co-operation and peace. In 1946 the UN Commission on Human Rights was set up under the Economic and Social Council to prepare an international bill of rights. The first part of the bill—the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—was ratified by the General Assembly on 10 December 1948. This was, in a sense, a revolutionary document: although it lacked any legal force, it set a standard by which governments could be judged by the world public. Its moral and political significance is immense. The second part of the commission’s work was to prepare the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (1966). Signatories of these treaties, including the USSR, the Belorussian SSR, and the Ukrainian SSR (19 October 1973), undertake to respect the rights specified in the first document and make progress towards realizing the rights specified in the second. Besides these general treaties the UN has adopted a number of special conventions that deal with the rights of specific categories of people such as refugees, stateless persons, women, and children. Only some of these agreements have been signed by the Ukrainian SSR: the International Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (1980), the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (1975), and the Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity (1969).

The Ukrainian SSR was a member of several UN agencies in the field of human rights: the Commission on Human Rights (1946–7, 1983–5), the Special Committee on the Policies of Apartheid (from 1970), the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (1970–1), the Commission on the Status of Women (1981–4), and the Human Rights Committee. The last was formed in 1976 to examine the reports of signatories to the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and to deal with petitions from signatories concerning the violations of human rights in other countries. Its recommendations have a certain moral and political influence, but no legal power. In 1968 Ukraine’s representative on the committee, Professor Petro Nedbailo, was the first laureate of its annual prize for work on behalf of human rights. Soviet representatives at the UN often criticized human rights violations in other countries such as South Africa, Chile, and Israel.

Human rights provisions were part of the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, which was signed on 1 August 1975 in Helsinki by 35 countries, including the USSR but not the Ukrainian SSR. The so-called Third Basket of the agreement guarantees the fundamental freedoms and such rights as freedom of movement across borders, free exchange of ideas, emigration, and family reunification. The Soviet Union failed to live up to its undertakings on human rights, and this was pointed out to its representatives at the periodic review conferences on the Helsinki Accords. Besides official delegations, spokesmen of non-governmental organizations attended these conferences in Belgrade, Madrid, and Vienna and staged their own parallel forums. The most active Ukrainian human rights groups in the West have been the Human Rights Commission of the World Congress of Free Ukrainians, the Foreign Representation of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, Americans for Human Rights in Ukraine, Prolog Research Corporation, and Smoloskyp. Independent organizations such as Amnesty International and Freedom House play an important role in the worldwide struggle for human rights, including the struggle in Ukraine.

The worldwide human rights movement spread to the USSR and Eastern Europe after Joseph Stalin’s death (see Dissident movement). Calling themselves pravozakhysnyky (rights defenders), Soviet dissidents exposed their government’s violation of Soviet law, the Soviet constitution, and international commitments on human rights. The struggle for human rights in Ukraine entered a new phase after the mass arrests of dissidents in 1972–3 and the signing of the Helsinki Accords. In fall 1976 the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, consisting of 10 members, arose in Kyiv. During its brief existence it prepared and disseminated about 20 documents concerning human rights violations in Ukraine, including several memoranda to the signatories of the Helsinki Accords who had gathered for a review conference in Belgrade. The group was repressed and its members were severely punished. In spite of heavy sacrifices the human rights movement in the Ukrainian was not crushed at that time, and it occasionally displayed signs of vitality. At the beginning of the 1980s, for example, the Ukrainian Committee for the Defense of the Rights of the Ukrainian Catholic church and the Rights of the Faithful was formed under the leadership of Yosyp Terelia.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Kosyk, W. Violation des droits de l’homme en Ukraine et en U.R.S.S. (Paris 1969)
Chalidze, V. To Defend These Rights: Human Rights and the Soviet Union (New York 1974)
Verba, L.; Yasen, B. (eds). The Human Rights Movement in Ukraine: Documents of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, 1976–80 (Baltimore–Washington–Toronto 1980)
Ovsiuk, O. Ideolohichna borot'ba i prava liudyny (Kyiv 1982)
Zinkevych, Osyp. (ed). Ukraïns'ka Hel'sins'ka Hrupa, 1978–82: Dokumenty i materiialy (Toronto–Baltimore 1983)

Vasyl Markus

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]