Michael Ignatieff, The Rights Revolution
(CBC Massey Lectures)

I.  Brief History of the Rights Revolution

“expressions of our moral identity as a people” (p. 2) “From these examples, I learned that human beings value some things more than their own survival, and that rights are the language in which they commonly express the values they are willing to die for.”
 

“In 1990, I vividly remember traveling from Kiev, in Ukraine, to Vienna with a trainload of Soviet Jews on their way to Israel.  They were frightened, bewildered, and sat up all night asking me questions about Israel, a country I had visited only once.  They did not know where they were going, but they knew exactly what they were leaving: a land where even the humblest freedoms were beyond their reach.  All of these battles for rights inside the Communist bloc had a huge political impact on the shape of our times.  For the demand for rights was a demand to live in truth; to end the regime of lies; to live, finally, without fear and shame.  What began as a campaign for rights within the Communist system ended up destroying the system altogether.  When the Berlin Wall was pulled down in those unforgettable days in November 1989, the rights revolution changed history.”

A story of struggle:
“The rights revolution makes society harder to control, more unruly, more contentious.  This is because rights equality makes society more inclusive, and rights protection constrains government power.  Countries with strongly defended rights cultures are certainly hard to govern.  But who says the ways of democracy must run smooth?  Democracy is rough and tumble; conflict is built into the process, but provided the conflict stops short of violence, it is better than bland or managed consensus.  To paraphrase Bette Davis, fasten your seat belts, because the rights revolution makes for a bumpy ride.”
 
 

II.  The Canadian rights revolution

1.Liberal, secular, and pro-choice.

2.Social-democratic in its approach to welfare and public assistance.

3.An emphasis on group-rights.
 -- Trudeau’s “desire to anchor Canadian unity in the equality of individual rights” (p. 7) was not enough.  Group rights (e.g. language-rights) made it into the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, passed in 1982.

4. Supreme Court decisions that put in writing the terms and conditions for breaking the federation apart. (1998)
Shaped by negotiations between three peoples: the English, the French, and the aboriginal First Nations.
Chinese judges study Canadian Supreme Court Cases.
 
 

III.  Issues and Problems

A.  Democracy
“…right have a double-sided relationship to democracy.  Rights enacted into law by democratically elected representatives express the will of the people.  But there are also rights whose purpose is to protect people from that will, to set limits on what majorities can do.  Human rights and constitutionally guaranteed rights are supposed to have a special immunity from restriction by the majority.”
“enhancing equality while safeguarding difference…is the essential challenge of the rights revolution”
 

B. Are we better or worse?
“we need to look more closely, with a little less self-congratulation, at the gulf between what the rights revolution has promised and what it has actually delivered.”

Problem not just with gap between rhetoric and performance, but with the rhetoric itself.
 

C. Interests vs. Rights
“’Give me my rights’ is not an invitation to compromise.  It’s a demand for unconditional surrender.”

“Too many workers have no job security, no pension rights, no holiday rights, and they are working too many hours.  This is the dark side of our affluence.”

“Codes of rights are about securing the minimum conditions for any life at all.”

D.  Divisiveness:
“Some people think Charter rights of free speech are being abused by Holocaust deniers; other people think that right to due process of law are being exploited by male defendants in rape cases.  More broadly, the rights revolution sometimes seems to have fragmented the political community into aggrieved victims’ groups, each seeking its rights at the expense of the other.”

Is right talk today about what is right and just?
Or about self-interest?
Have we lost sight of responsibility, focusing on my rights.
(Rights language meets the Me-generation).

E.  Group vs. Individual rights
“Almost everybody thinks that aboriginals should have the right to strengthen their self-government, but what happens if individuals don’t want to take part?  If so, the very future of the group may be jeopardized.  Or take an example from Orthodox Judaism.  It’s a good thing to give groups the right to practice their religion, of course, but is it so good if the women can’t take part in the prayers?  If a woman rebels at this subordination and wants to leave, does the group have the right to compel her to stay?  Can it force her out if she tries to change the practices of the group?” (p. 18)

French legislation against wearing overtly religious garb in public school.

Self-Determinism vs. Human-rights for First-Nations women
 

F. Capitalism and Rights
Entitlement to one’s holdings:
“I prefer the evils of capitalist individualism to the evils of collectivism.  Historically speaking, coercive communities have done more harm.”

Great difficulty “in focusing the social and economic inequality that accompanies the competitive individualism of market society.  Doing something serious about inequality means infringing on property rights”

We, not just corporations, are property holders.

“The problem, in short, is neither individualism nor individual rights.  Nor is it capitalism.  The chief obstacle to making a dent in inequality is democracy”

Closing Thought:
“Instead of a battle between right and wrong, the conflict beings to be seen as a battle between competing rights.  At first, this may only reinforce self-righteousness.  But after a while, when one side realizes that the other has a rights claim too, compromise can become possible.  Rights talk clarifies disagreements and creates the common language in which agreement can eventually be found.”
 

III.  Application

Assume the following:

1.Bob Smith suffers from life-threatening illness, for which there is currently no treatment available.

2.DrugCo spends millions of dollars in research and development and eventually comes up with a promising pharmaceutical treatment.  They believe they can make several million dollars in profit by selling their drugs to those will this illness at exorbitant prices.

Does Bob have a right to this drug? To purchase the drug at a lower price?

Does DrugCo have a right to sell the drug at any price it wants?

How do we decide the issue?
 

Code 13 of the BC Human Rights code:
(1)A person must not:
(a) refuse to employ or refuse to continue to employ a person, or
(b) discriminate against a person regarding employment or any term of condition of employment because of the race, colour, ancestry, place of origin, political belief, religion, marital status, family status, physical or mental disability, sex, sexual orientation or age of that person…

(4) Subsections (1) and (2) do not apply with respect to a refusal, limitation, specification or preference based on a bona fide occupational requirement.

What counts as a “Bona fide occupational requirement”?

Can a pharmacist refuse to fill a prescription for the “morning after pill”?
IF a pharmacist does refuse to fills such prescriptions, could a pharmacy fire him?
Is this simply an issue between employer and employee?
    What if an employer wants employees who will flirt with customers (this being their niche in a competitive environment)?