Page 220 - Contemporary Political Sociology Globalization Politics and Power

206 Globalization and Democracy

customary law may also override law made by democratically elected
governments where state leaders are accused of “ crimes against human-
ity. ” For example, amnesties granted to former dictators as part of pro-
cesses of peace - making and reconciliation are not accepted by the
International Criminal Court, which may still proceed with prosecution
for gross violations of human rights.
Most human rights law, however, is developed and enforced in a much
less dramatic fashion than these examples suggest, through “ statist ” pro-
cedures that respect the ideals of state sovereignty and national self -
determination governing the UN systems. The “ statist ” adoption of
human rights agreements, however, raises different problems: how then
can respect for individuals ’ human rights be assured given that it is states
that violate human rights? It is by no means clear how the tension between
the principle that individual rights must be respected everywhere that is
the basis of global human rights, and the principle that states are equal
and independent, the basis of state sovereignty in the UN system, will be
resolved, if at all. In the meantime, virtually all the development and
monitoring of human rights agreements concerns consensus - building
between and within states.
Sally Engle Merry has made an in - depth ethnographic study of how a
UN document concerning violence against women was created. In Human
Rights and Gender Violence, she shows the extraordinary lengths partici-
pants in UN conferences and meetings went to over a number of years to
ensure consensus between state representatives and members of NGOs
(Merry, 2006 ). Once they have been drawn up, human rights agreements

are signed and ratified by state representatives. States may ratify human
rights agreements with reservations: that is, they are allowed to opt out
of some points, as long as this does not destroy the spirit of the agreement
itself. A notorious example is US ratification of the International

Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR); state offi cials insisted
on a reservation to allow capital punishment for juveniles that was
expressly prohibited by Article 6 (Roth, 2000 ). By far the largest number
of reservations to any human rights agreement is to the Convention for
the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, especially concerning

“ cultural practices, ” where women ’ s roles are defined by religious or
family law within that state (Bayefsky, 1994). Finally, human rights agree-
ments are “ self - executing ” for some states: they immediately become
domestic law. For many others, however, like the US and the UK, they
must be incorporated into national law through legislatures.
The member states of the Council of Europe (which includes all those
in the EU, and Turkey) are a partial exception to the “ statist ” adoption