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Essay: Critically discuss the claim that we should not have minority rights.

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Thesis statement: We need minority rights as they are important to ensuring equality with in today’s society.

Reasons in favour of my thesis: [1 marks]

1. Minority rights are needed, they compensate for the lack of equality within a liberal society

2. [1 sentence]

Reasons against my thesis: [1 marks]

1. Minority rights providing additional benefits to people is justified by the reasoning that laws are already exist that protect the majority, and extra laws would only give people special treatment.

2. Minority rights are incompatible with liberalism. This is because if some members of society would be granted extra protection and rights in front of a judge than others wouldn’t

Responses to the reasons against my thesis: [1 marks]

1. Allowing people to join communities and participate in the events of those communities as well as individual expression are joys of liberalism, so denying people that right would be against what a liberal society tries to achieve

2. [1 sentence]

Relevant research

1. It is so hard to get minority rights through parliament reflects the point that it is undesirable to the majority (Sieberer & Muller, 2015).

2. The very essence of Liberalism is less state involvement and perhaps more integral equality before the law (Gray, 1995, 2004).

3. Liberalism would argue that societies should have minority rights not because of their right as a culture, but their freedom to associate, to form communities and to live by the terms of those associations (Kukathas, 1992)

Minority rights, particularly those of cultures and ethnicities are an integral part to societies as they encourage equality amongst the cohort and promote individual birthrights to those misrepresented groups in society. In a liberalist society this promotes the protection of disenfranchised minorities through legal representation and protection. Minority rights are a necessity in a liberal society as they tend to pick up the pieces that are missed when general laws have failed individuals. If we adopt a liberalist view traditionally individuals are viewed as autonomous and therefore there are no group rights, like those pertaining to minorities.

However, this is one of the down falls of liberalism as it is to individualistic and outdated as there is a rise of globalisation, increasing interconnectedness of borders and increased understanding of the original position has changed the way that we view the individual idea of a people. Furthermore, to this point it is believed that group rights such as minority rights are a part of liberal thought and necessary for freedom and equality (Kymlicka, 2002). Never the less this changing understanding of societies and is not without its difficulties, allowing protection to minority groups sets a precedent of changing ways that can be neglected. The view of minority rights furthermore endangers the idea of a cohesive liberal society as some people receiving rights and exemptions will be pedestaled above all others in society defeating the idea of equality.

If we look at the time line of governments, laws, rights we see that they tend to be controlled by the majority – with the exception of dictatorships and monarchs. Originally in Australia for example the governments were ran by men, men voted and mainly the laws only aimed at improving the male life. It was a bureaucracy of males. (Camilla M. Stivers, 2002). This lack of urban reform and traditional gender roles pushed the rise of feminism that started in 20th century, during this time the traditional understand of laws and protections were challenged. This movement created a catalyst of change that reformed legislation around equal employment equal rights for both men and woman and created the anticipatory movement for further change. This social change shows the important of minority rights to promote equality. If we consider John Rawls’ theory of the original position this will help determine whether minority rights have a place in society. The Natural Lottery presumes that in life some people are going to be dealt with ‘bad luck’ and those people tend to not fit in the fervent view of a majority, if we consider this view behind the veil of ignorance as Rawls would implore – we would not allow those who are affected by the bad luck to suffer as a result (Rawls, 1971). The original position shows that in life this bac luck could happen to anyone. This general rule shows that rights should not be considered just if they please the majority, but rather the need for laws to be morally right for everyone. Minority rights are important because being fortunate enough to be protected in society should prevent those who are unfortunate suffer as a result. Kymlicka (2002) believed that cultural membership, like those within minority societies is so important that is should be considered in the original position. He believed that cultural membership should be a factor when viewing behind the Veil of Ignorance and as a result of this makes minority rights an important consideration and there for needed.

Many critiques of minority rights argue that they are unfair because they provide additional rights to people, rather than the blanket rules for all, like those seen in a democracy. This is justified as existing laws protect the majority, and extra laws would be seen as giving special treatment. In a liberalist society membership into a particular group or lifestyles can only result from free choice (Michael Walzer, 1984). Therefore, it is a person’s choice to pick where they live and what religion they worship. These two choices should not be considered differently from each other in terms of the rights and laws and would be unjust to provide extra rights for a preference. This is exemplified in modern day democracy. The politicians of the modern day often create policies and laws around the general consensus of a popular vote and keeping them in power. Currently the laws passed through parliament generally only reflect the views of the majority – and it can be difficult to achieve minority rights through parliament. This very aspect shows that minorities rights are therefore undesirable to the majority (Sieberer & Muller, 2015). Resultantly such drastic changes to freedoms require such large movements for democracy to give minority rights. Alexis de Tocqueville (1835) view in his article “Tyranny in the Majority” states that political and social minorities are considered a ‘constant threat’ democracy. This can be correlated with how Critics such as He (2004) interpret Kymlicka’s (2002) view that minority rights are a primary good as undercutting liberalism. He (2004) believed that granting minority rights blurred the line between individual liberty and the state, and there for insisted the state should not get involved with issues of culture. One of the biggest characteristics of Liberalism is less state involvement and more integral equality before the law (Gray, 1995). Therefore, it can be said that the view of minorities not being granted rights would be incompatible with liberalism, as a society would be created where some members are given more rights than others.
Never the less it can be argued that Democracy and therefore Liberal societies need minority rights. It is important that minority rights are protected now alienated a minority is form the majority society, otherwise the majority’s rights lose their meaning (Democracy Online, (2008). Philosopher John Mill’s (1966) stated that “The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community against his will is to prevent harm to others”. Mill’s ‘no harm principle’ shows that minority rights are important as they serve as a protection against harm which may be bought onto them from being culturally different. Mill’s believed that this would prevent “tyranny of the majority” which generally can be perceived as a political and social tyranny that aimed at supressing minority voices. In this way we can see that minority rights only exist to gain the same protections as the majorities and are actively seeking protections from where the social structures of society have failed them. This can be explored in the current events of Australia’s Same Sex Marriage vote. This is a modern day example of how legal systems and governments have failed to protect minority rights. The laws extended the legal protections to the majority and forgot the minorities – which according the Mill’s was a failing system. The view of changing the law to allow same-sex marriage had seen countless protests and tremendous amounts of support in support of the change. According to Vasilev (2015) the demonstrations were an integral part to achieving justice. What is an important part of this example is that same-sex attracted couples never considered that their fight for the same rights would reduce the rights of anyone else, however on the other side of the debate it was feared that changing the laws for the minority would affect the majority. Francis Beckwith (2003) argued that the heterosexual protesters feared that changing the law would reduce the cogency of their own marriages. However, it is important to note that protecting individuality and personal choice is a reflection of liberalism. Every individual freedom consists of being treated equal in every aspect therefore the free choice to be a part of a particular minority culture must be protected by the right to voluntary associations (Walzer, 1980). Additionally, Kukathas (1992) agreed with Walzer partially, he believed that minorities should not receive rights based of their culture they should only receive rights based on their freedom to associate and to form communities. It is one of the principles of liberalism that allows freedom to people to join communities and to freely participate in the activities of those communities (Kramer, 2003). It is this freedom of association that maintains the importance of needing minority rights in today’s society.

According to Dworkin (1977), having equal treatment would actually do the opposite of its intent and represent a restriction of the right to be treated as an equal. This is one of the highest principles of liberalism and consequently the need for minority rights its greatly criticised. The regularisation of different cultures could provide unwanted habits to fit into pre-existing cultural majorities. Moreover, minorities being allowed to carry out their cultural habits which are not viewed as the mainstream would instil unwanted fear amongst society. If we look at culture from a Rawlsian view – we see that culture is a sphere that falls outside all other jurisdictions of the law. It is important that in Rawlsian society that culture is upheld and considered in all aspects of law making, however if we blanket rule minority rights based of culture, we deny equality. Creating laws for one group to perform certain activities may affect another groups ability to perform their activities thus making minority rights unnecessary, and this would go against the liberalist view. However, this rule of equality is already broken in modern society because it recognises people as all having the same needs and wants and this would create a singular culture. Modern society has so many different cultures and as a result minority cultures have different backgrounds that are not their choice, and this influences their desires. Tomasi (1995) believed that these cultural narratives were crucial to the liberalist view as they implore uniqueness. Thus, showing that we need minority rights as this will maintain a healthy manifestation of culture and will remove the need for their activities to have to be performed in private. This ultimately according to Roe, (2004) changes the perspective of cultural practices being scrutinised to ‘managed’. Finally, this type of society would then allow freedom for all – showing that minority rights are essential in creating a cohesive society.
To sum up, Minorities rights are extremely important in today’s society as they allow for protections of both individuals and as cultural groups. We can see that minority rights are important to Democracy and also the Liberal society as it allows for consistency of protections for all people ultimately leading to equality. Furthermore, this total equality in every aspect would prevent or inhibit anyone else’s freedoms from being reduced. It is inherent in liberalism to protect individual expression and individuality and therefor paramount that minority rights are protection as they connect to this main principle. Minority rights will additionally with preventing the majority for leading to tyranny by keeping them accountable, by no longer allowing large groups to marginalise minorities. In the ever changing ever transforming global world, minority rights pose not a threat but an important reflection of equality for all.

References:

  • Beckwith, F (2013). Justificatory Liberalism and Same-Sex Marriage. An International Journal of Jurisprudence and Philosophy of Law. Vol. 26 (4)
  • De Tocqueville, A. (1835). Democracy in america(Vol. 10). Regnery Publishing.Translated by Henry Reeve (2003) . [online] available at: http://dl4a.org/uploads/pdf/Alexis-de-Tocqueville-Democracy-in-America.pdf. Accessed 18th May 2018.
  • Democracy Web (2008) Essential Principles and History [online] available at: http://www.democracyweb.org/node/36. Accessed 15th May 2018.
  • Dworkin, R. M. (Ed.). (1977). The philosophy of law (Vol. 102). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Guinier, L. (1994). The tyranny of the majority: Fundamental fairness in representative democracy(pp. 1-20). New York: Free Press.
  • He, Baogang (2004). Confucianism Versus Liberalism over Minority Rights: A Critical Response to Will Kymlicka. Journal of Chinese Philosophy. Vol 31 (1)
  • Kramer, M. H. (2003). In defense of legal positivism: Law without trimmings. Oxford University Press on Demand.
  • Kukathas, Chandran (1992). Are There Any Cultural Rights? Political Theory. Vol 20 (1)
  • Kymlicka, Will (2002). Contemporary Political Philosophy: an Introduction. Oxford University Press.
  • Merle, Jean-Christophe (1998). Cultural Minority Rights and the Rights of the Majority in the Liberal State. Ratio Juris. Vol. 11 (3)
  • Mill, J. S. (1966). On liberty. Palgrave, London. 18. [online] available at: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/34901/34901-h/34901-h.htm. Accessed 20th May 2018.
  • Rawls, John (1971). A Theory of Justice. Harvard University Press
  • Roe, P (2004) Securitization and Minority Rights: Conditions of Desecuritization. Security Dialogue. Vol. 35 no. 3
  • Sieberer, U & Muller, W (2015). Explaining Reforms of Parliamentary Minority Rights: A Theoretical Framework with Case Study Application. West European Politics. Vol. 38 (5)
  • Stivers, C. M. (2002). Bureau Men, Settlement Women: Constructing Public Administration in the Progressive Era (Studies in Government & Public Policy). University Press of Kansas.
  • Tomasi, J (1995). Kymlicka, Liberalism, and Respect for Cultural Minorities. Ethics. Vol. 105(3)
  • Vasilev, George (2015). Minority right activism beyond borders: the synergies between deliberation and strategic action. Policy Studies. Vol. 36 (3)
  • Walzer, M. (1980). Pluralism: A political perspective. The politics of ethnicity, 1-28.
  • Walzer, M. (1984). I. Liberalism and the Art of Separation. Political theory, 12(3), 315-330.

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