In the field of population, concern for Human Rights has become more prominent during recent years. Most governments have adopted policies and programmes intended to influence demographic trends. at the same time, governments have used the United Nations as a forum where their representatives can discuss and ultimately reached on their citizen’s rights in the field of population (Heisel, ND: 1). Human population growth is perhaps the most significant cause of the complex problems the world faces; climate change, poverty and resource scarcity complete the list (Foresight, 2009b quoted in Horizon, 2009: 1). By 2050, the world’s population would have grown by 2.7 billion to 9 billion. Most of this increase will be in Asia and Africa, which, along with the rest of the globe, will face increased strain on already insufficient resources. Sustained population growth, aggressive economic competition and increased consumption will result in intensive exploitation and pressure on resources (UNEP, 2009; OECD, 2003; DCDC, 2007).
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Population and human rights were two prominent issues on the world’s agenda during the years following the conclusion of World War II. Scholars can trace historic roots for each of them back the millennia, but they were really only fully articulated after the mid 1940s. During the last half – century, they have established their own programmes at the international, national and local levels. Each has experienced considerable growth in the institutions that are active in its respective area (Heisel, ND: 1). Population and human rights are separate issues, but they are not independent of one another. Human rights concerns have come to play an increasing role in population policies and programmes over the last fifty years. In turn, demographic trends and population policies continue to present evolving and at times new challenges to human rights (Heisel, ND: 1).
The foundation stone upon which the post cold war II human rights establishment was built was the universal declarations, along with its two accompanying covenants, make up the international bill of human rights.
The universal declaration (UDHR) is a comparatively brief document; it consists of thirty articles, set forth in just a few pages of text. it provides the essential frame work of civic and of social and economic rights that every human being must be able to enjoy simply because he/ she is a human being (Heisel, ND: 3). the topics covered include the fundamental equality of all humans, their rights to life, liberty, security, due process and equality before the law and privacy. Slavery, torture, and arbitrary arrest are prohibited. The right to freedom of movement, asylum and to nationality is specified. All persons are granted the right to form a family, own a property, enjoy freedom of thought, religion, expression, peaceful assembly and participation in the government of their country. In addition, all have rights to development, employment, leisure, education, social security, and the enjoyment of one’s culture (Heisel, ND:3).
Reproductive health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity, in all matters relating to the reproductive system and to its functions and processes.
Reproductive health therefore implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and that they have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so (ICPD Programme of Action, 1994). Implicit in this last condition are the right of men and women to be informed and to have access to safe, effective, affordable and acceptable methods of family planning of their choice, as well as other methods of their choice for regulation of fertility which are not against the law, and the right of access to appropriate health-care
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services that will enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a healthy infant(ICPD Programme of Action, 1994).
With the extension of the concept of Human Rights to include social entitlements as well as personal freedoms, governments are charged not only with protecting individual liberty but also with ensuring social wellbeing. Furthermore, if everyone has the right to such personal freedoms and social entitlements, then no person or institution can deny another person or group the exercise of these rights (Dixon-Mueller, 1993: 3). The transition from individual liberty to social entitlement carries new obligations for the citizen as well. For instance, the "right" to an education becomes a moral obligation for parents (and a legal requirement in many countries) to send all children of a certain age to school. Similarly, the right to health becomes an obligation to vaccinate one's children against certain infectious diseases; the right to decide "freely" on the number and spacing of one's children becomes an obligation to decide ’’ responsibly" as well.
(The constitution of China, for example, makes family planning not only an individual right but also a duty) (Dixon-Mueller, 1993:3). Out of liberty is born obligation, and the exercise of a right is rendered essentially compulsory" (Veil 1978:314). Population issues such as are not extensively dealt with in the UDHR. No reference is made to population size or to rate of growth, nor for that matter in any other human rights instruments adopted since. however, in one way or another each of the various factors that affect the population – fertility, mortality, internal and external migration are taken up (Heisel, ND:3).
In recent years, much attention has been devoted to the problems of overpopulation and attempts at slowing population growth. The number of people is expanding at an alarming rate, thereby threatening the physical environment as well as the quality of human life. The United Nations has not adequately dealt with the population problems (Eisenhauer, ND: 1). The idea of reproductive rights and freedoms cannot be considered apart from the exercise of other basic Human Rights. Reproductive freedom lies at the core of individual self-determination. The principle of "voluntary motherhood" was central to the movement for female emancipation among nineteenth-century liberal feminists, whereas birth control for socialist and radical feminists was more often a means to sexual and social liberation (Dixon-Mueller, 1993: 5). At least three types of reproductive rights can be distinguished: (1) the freedom to decide how many children to have and when (or whether) to have them; (2) the right to have the information and means to regulate one's fertility; (3) the fight to "control one's own body."
The first two concepts have been formalized in various U.N. declarations
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since the mid-1960s while the third has emerged primarily from feminist discourse liberation (Dixon-Mueller, 1993: 5). Reproductive freedom refers in most U.N. documents to the freedom of all persons of "full age" to marry or not, to choose one's spouse, to have children or not, and to decide when to have them and how many to have (Dixon-Mueller, 1993: 5).
Talking about reproductive right, Dixon-Mueller (1993: 5) argued that:
Reproductive rights and freedoms is the right to be able to regulate one's fertility, that is, the right to obtain family planning information and services. From its tentative origins in U.N. documents as a right "to adequate education and information" permitting couples to regulate their fertility, the concept was broadened to include the right to the "information, education and means to do so." This right is an entitlement in theory if not in fact: if people are to exercise their reproductive freedom, they are entitled to have the means to do so safely and effectively. Reproductive rights and freedoms is the more comprehensive right to control one's own body. Articulated as a feminist principle, this formulation recognizes the potential for conflict inherent in male-female relationships and includes sexual as well as reproductive rights. All of the elements of reproductive rights and freedom mentioned here incorporate the principles of individual liberty and social entitlement within a broad human rights framework. The individual liberty elements consist of the freedom to choose among alternative sexual and reproductive behaviours without coercion from governments or from individuals or social institutions. In turn, individual behaviour is to be governed by a sense of social responsibility.
SELF-ASSESSMENT EXERCISE
What’s the link between Human Right and population?
4.0 CONCLUSION
Population and human rights were two prominent issues on the world’s agenda during the years following the conclusion of World War II.
Population and human rights are separate issues, but they are not independent of one another. Human rights concerns have come to play an increasing role in population policies and programmes over the last fifty years.
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5.0 SUMMARY
The major emphasis of this unit is population and human rights. The nexus between the two has been thoroughly examined in this section.