Archive for August, 2011

Published August 18th, 2011 by Future Atlas

Future of Human Rights: Some Resources

For the Twitter futrchat on the future of human rights today, here are some resources and links. (Follow the conversation with #futrchat.)

  1. Freedom House checklist of political and civil rights — This is a good list of what might be called core human rights, though that designation is subject to a variety of debates.
  2. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which codifies many political, civil, and social rights, and is accepted by most countries in principle, if not in practice.
  3. “A History of Violence” — An essay by Steven Pinker arguing that violence and brutality of all kinds have been decreasing for a long time.
  4. A report on fighting human rights abuses using technology.
  5. Ronald Inglehart on the relationship of social conditions and wealth to values, including values that shape attitudes toward human rights.
  6. Pew polling data on the attitudes of middle classes toward democracy; culture and class matter.
  7. In thinking about future drivers, what happens if the world becomes much more wealthy? This Asian Development Bank report offers a scenario in which both China and India have per capita incomes over $40,000 by 2050 — see pages 124 and 120.
  8. Some thoughts from Hplus on the relationship of transhumanism and human rights — see especially scenarios 3 to 5.
  9. Other human rights-related posts on this blog.

| Post in Human rights, Technology, Values | 0 Comments

Published August 4th, 2011 by Future Atlas

Upgrading Chinese Oppression

IMG_0811I used to wonder whether a society that became so networked that it could support a ubiquitous monitoring system would end up not using such a system for oppressive political control, both because of the flows of relatively free information that the networks would enable, and because the ability to run such a system implied a high level of socioeconomic development.

China appears to be answering this question, by building an immense surveillance system that will “cover a half-million intersections, neighborhoods and parks over nearly 400 square miles,” using as many as 500,000 cameras reporting to a central system, David Brin notes (from an NPR report). The monitoring system is ostensibly targeting crime, but could clearly be redirected for political surveillance — and in any case the line between crime and politics becomes blurred in China, for instance when social order is seen to include suppressing dissent by Tibetans or Uighurs.

Still, while China puts immense efforts into controlling expression on the Internet and mobile networks, these technologies have still provided new outlets for expression that have changed the role of public opinion in Chinese society. China runs a highly oppressive high-tech monitoring system, by some definitions, but it is also clear that new information networks are changing the nature of China’s politics.

So I won’t dismiss my original question about the role of technology. Its oppressive aspects will vie with its liberating qualities in coming decades, shaping human rights this century.
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| Post in Asia, China, Human rights, Security, Technology | 0 Comments