HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE PROBLEM OF ETHNOCENTRISM Adam Etinson New College, Oxford

272 Pages·2011·1.27 MB·English

by  Adam Etinson

HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE PROBLEM
OF ETHNOCENTRISM

Adam Etinson
New College, Oxford

A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Degree of Doctor of
Philosophy (DPhil) in Philosophy

Trinity Term, 2011
University of Oxford

Word Count: 74, 450
A myth of the origin of human races, told by the Cherokee Indians of the Great
Smoky Mountains gives another instance of this kind of ethnocentrism. These Indians,
of course, know whites and Negroes. Like all Indians, they are brown-skinned, and, as
in all mythologies, the acts of supernatural beings once performed are irrevocable. As
in most mythologies, also, man is the supreme achievement of the Creator, who in this
instance went about creating him by first fashioning and firing an oven and then, from
the dough he had prepared, shaping three figures in human form. He placed the
figures in the oven, and waited for them to get done. But his impatience to see the
result of this, his crowning experiment in the work of creation, was so great that he
removed the first figure too soon. It was sadly underdone – pale, an unlovely color.
But for better or worse, there it was, and from it are descended the white people. His
second figure had fared well. The timing was accurate, the form all he had envisaged.
Richly browned, it pleased him in every way, this figure that was to be the ancestor of
the Indians. He so admired it, indeed, that he neglected to take out of the oven the
third form, until he smelt it burning. He threw open the door, only to find this last one
charred and black. It was regrettable, but there was nothing to be done; and this was
the first Negro.

- Melville J. Herskovits, Man and His Works:
The Science of Cultural Anthropology (New
York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1947), pp. 68-69.

Now, to return to my argument, I do not believe, from what I have been told about
this people [i.e., the cannibals], that there is anything barbarous or savage about them,
except that we all call barbarous anything that is contrary to our own habits. Indeed
we seem to have no other criterion of truth and reason than the type and kind of
opinions and customs current in the land where we live. There we always see the
perfect religion, the perfect political system, the perfect and most accomplished way
of doing everything.

- Michel de Montaigne, “On Cannibals” in
Essays (London: Penguin Books, 1580/1993),
Translated by J.M. Cohen, pp. 108-109.
ii
Abstract

Despite its prominence as a pejorative term in moral and political philosophy, the
phenomenon of ethnocentrism has escaped the focused attention of moral and political
philosophers. Little sustained effort has been devoted to its in-depth analysis. This thesis
attempts to fill in that gap in the philosophical literature, with a particular focus on the
analysis of ethnocentrism as a problem, or rather a set of problems, facing the theory and
practice of human rights. The thesis begins by drawing a core distinction between
ethnocentrism as a moral phenomenon (i.e., a form of moral partiality), on the one hand, and
as an epistemological phenomenon (i.e., a mode of judgment), on the other. After singling out
the epistemological aspect of ethnocentrism (which I call socially reflexive belief) as its main
focus, the thesis argues for four interlocking claims. The first claim is that ethnocentrism
represents an unwarranted mode of judgment, and thus an epistemic hazard that ought to be
avoided if at all possible (Chapter One, §3). This claim is defended at length against the
version of political constructivism advanced by John Rawls, which, by grounding political
argument exclusively in ideas and values embedded in a common public culture, implicitly
justifies a form of ethnocentrism (Chapter Two). The second claim is that moral argument
cannot avoid ethnocentrism by grounding itself, as some have thought, in judgments upon
which there is broad moral consensus, or rather by avoiding any appeal to judgments that are
the subject of marked dissensus (Chapter Three and Chapter Four). Thirdly, the thesis argues
that ethnocentrism is, if avoidable, only so to a limited extent (Chapter Six, §2). And
fourthly, it offers an outline of how this limited form of avoidance might work (Chapter Five
and Chapter Six, §3).

iii
Preface

The present work, or rather my interest in it, first came to life in an essay I wrote as an
undergraduate student at McGill University. The essay, which was written for an
anthropology professor (philosophy was my major; anthropology was my minor), examined
the intricacies, mutual suspicions, and philosophical problems involved in the corroboration
of evidence in Native American land claim disputes. In particular, it focused on the use of
Native American oral history as evidence in such legal confrontations in Canada, a place
where, in recent years, the use of such evidence has become increasingly common.
What made the use of oral history in such cases so intriguing to me was its
controversial status as courtroom evidence. On the one hand, there was the position of the
Federal or Provincial judges who, not unreasonably, feared the worst: unlike textual or “hard”
evidence, oral history evidence could possibly be concocted ad hoc to suit the interests of the
Native American plaintiffs. In the most famous Canadian case involving oral history
evidence, R. v. Delgamuukw (1987), which involved the Gitksan and Wet’suwet’en peoples’
claim of ownership over a massive 54,000 square kilometres of land in northern British
Columbia, some such suspicion lead the Provincial judge, Chief Justice McEachern, to rule
out oral history evidence as an inadmissible form of “hearsay.” On the other hand, there was
the position of the Native Americans themselves, backed by the relativistic vitriol of the
anthropologists, who complained that Native American history was oral (i.e., based on
traditions of storytelling, not texts), that it had always been that way, and that in dismissing
oral history as hearsay the court was merely expressing its ethnocentric “Western” textualist
prejudices.
In recounting this dilemma, my own take was that no one side was being blamefully
ethnocentric in the matter, both were. Somewhere in the midst of the squabbling over land,
and the obvious raw interests at play, was a genuine confrontation between two cultures, two
ways of life, and two ways of doing history that were struggling to understand one another.
The Native Americans, baffled and frustrated to find their stories and songs dismissed as
unverifiable by the court, were in their own way failing to understand the position of the
Canadian judges. And the Canadian judges, for their part, baffled by the Native American
presumption that such stories and songs were the sort of thing that a court should take as
seriously as, say, a signed, dated, and official land deed, were failing to appreciate the
history, traditions, and exceptional position of the Native Americans. In this way, as I saw it,
both sides of the confrontation were to some extent entrapped by their life experience and
cultural background. And it was this idea – the idea that we are all to some extent inevitably
entrapped by cultural prejudice or pre-conviction, and yet are all trying to make sense of the
world as it is, while living together with others who are entrapped by different prejudices and
pre-convictions – that first drew me into the arms of moral and political philosophy. My
ongoing interest in that idea is what has driven me to write the present work.
For help in the creation of this thesis, I owe many debts of various kinds. For crucial
instruction, insight, and guidance, I am most indebted to my three supervisors: Professors
Jeremy Waldron (primary supervisor since January of 2011), John Tasioulas (primary
supervisor until December of 2010) and Roger Crisp (secondary supervisor throughout). For
the funding necessary to complete this project, my thanks goes to both the Association of
Commonwealth Universities at the British Council, London (for a two-year Commonwealth
Scholarship), and to Le Fonds Québécois de la Recherche sur la Société et la Culture, Québec
(for a three-year Doctoral Research Grant).
iv
For helpful comments on draft chapters, I extend my sincere thanks to Kimberley
Brownlee, Caleb Yong, John Gardner, and anonymous reviewers at Utilitas, the Journal of
Political Philosophy, and the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies. For generous, insightful, open,
and engaging discussion both at conferences and in private, I thank Caleb Yong, Charles
Taylor, Rachel Bayefsky, David Wiggins, Jeff Howard, Carlos Fraenkel, Joseph Raz, Carina
Namih, Andreas Tupac Schmidt, James Edwards, Alexandre Erler, Charles Larmore, Robert
Ballingall, Insa Lee Koch, Clara Weinhardt, Jonathan Rafman, Mark Shortt, Mark Kupfert,
Deborah Corber, Brian Earp, Jane Friedman, and S. Matthew Liao. Finally, for their
nourishing love and support, I thank my whole family – Jack (Grandfather), Lil
(Grandmother), Michael (Dad), Janie (Mom), Ryan, Carly, Lynn, Kenny, Elan, Jamie, and
Neil – along with, of course, my partner in crime, Carina.

July 30th, 2011
New College, Oxford

v
Table of Contents

Abstract iii

Preface iv

I. What is Ethnocentrism?

1. A Statement on Human Rights 1
2. Ethnocentrism as Moral Partiality 10
3. Reason and Reflex 20
4. Is There Any Reason to be Reflexive? 25
5. Ethnocentrism and Moral Realism 38

II. Truth or Reasonableness?

1. Reasonableness According to Rawls 52
2. The Argument from Stability 62
3. The Argument from Liberal Legitimacy 70

III. “No, Not Necessarily”: Ethnocentrism in The Law of Peoples

1. Rawls on Ethnocentrism 97
2. The Idea of Mutual Respect among Peoples 100
3. Equal Respect for Rights 107
4. Ethnocentrism and Political Objectivity 114
5. Recognition in The Law of Peoples 132

IV. Human Rights and Moral Consensus

1. Don’t We All Agree? 134
2. Varieties of Agreement 136
3. The Case for an Agreement Theory of Human Rights 145
4. A More Plausible Alternative 170

V. Human Rights, Claimability, and the Uses of Abstraction

1. The Demand for Claimability 173
2. Claimability and Abstraction 179
3. Aspects of Rights 186
4. Specification through Law 190
5. In Defense of Abstract and Unclaimable Rights 203
6. The Uses of Abstraction 208

vi
VI. Avoiding Ethnocentrism

1. An Outstanding Question 216
2. The Endemic Reflexivity of Moral Reasoning 222
3. Modest Objectivism 239

Index of Abbreviations viii

Bibliography 257

vii
Index of Abbreviations

General Lexicon

UDHR – Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)
ICCPR – International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1976)
ICESCR – International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (1976)
ECHR – European Convention on Human Rights (1953)
CRDP – Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2008)
CAT – United Nations Convention Against Torture (1984)
UN – United Nations
UNESCO – United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization
ICC – International Criminal Court
CCHR – United Nations Human Rights Committee
CESCR – United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
AAA – American Anthropological Association

Rawlsian Lexicon

LP – The Law of Peoples (Cambridge: HUP, 1999)
PL – Political Liberalism (New York: CUP, 1996)
TJ – A Theory of Justice: Revised Edition (Cambridge: HUP, 1971/1999)
JF – Justice as Fairness: a Restatement, E. Kelly, ed. (Cambridge: HUP, 2001)
PRR – “The Idea of Public Reason Revisited,” in Political Liberalism (Ibid)

viii
Chapter One:
What is Ethnocentrism?

1. A STATEMENT ON HUMAN RIGHTS

In June of 1947, during the initial drafting stages of the 1948 Universal Declaration of
Human Rights (UDHR), the Executive Board of the American Anthropological Association
(AAA) issued a statement of concern to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights
(UNCHR). They expressed their deepest worry, or what they took to be the primary challenge
facing the drafting committee, in the form of a question:

How can the proposed declaration be applicable to all human beings, and not be a
statement of rights conceived only in terms of the values prevalent in the countries of
Western Europe and America? 1

Today, over sixty years after the drafting of the UDHR, this question continues to haunt both
popular and scholarly debates about human rights. Political opposition to human rights is often
couched in cultural terms, with many contending that human rights – or rather that certain
purported human rights, such as the right to non-discrimination on the basis of gender or sexual
orientation – are simply not “Islamic,” “African,” or “Asian,” etc.2 And scholars of various stripes,

1 The Executive Board, American Anthropological Association, “Statement on Human Rights” in
2 See: the debate about the morality and legality of homosexuality in Uganda that I describe below
in §3.
1
both “continental” and “analytic,” and from a variety of disciplines (e.g., philosophy,
anthropology, law, history, political science, international relations, literary and cultural studies,
etc.), have considered the AAA’s question important and worthy of an answer.3 Even people who
have otherwise given little thought to the modern idea of human rights nevertheless seem to
understand and appreciate the basic worry that it expresses. But what is that basic worry?

1.1 An Adjective

The AAA’s question itself will for many evoke what has come to be known (rather
loosely) as the problem of ethnocentrism.4 This evocation is entirely appropriate, and for at least
two reasons. First of all, the question quite literally asks how a declaration like the UDHR can
avoid being ethnocentric – that is, how it can avoid expressing (or being ‘conceived in terms of’)
values that are recognized only in some cultures, ethnicities, countries, or parts of the world. In
this possibility the AAA foresaw a host of historically-borne-out dangers, among them the
stifling or frustration of the “personalities” and freedoms of vast numbers of human beings.5
That such cultural one-sidedness was something that ought to be avoided, however, was an
opinion shared not only by the AAA, but also by the broader United Nations organization itself.
Already by March of 1947 the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) had assembled a Committee on the Theoretical Bases of Human
Rights composed of several eminent intellectuals, the sole purpose of which was to establish
whether broad cross-cultural agreement on a single declaration of human rights was in fact

3 See, for instance: fn. 19 below. It would make little sense for me to shoot off innumerable
references in support of this statement here and right away. Instead, one will find the relevant
references placed throughout this thesis at the appropriate points.
4 Sometimes also called the “parochialism objection” to human rights. See, for instance: Allen
Buchanan’s, “Human Rights and the Legitimacy of the International Order” in Legal Theory, Vol. 14,
No. 1 (2008), pp. 39-70.
5 The Executive Board, AAA 1947, pp. 540-541, 543.
2