Optimize Environment for Human Rights Development, and Boost Sustainable Human Rights Development
- By Luo Haocai
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E-mail China.org.cn, September 12, 2013
The strengthening of social construction shall always lay an emphasis on the guarantee and improvement of people's livelihood, and highlight the orientation of human rights protection to people's livelihood. The profound Chinese thought of people-orientation and the Chinese tradition of care for people's livelihood, both of which have a long history, determine that the human rights protection in China must give priority to people's livelihood, lay an emphasis on people's livelihood, and be oriented in people's livelihood. The priority to people's livelihood means to care for the most basic requirement and guarantee of people's subsistence and livelihood, and give priority to the rights to subsistence and development; the emphasis on people's livelihood means to take the guarantee and improvement of people's livelihood and the improvement of the people's material and cultural standards of living as the very purposes of all the work of the government; and the orientation to people's livelihood means to view the guarantee of people's livelihood as the very foundation of human rights protection. China has constantly increased its investment in people's livelihood. In the past five years, the expenditures that the public finance of the Central Government have added up to 16.89 trillion, with an annual increase of 21.1%, and steadily accounting for more than two thirds of the total expenditures of public finance of the Central Government.
The strengthening of social construction entails the accelerated reform of social systems, the transformation of functions, the rectification of mechanisms, and the overall planning of the cooperation of all forces in the society for the improvement of human rights protection. First, we should handle well the relations between the government and the society, and strengthen cooperation between power and rights. There are both rivalries and cooperation between power and rights, and the relations between these two should be viewed from a dialectical point of view, and we should abandon adversarial thinking and intensify the awareness of cooperation, handle the relations between power and rights as a whole from the point of view of balance, and make concerted efforts for the promotion of human rights. Secondly, we should speed up the formation of a basic public service system, realize basic human rights protection, and guarantee social justice and righteousness. Thirdly, we should release the vigor of the society, accelerate the formation of a modern system of social organizations, give a play to such non-governmental organizations as associations of human rights studies, make social organizations a bridge between the governments and the populace, and form a social structure for the governments, enterprises and social organizations to interact, cooperate and circulate in a benign way. At the beginning this year, the National People's Congress initiated a new round of reform of governmental institutions. This reform lays an emphasis on the transformation of governmental functions, the regulation of governmental power, the decentralization of power and its granting to markets and the society, and its final purpose is to allow a bigger share of interests to the people and return the power to the people. Administrative examination and approval are the breakthrough point for the reform. In the past ten years, the Central Government has abolished and adjusted 2,497 items which formally required administrative examination and approval, accounting for 69.3% of formal total items. Now, this session of the government will reduce within its term more than one third of the excising 1,700-odd items of administrative examination and approval, which involve all departments of the State Council.
With the cooperation between the state and the society, the government and non-government organizations, and power and rights on the basis of balance, China has found a path of human rights protection featuring the cooperation between rights and power, which is within the frame of the Constitution and laws and lays an emphasis on people's livelihood, the protection of human right has been boosted in many aspects, and the society has remained harmonious and orderly.
Thirdly, we should strengthen international cooperation and guarantee world peace to create a benign environment for the promotion of sustainable human rights development Peace, security and human rights have different connotations, but are intrinsically consistent. On the one hand, peace and security have increasing scopes, including human rights, governance by law, democracy and so forth, and systems that systematically encroach on human rights are thought threats against peace and international security. On the other hand, human rights protection and peace maintenance depend upon each other. Human rights may be threatened by military conflicts, while the systematic infringement against human rights are one major cause of national, religious, social and political tension, and often worsens into unsteadiness or military conflicts.
The maintenance of regional security, the guarantee of international peace and the protection of human rights have been the major concerns of the UN all along. Since the World War Two, the international law on human rights and the international protection mechanism of human rights have been rapidly developed as a reflection of the Nazism tyranny. Today's international protection of human rights is not only viewed as a basic obligation defined by the international law, but also a major task of the international community. Globalization calls for global cooperation, and strengthened multilateral cooperation and the UN's role are not only the necessary choice of all countries, but also a requisite measure for the international community to effectively meet common challenges. All countries are obliged to carry out their undertakings in the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, pay attention to exchanges, improve understanding and strengthen cooperation. That is not only the basic requirement for sustainable human rights development, but also the responsibility of each government, non-governmental organization and individual.
For years, China has adhered to principles, actively mediated, promoted peace and boosted negotiation with regard to a series of international and regional hot point issues, making important contributions to the maintenance of regional peace and steadiness. China will continue to carry the banner of peaceful development and win-win cooperation, keep up the spirit of equality, mutual trust and tolerance, learn from each other, engage in win-win cooperation, firmly stick to the path of peaceful development, play the part of a responsible large country, resolvedly guarantee the sovereignty and development of the state, maintain regional security and world peace, and boost the full and all-round realization of human rights protection.
On the path of sustainable human rights development, of course, we are still facing many problems, and the task is still very arduous. The concrete contents of human rights and their protection routines are dynamic and evolve, and human rights development is not limited to a single lane. Countries vary in terms of environments when they strengthen human rights construction and protection, and they have to seek for their own paths of sustainable human rights development which conform to the stages of their economic, social and cultural development.
We live in the same global village and share the same dream of human rights and development. Each of our gatherings is a step towards the realization of this dream, and each effort will be a contribution to human rights. This year meets the 65th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 20th anniversary of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, and also the 20th anniversary of the China Society for Human Rights Studies. Since its first opening in 2008, the Beijing Forum on Human Rights has held six sessions consecutively, with each session under a different theme. All these sessions have reached consensuses and achieved greatly. Now I wish the Forum to increasingly prosper, and the road of international exchanges and cooperation in human rights to become increasingly broad.
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