|
Jonathan Fanton, president of the John
D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation,
received an honorary Doctor of
Laws degree during the ceremony.
The
Text:
Good afternoon. This is a special moment for me. My family first came
to Connecticut in 1680, settling in what is now Fairfield, Easton and Weston. We
have lived in Connecticut continuously for 325 years; no honor could mean more to
my family and me. Thank you.
I want to talk with you for a few minutes about human rights and about an important
issue that I hope will engage you.
Human rights is an appropriate topic for this University because Connecticut
has pioneered the theory and practice of protecting individual freedom.
In 1639, the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut were adopted affirming that the “foundation
of authority is the free consent of the people.” Two years before the
Declaration of Independence, the town of Mansfield, along with others across the
state, asserted the “natural rights” of Connecticut’s citizens
in defiance of the British Crown.
As early as 1774, Connecticut began to restrict the trade of slaves. In 1840,
a number of Connecticut citizens worked to shelter and free slaves seized here
on the Amistad.
In 1866, Connecticut was the first state to ratify the 14 th amendment guaranteeing
equal protection under the law. In 1869, the Connecticut Women’s Suffrage
Association was born, and in 1943, the General Assembly established the Inter-Racial
Commission, the nation’s first civil rights agency.
Through this University, Connecticut continues to issue a call and a challenge
for our nation to live up to the high aspiration for human rights articulated in
our country’s charter documents.
I am enormously impressed with the depth and breath of the University’s commitment
to human rights: The Human Rights Institute, the Dodd Research Center, the
Gladstein and UNESCO chairs in human rights, an undergraduate minor, an active outreach
program to public schools, a robust research agenda, and conferences drawing world
leaders.
I am pleased to see that human rights study runs across schools, departments,
and disciplines; that it embraces both civil and political as well as economic
and social rights; that it puts U.S. rights issues in comparative perspective;
and that it examines fundamental and structural dimensions of human rights abuses.
The University of Connecticut stands tall among universities around the world
as a beacon for scholarship, teaching, and principled action in the human rights
field.
Fired by the honorable tradition of this State and the inspiration of this University,
we must join together to fulfill our obligation for leadership in protecting human
security, individual dignity, and opportunity for all.
It is natural at this joyous moment to be thinking about the professional challenges
ahead, opened and expanded by your studies here and the degrees you are receiving
today. But you may also be reflecting on how to fashion a balanced life – career,
family, personal avocations, and civic engagement.
I can bear witness to the importance of volunteer service and engagement in
issues advocacy. I feel blessed to have had interesting and challenging
jobs, but my deepest satisfaction has come from my 20-year involvement with Human
Rights Watch.
HRW works in 70 countries around the world bringing to light human rights abuses
from Rwanda and Sierra Leone to Iraq and Egypt; from North Korea and China to Columbia
and Cuba. It also attends to America’s own shortcomings: appalling
prison conditions; indefinite detentions and abusive practices at U.S.-run facilities
in Guantanamo Bay and Iraq; the “extraordinary rendition” of terrorism
suspects to countries where torture is common.
Human Rights Watch is emblematic of civil society’s growing importance over
the past fifty years. By “civil society,” I mean non-governmental
groups that do careful research and monitoring to expose problems, propose specific
remedies rooted in law and reality, and pioneer models of direct service.
Amnesty International, Physicians for Human Rights, CARE, Doctors Without Borders,
Save the Children – the honor role is wide and deep. These global
groups support and draw strength from a burgeoning number of local civil society
organizations the Moscow Helsinki Group, Mexico’s Sin Fronteras, Nigeria’s
Access to Justice.
All over the world, people like you and me are joining together to influence
governments and confront problems, from the environment to AIDS to human rights
violations, directly through the power of civil society.
These groups play an indispensable role in the policy process and at the same
time advance the prospects of creating and sustaining healthy democracies around
the world. They give voice to ordinary citizens, check governmental excesses,
fill in service gaps, and prod international agencies to establish norms that express
humankind’s highest aspirations for justice and fairness.
And so here is my bottom-line message to you: Get involved – you can
make a difference. Financial contributions are important and absolutely essential,
but they are only the beginning. Time, expertise, emotional commitment: that’s
where the real action is. Opportunities abound whether you live in Fairfield
or Chicago, New Dehli or Nairobi, in Moscow or Madrid, in Cairo or Caracas.
What we do as volunteers matters, but so does the exercise of our political
influence. In my concluding minutes, I want to talk about one issue that
needs your attention: the new International Criminal Court that came into existence
in 2002.
The architecture for the worldwide protection of human rights is pretty much
in place: agreements like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Convention Against Torture give
a basis for robust action.
The challenge ahead is enforcement of these rights and punishment for those
who violate them. A vibrant system of international justice is emerging,
with the new International Criminal Court at its center.
The Court has jurisdiction over the worst human rights abuses: genocide, war
crimes, and crimes against humanity -- acts like torture, enslavement, or forced
disappearances committed on a massive scale causing great suffering. The attacks
of September 11 – the deliberate murder of large numbers of civilians – would
have made Osama bin Laden subject to international criminal prosecution had the
Court come into existence a year earlier.
2005 is a crucial year in the Court’s early history. The ICC is currently
investigating its first three cases: the atrocities in Northern Uganda committed
by the Lord’s Resistance Army, and systematic acts of murder and mutilation
by warring groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Just last month, the
U. N. Security Council asked this new Court to investigate 51 individuals suspected
of committing crimes against humanity in the Darfur region of Sudan, crimes that
Secretary of State Powell called “genocide.” Although no indictments
have been made in those three cases, the ICC’s investigations have already
brought greater pressure to end these conflicts and have focused international attention
on the abuses.
It may surprise you that the United States has not ratified the Treaty of Rome,
which created the International Criminal Court, and that it is not part of the
ICC. It opposes the Court for fear that United States citizens would be
brought to trial under it – an unlikely possibility because the Treaty states
that the Court will assume jurisdiction only when a country is unable or unwilling
to conduct an investigation of its own.
But America’s refusal to join its allies like Britain, Canada, France, and
Germany, and ninety-four other nations, will not stop the Court from going forward. This
is the most important new international institution since the founding of the United
Nations, not only because it may well deter future Pol Pots or Pinochets, but because
it is causing nations around the world to reform their own laws and bring them into
compliance with international standards.
Because the United States has a functioning criminal justice system capable
of addressing allegations of genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity,
U.S. citizens, military personnel, and government officials have nothing
to fear from the International Criminal Court. Dictators, corrupt armies, and
armed groups in failing states do.
The United States should not undermine the ICC, which can bring justice to hundreds
of thousands of victims and families who do not have the privilege of such recourse
in their home countries.
A recent national poll by the Chicago Council on Foreign Affairs reports that
69% of Americans support the ICC – a strong majority. Why then is
our government out of step with public opinion? It may be that we as citizens
have not raised the issue forcefully enough or made it a priority among other important
issues we care about.
I urge you to educate yourself about the Court and to speak up in favor of American
ratification of the Treaty of Rome. The United States government should get in
step with the American people, who understand that our failure to join the Court
puts us on the wrong side of history.
You can tell that I feel passionately about human rights. But there are other
issues worthy of your attention, so I conclude with this simple observation.
Being engaged in community organizations, issue advocacy groups, as well as
religious and service institutions, will add value to your lives and contribute
to our search for a more just and humane world at peace. And as you feel
the difference you are making, you will take heart that the deadly forces of apathy,
fatalism, and despair can be turned back by the power of individuals coming together
directly, unmediated by governments.
That is the way of the future in our race against global warming; against the
ravages of AIDS; against the growth of terrorist networks; and against the potential
of social explosion, as rising expectations clash with the stubborn persistence
of poverty.
The most powerful force for good in our time is the worldwide mobilization of
citizens to act directly: sometimes to supplement government action, sometimes
to resist it; most often to bring compassion and competence, hope and determination,
when formal mechanisms fail. I hope that you will all join in.
| 
