Classification of human rights

Dacă faptulcă o persoană individual este deţinătoarea drepturilor omului este dincolo de orice discuţie, nu aceeaşi este situaţia cu drepturilecolective, adică acele drepturi al căror deţinător nu este o persoană, ci un grup de persoane, fie că acestea sunt grupate formal într-o persoană juridică, fie informal în cazul diferitelor comunităţi. Chestiunea drepturilor colective a fost şi mai este puternic contestată de unele state, mai ales din perspectivă politică, cauza acestei contestări aflându-se mai ales în susţinerile făcute de numeroase minorităţi naţionale potrivit cărora drepturile lor nu sunt drepturi individuale, ci colective. S-a ajuns până acolo încât s-a contestat însăşi existenţa drepturilor collective în sine, ca drepturi ocrotite de dreptul internaţional, în ciuda faptului că există documente internaţionale care reglementează drepturi ale căror subiecte nu pot fi decât collective. Aşa sunt, de exemplu “dreptul popoarelor la autodeterminare”, “dreptul la dezvoltare economic şi socială”, “dreptul de a participa la şi de a beneficia de <moştenirea comună a omenirii>”, “dreptul la pace”, “dreptul la un mediu sănătos”, “dreptul la ajutor umanitar în caz de dezastru”. La acestea trebuie adăugat că subiectul ocrotit de Convenţia cu privire la crima de genocide este tot un subiect colectiv, dreptul la existenţă fiind recunoscut colectivităţii ca atare. În ceea ce priveşte drepturile minorităţilor trebuie să spus că deşi multe din ele sunt drepturi ale persoanelor care aparţin minorităţilor naţionale, exercitarea lor putând fi făcută individual sau în comun cu alţii, există însăşi drepturi care fie pot fi considerate colective, fie au o dimensiune colectivă, în sensul în care exercitarea lor individual este practice imposibilă. De exemplu, recunoaşterea minorităţii ca atare este un drept colectiv, căci ea are în vedere nu fiecare individ în parte, sau suma acestor indivizi, ci însăşi comunitatea. Dreptul de la instrucţie în limba maternă este un drept care aparţine fiecărei persoane, dar exercitarea sa în cadrul unei şcoli se face numai în comun cu alţii, în afara acestei dimensiuni collective reglementarea însăşi fiind inutilă, căci în particular fiecare are dreptul să înveţe cum doreşte. Extrem de important este însă sublinierea faptului că protecţia drepturilor colective nu poate fi făcută în dauna celor individuale, acestea din urmă prevalând asupra primelor. Drepturile care aparţin fiecărei persoane pot fi reclamate nu doar în relaţia acesteia cu statul, ci şi cu celelalte persoane, inclusiv cu comunitatea căreia îi aparţine.

Teacher: Cichi Ani Felicia, "Virgil Madgearu" Economic Technological High School, Iași

Just as there is no unanimity on the definition of human rights, so there is no consensus on their classification, and the following examples have more of a guiding role in understanding the concept.

a) Depending on the social relations protected (“three generations of human rights”) Inspired by the regulations of the French Revolution, Karel Vasak, a French jurist and human rights theorist, came up with the idea of dividing them into three generations. So: - the first generation would be of civil and political rights (liberté); - the second generation would be of economic, social and cultural rights (egalité); - the third generation would be the rights of solidarity (fraternité). The doctrine also stated that civil and political rights would be "negative rights", in the sense that states should only refrain from interfering in their free exercise by individuals. For example, the right not to be subjected to torture presupposes that the state authorities do not torture persons on the territory of the state. Or, the right to liberty means that no one is arbitrarily arrested. Freedom of expression presupposes the non-existence of state censorship, etc. In contrast, economic, social and cultural rights would be "positive rights", understanding that their exercise requires state action. For example, in order to be able to work and benefit from social insurance, the state must take care of the existence of jobs, put in place an insurance system, etc. Finally, solidarity rights would be “collective rights”, because their bearers are not individual individuals, but communities of people. In reality, this division into negative and positive rights is quite simplistic, because it is difficult to conceive how only the non-intervention of the state could ensure the unhindered exercise of civil and political rights. In fact, states even have the obligation to ensure, in all respects, the right environment for the exercise of these rights and the obligation to intervene when they are violated. Thus, there must be internal legislation and judicial mechanisms (police, courts) to ensure that rights can be exercised and their violation is sanctioned. But this means precisely a positive action of the state and not just one of abstention. At the same time, it should be noted that the distinction between civil and political rights, on the one hand, and economic, social and cultural rights, on the other, influenced the whole process of codifying human rights after the Second World War and until present. If Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke of the "four freedoms" without distinguishing between these categories of rights - freedom of speech and expression - freedom of worship / freedom of religion - freedom from want - freedom from fear The same cannot be said of the way human rights instruments have been drafted. Against the background of the ideological conflict at the end of the war, the two international Covenants that were adopted by the UN were different depending on the categories of rights regulated, the essential difference between them being the implementation mechanisms: - civil and political rights (eg the right to life, the right not to be subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment, the right not to be held in slavery, the right to personal liberty, the right to a fair and just trial, the freedom to freedom of conscience and religion, the right to privacy, freedom of association, freedom of assembly, the right to stand for election and to vote, etc.) are rights for which the trial; she is also entitled to obtain an appropriate remedy in the event of a violation of her rights; there are even specific international complaint mechanisms finding that the state has violated a person's rights;

- economic, social and cultural rights (eg the right to work, the right to social security, the right to rest, the right to health, the right to housing, etc.) are formulated rather in the form of recommendations which take into account essentially the power economic development of each state; With regard to the control mechanisms for the observance of these rights, it must be said that they are much weaker, practical, reducing to the reports that states have to submit to the various international bodies, showing the progress made. On the other hand, it would also be too simplistic to consider that the difference between the two categories of rights is only one that was based on the division of the world into the two ideological blocs. If that were the case, then it would not have manifested itself in the Council of Europe, which originally included only Western European democracies. And yet, the European Convention on Human Rights refers only to civil and political rights, the mechanisms for control and enforcement being provided only for them. The European Social Charter was adopted many years later, and the enforcement mechanism does not provide for a procedure before the European Court. This means that the distinction between the two categories of rights is deeper, its causes can be identified in the very philosophy that generated the concept of human rights and according to which the difference is made between "rights" - civil and political and "aspirations". ”- the economic, social and cultural ones. With regard to the rights of solidarity - the rights of minorities - although concerns for their legal codification within the UN have always existed, they have received only partial protection at first, through the Convention on the Crime of Genocide or the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of racial discrimination. Only after the fall of the communist regimes and with the violent forms of manifestation of national and religious intolerance in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union did it succeed both at the UN level and at the Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe and the Council of Europe to adopt documents that are addressed exclusively to minorities. c) Depending on the rights holder: individual rights and collective rights If the fact that an individual is the holder of human rights is beyond any discussion, the same is not the case with collective rights, ie those rights whose holder is not a person but a group of people, whether they are formally grouped in a legal person, or informally in the case of different communities. The issue of collective rights has been and still is strongly contested by some states, especially from a political perspective, the cause of this challenge being mainly in the claims made by many national minorities that their rights are not individual rights, but collective. It has gone so far as to challenge the very existence of collective rights themselves, as rights protected by international law, despite the fact that there are international documents that regulate rights whose subjects can only be collective. Such are, for example, “the right of peoples to self-determination”, “the right to economic and social development”, “the right to participate in and benefit from the <common heritage of mankind>”, “the right to peace”, “the right to a healthy environment "," the right to humanitarian aid in case of disaster ". To these must be added that the subject protected by the Convention on the Crime of Genocide is also a collective subject, the right to exist being recognized to the community as such. With regard to the rights of minorities, it must be said that although many of them are rights of persons belonging to national minorities, their exercise can be done individually or jointly with others, there are rights themselves that can either be considered collective or have a collective dimension, in