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  • Can Globalization Promote Human Rights?
  • Mahmood Monshipouri (bio)
Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann , Can Globalization Promote Human Rights? (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2010), 168 pages, plus index, ISBN 9780271037394.

The dynamics of the emergence and transmission of human rights norms on the one hand, and the rapid movement of globalization among the world's economies on the other defy any simple analysis of the relationship between the two. It is especially problematic to commit to a grand theory for illumination of either factor when one is faced with a sense of uncertainty about how this issue is unfolding across a globalizing world. Two relevant questions arise: first, which perspective, paradigm, or theory can better explain these changes transpiring around us? And second, has economics fared much better than political science in explaining the problems of poverty and inequality? Hence, the debate among social scientists continues over whether global market forces have reduced or increased the rate of world poverty.

Some experts identify state sovereignty as having been significantly undermined [End Page 568] in the face of serious limits to governmental capacity given the lingering global financial turbulence.1 Others point out that globalization has yet to reshape the security environment or overwhelm the state as the chief security actor. In fact, they argue, the state has retained its primacy in shaping globalization, especially in the provision of security.2 Still others regard the rise of global forces as synonymous with social disempowerment of governments to cope with new economic challenges.3 In a similar vein, some have called into question the promise of global institutions, arguing that globalization will help create a new global economy in which the fruits of growth are more equitably shared only if all countries have a voice in policies affecting them. It is questionable whether the sacrifice of state sovereignty has resulted in equal gains for both greater and lesser powers.4

Rhoda Howard-Hassmann's Can Globalization Promote Human Rights? criticizes conventional and overly structuralist approaches to globalization for being so obsessed with exogenous scripts that they lose sight of the fact that domestic strategic choice plays a vital role in determining how globalization can be put to good use. Howard-Hassmann provides a useful theoretical framework that stresses issues beyond political and sociological approaches and takes economic factors and relationships seriously. Howard-Hassmann, well-known for her previous work on human rights, examines more closely the way in which globalization can promote human rights, while rejecting the notion that globalization will necessarily enhance human rights or that states have lost substantial control over most of what occurs within their borders. Rather, she argues that the relationship between globalization and human rights cannot be predicted over a short period. Instead, it is reasonable to look to the medium term—a period of about twenty to fifty years—as a more reliable method to examine the possible effects of globalization on human rights.5

In the long run, Howard-Hassmann goes on to argue, globalization may help to create a world of increased prosperity and democracy, and better protection of human rights. This depends, among other things, on successful social action and public policy measures in defense of human rights. Simply put, a positive human rights outcome is not inevitable; it is a matter of concrete social struggle and political decision making.6 Howard Hassmann's argument is validated by some experts of the politics of developing countries who posit that the key determinants of national policy outcomes often remain internal rather than external.7

Having relied on several empirical studies and a variety of indicators, Howard-Hassmann identifies a finding that between 1981 and 2005 the percent age of the world's population living in poverty decreased from 51.8 percent to 25.2 percent.8 This decline in the poverty [End Page 569] rate, however, is accompanied by widened inequality both between and within countries. Although most studies concur with Howard-Hassmann's assessment that global inequality is increasing, as absolute income gaps are widening and will continue to do so for decades, the validity of the thesis that the number of people in extreme poverty is falling...

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