Carolyn Balk
Trailblazer Foundation
Siem Reap, Cambodia
As I began discussing in my first post, access to clean drinking water is an essential human right. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) states that human rights center on the “inherent dignity” of all men and women. Clean water access creates a pathway for more human rights due to greater well-being as well as allowing people to preserve their “inherent dignity,” an essential part of the UDHR. As United Nations Social and Economic Council (ECOSOC) succinctly states: “The human right to water is indispensable for leading a life in human dignity” (1).
Drinking water access is a vital human need for survival and “better standard of life” (UDHR). The “better standard of life” implies better health and wellbeing, in turn allowing for “social progress” (UDHR). The United Nations officially recognizes that all humans have the right to drinking water and sanitation and that these are “essential to the realization of all human rights” (UN). This is because the benefits of clean drinking water. including the prevention of water-borne illness and creation of stronger immune systems, in turn promotes the perpetuation of human rights and gives more agency to the Cambodian people. Sustainable water filters in homes and villages as well as piped water in certain areas allow Cambodians to obtain adequate housing and clean living standards (UDHR). Fundamentally, drinking water is crucial to human dignity, essential for the right of life, and critical element for a host of other human rights.
Water can also easily be viewed as only a biological need, in order to sustain life, rather than a human right. The short answer is that access to clean drinking water is both a need and a right. We need clean water to live, and we have the right to access it. Moreover, labeling clean drinking water access as a human right rather than a need elevates its status and urgency in the international political arena. Human rights, after all, tend to garner more attention than human needs, which do not have the same rhetorical power.
As Andrew Clapham, author of Human Rights: A Short Introduction, explains, it becomes difficult to define “need,” particularly when that definition may shift across countries. Clapham describes the “right to food” as signifying that the government is prepared for food shortages and can ensure access to food for all of its citizens (122). The right to food does not mean that the government must give free food to all of its citizens (Clapham 121). Guaranteeing food security is true of water security as well: the government should ensure that clean water is available to its citizens. It is a right to have access to a need. The government should take a keystone role in insuring water security in its country because the government will ideally always be there and be accountable, while private organizations can instead come and go. As I discussed in my previous post, privatized water is often more expensive than public water as well.
Many scholars and political analysts are critical of human rights rhetoric when framing any problem, saying that it is too “feathery,” or rather, idealistic and intangible in developing potential steps to lessen the problem. In “International Human Rights Movement: Part of the Problem?” academic David Kennedy discusses his fear of creating a “fantasy government” in terms of problem solving and obtaining human rights (20). He argues that human rights discourse and rhetoric—often too narrow or too broad—are usually not grounded in concrete problem solving, necessary to obtain human rights, and often promise more than they can deliver (Kennedy 9, 12, 15). Nevertheless, access to clean drinking water is a vital human right, especially in terms of obtaining other human rights, and the human rights framework is vital in elevating the problem’s status to an international level.
Works Cited:
Clapham, Andrew. Human Rights: A Very Short Introduction. New York, New York: Oxford University Press Inc., 2007. Print.
Kennedy, Kennedy. “International Human Rights Movement: Part of the Problem?” European Human Rights Law Review. 3 (2001): 1-23. Print.
United Nations Economic and Social Council. Substantive Issues Arising in the Implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. General Comment No. 15. Nov. 2002. Retrieved from http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/0/a5458d1d1bbd713fc1256cc400389e94/$FILE/G0340229.pdf. Web.