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Self-determination

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Self determination is a principle, often seen as a moral and legal right, that "all peoples have the right [to] freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development." It also has influenced existentialism.

While the right to self-determination is embodied in several treaties and is held to form part of customary international law, it is difficult to deduce practical applications of the theory not only in itself, but weighed against other principles such as the territorial integrity of sovereign states. This prevents self-determination being considered as a right to authorise or encourage "any action that would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and independent States conducting themselves in compliance with the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples and thus possessed of a Government representing the whole people belonging to the territory" As such, the right rarely allows for secession, although is often confused as such.

During the 20th century the principle was central to the process of decolonisation and the advent of modern Nationalism.

Some interpretations of the principle in ethics treat it as a translation or extension of universal rights of individuals (e.g. political freedom, freedom of religion, freedom of speech) to a group. Sometimes it is treated as a specific collective right, distinct from individual rights. It is a disputed principle in ethics, with some arguing that no such entitlement exists, other than perhaps the right to resist or secede from tyranny.

Wilsonianism

This principle was first applied to the modern international relations context by Woodrow Wilson in his Fourteen Points of January 1918, in which he set out a blueprint for a just and lasting peace in Europe after World War I. The Wilsonian approach influenced the idealist tradition in international relations, which has at times supported military intervention in support of self-determination.

The Soviet Union

The 1918 Constitution of the Soviet Union acknowledged this right for its constituent republics (although not for declared "autonomous" regions), but it was not applied in practice until perestroika, when it led to the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Vladimir Lenin supported the concept of the right of a culturally distinct grouping to self-determination, albeit within the framework of proletarian internationalism and, as it turned out, the policy of the Soviet Union. The policy of korenizatsiya seemed to indicate Lenin's sincere belief in national self-determination, however, Lenin also assumed that the populations of the ethnically diverse Soviet republics were voluntarily confederated with Russia in the form of the Soviet Union. The process of national delimitation in the Soviet Union established ethnic-national boundaries for national autonomies for non-Russian populations where there were none in the time of the Russian Empire.

During the German invasion in 1941, some national minorities saw the invading forces as liberators, and some of those fought with Nazi Germany. After the Soviet victory, this was treated as collaboration: the issue is still contentious in the Baltic States.

In regard to a long-running argument going on among Rosa Luxembourg, right-wing tendencies within the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, and the Bolsheviks, Lenin said:

[T]he tendency of every national movement is towards the formation of national states, under which these requirements of modern capitalism are best satisfied. ... [T]he national state is typical and normal for the capitalist period. Consequently, if we want to grasp the meaning of self-determination of nations ... by examining the historico-economic conditions of the national movements, we must inevitably reach the conclusion that the self-determination of nations means the political separation of these nations from alien national bodies, and the formation of an independent national state. ...[It] would be wrong to interpret the right to self-determination as meaning anything but the right to existence as a separate state.

—Lenin, The Right of Nations to Self-Determination

The UN Charter

At the ratification of the UN Charter in post–World War II 1945, the signatories introduced the right of all people to self-determination into the framework of international law and diplomacy. In addition, the right to self-determination holds the prestigious position of Article 1 in both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Its presence in the two covenants points to the right's complex nature and importance.

In the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations states that everyone has the right to a nationality and that no one should be arbitrarily deprived of a nationality or denied the right to change nationality. Self-determination is often invoked in national liberation struggles, secession of territories, and constitutional disputes about how this right can be expressed to the satisfaction of opposing interest groups.

Conflict with territorial integrity

At the time of the UN Charter, the focus was on the former colonies of the Axis powers, and implicitly on all overseas colonies. There was no intention to support secessionist claims in, for instance, European states. However, the concept of self-determination is by definition in tension with that of territorial integrity, which is an older principle of international law. Territorial integrity applies to integral parts of a state, and since the colonies were not seen as such (except by France), their independence was not seen as an attack on the principle. The importance attached to territorial integrity was exemplified by adherence to the principle of uti possidetis during the decolonization process. The colonial borders were retained at independence, even if they had little relevance to linguistic, ethnic, and cultural boundaries. Once these new nation-states were established in Africa and Asia, some felt that the principle had been sufficiently applied, and that the principles of territorial integrity and non-intervention should again prevail. Certainly, the United Nations never supported any secession during the Cold War, other than from a colonial power.

When some of the newly independent ex-colonies faced secessionist and irredentist movements, the international consensus was that self-determination did not apply to these movements. The consensus defined a "people" entitled to self-determination as persons living in a particular geographic area, rather than persons sharing a common culture or language (a nation). This did not generally promote the political aspirations of oppressed ethnic minorities. Since the end of the Cold War, however, this consensus has eroded. Most notably, Western powers gave covert and overt support to the serial secession of the constituent republics of Yugoslavia.

Self-determination is a notoriously difficult principle to define and apply. A state is self-determining even if its citizens strive, and fail, to create free political institutions, however, in turn, it is deprived of its self-determination if such institutions are established by an external power. Mill argued that the members of a political community must seek their own freedom, just as they may seek to be virtuous; they cannot be "set free" just as an individual cannot be made virtuous. In this way self-determination can be seen to be a parallel to state sovereignty.

Given the perceived risk of constant fragmentation, states have approached self-determination cautiously. Methods of self-determination range from the sovereignty referendum, as in the case of the people of Quebec in Canada, to armed struggle, as in the case of the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka. The threat of fragmentation due to self-determination can be regarded as very dangerous by other communities in a country, especially if the groups striving for self-determination live in an area with the majority of a country's wealth. On the other hand, supporters of self-determination argue that if the wealth is coming from the land they live in, the local inhabitants deserve the wealth, not the country as a whole. This is an important dimension of the self-determination arguments in Iraq and Nigeria as well as many other countries.

Twentieth Century issues

Vietnam

French Indochina came out of World War II having defeated the Japanese invasion, and yet it was still a colony of the French Empire. France was arguably too weak militarily and economically, and perhaps psychologically, to maintain control of the territory, especially during the First Indochina War in the early 1950s. After the French defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, a conference convened in Geneva, Switzerland, to resolve the dispute. The Geneva Conference (1954) divided the country into North Vietnam and South Vietnam, and guaranteed the Vietnamese self-determination, through a plebiscite to be held in July of 1956. The committee was too weak to enforce the accord, and South Vietnam President Ngo Dinh Diem refused to allow free elections for determination. A Communist resistance was formed against Diem's government (the Viet Cong), sowing the seeds of the Vietnam War.

Current issues

Australia

Recently (2003 onwards), self-determination has become the topic of some debate in Australia in relation to Aborigines (indigenous Australians). In the 1970s, the Aboriginal community approached the Federal Government and requested the right to administer their own communities. This encompassed basic local government functions, ranging from land dealings and management of community centres to road maintenance and garbage collection, as well as setting education programmes and standards in their local schools.

Israel and Palestine

The right to self-determination as outlined in public international law is often referenced by both sides in the ongoing Israel-Palestinian conflict. Palestinians assert a nationalist right to self-determination that they argue is hindered by Israeli policies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Israel was, in turn, formed under the right to self-determination as outlined in the U.N. Charter. Its declaration of independence notes that "This recognition by the United Nations of the right of the Jewish people to establish their State is irrevocable", and that "This right is the natural right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own fate, like all other nations, in their own sovereign State."

Jordan occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem (including the Old City) and Egypt occupied the Gaza Strip from 1949 through 1967. Throughout those years, the King of Jordan had annexed the West Bank, providing its residents with citizenship, but not with the right of mobility across the Jordan River. The king forbade the use of the word "Palestine" on official documents. The Jordanian position on this was that historically the East and West banks had been one cultural entity and thus one nationality, though Palestinians dispute this. This led to open fighting between Palestinian refugees and the Jordanian government in 1970. However, in 1988, the Jordanian government relinquished its claim to the West Bank. Egypt never annexed the Gaza Strip, and denied its residents citizenship and did not allow its residents to move into Egypt or anywhere else. Despite this, Egypt was not subject to a rebellion. In fact, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was created in 1964 by the Arab League in Cairo, Egypt, and was controlled by and large by the Egyptian government. Neither country attempted to relieve the refugee crisis, although Jordan did alleviate this somewhat by granting Palestinians citizenship, and neither allowed, to different extents, self-determination in these territories.

The PLO stated its goal to be the destruction of the State of Israel through armed struggle and replacing it with an "independent Palestinian state" between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Israelis argue this would deny self-determination to the millions of Israelis now living there. Today, certain factions of the PLO, including some representatives from its dominant Fatah party, agree that Palestinian self-determination and Jewish self-determination need not be mutually exclusive. However, Hamas, which was elected to a majority of parliamentary seats in Palestinian elections and is the disputed but de facto government in the Gaza Strip, continues to call for the destruction of Israel.

Kosovo

The province of Serbia, is the subject of a long-running political and territorial dispute between the Serbian (and previously, the Yugoslav) government and Kosovo's largely ethnic-Albanian population. In 1990 Serbia's president Slobodan Molosovich crushed an attempt for independence. Following the Kosovo war in which Serbian forces committed large scale human rights violations against the majority Kosovo Albanians sought independence from Serbia on the grounds of self-determination. International negotiations began in 2006 to determine the final status of Kosovo which were ultimately unsuccessful.

On the 17th of February 2008, 109 members (10 members including all Kosovo Serbs were absent) of the Kosovo Assembly voted unanimously for a unilateral declaration of independence limited to the principles outlined by the Ahtisaari plan. Serbia responded immediately by rejecting the decision. See the 2008 Kosovo declaration of independence.

Jammu and Kashmir

Insurgent groups in Indian-controlled Kashmir (the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir) such as Lashkar-e-Toiba and Hizbul Mujahideen are currently trying to seek full independence for the whole region from India on the claim of its right to self-determination as an Islamic state. Both the insurgents and the Indian armed forces stand accused of human rights violations, with some insurgent groups conducting a policy of ethnic cleansing of Hindus in Kashmir, and the Indian army being accused of violating human rights of ordinary citizens of Kashmir.

Taiwan

Taiwan is the focus of a self-determination dispute in the East Asia region. The government of the People's Republic of China claims the entirety of Taiwan as its territory. However, Taiwanese independence advocates argue that there is no legal claim to Taiwan, as no legally binding treaty ever transferred sovereignty to China following World War II, an assertion that both the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China disagree with. At the same time, the de facto government of Taiwan, the Republic of China still has not formally withdrawn its claims to the mainland and several other areas. In practice, however, this claim essentially died off through the 1990s and is no longer pressed by Taiwan's elected government.

Turkish Cypriots

Since 1974, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, a state recognized by Turkey only, has been governing the northern part of the Mediterranean island of Cyprus. The Turkish Cypriot community claimed a right of self-determination in ending their partnership with the Greek Cypriots in the Republic of Cyprus.

United States

The colonization of the North American continent and its Native American population has been the source of legal battles since the early 1800s. The westward push of European-American settlers brought about significant changes to Native American cultures, and those that remained were resettled to separate tracts of land (reservations). These had been given a certain degree of autonomy, within the United States federal government, which allows for their exclusion from various national legal restrictions.

Another group of people affected by the westward expansion of the European-Americans were Mexicans and their present descendants the Chicanos. Mostly of Native American and Mestizo descent, these people lay claim to the "stolen" territories of the U.S. Southwest, most notably California, Arizona, Texas, Utah, New Mexico, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming. These movements name this area "Aztlan" after the original homeland of the Mexica (Aztec), or refer to it as "Occupied Mexico." They hold that the U.S.-Mexico Border is an apartheid border and that recent migrants from Mexico and Latin America are only following ancient migratory patterns of their Native American ancestors.

There is an active Hawaiian sovereignty movement which aims at rectifying the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in the late 19th century which resulted in the incorporation of Hawai'i into the United States. They hold that self-determination was never granted to native Hawaiians after the overthrow, and thus a large measure of autonomy or independence should be granted to Hawaii. Opponents allege that this would violate the self-determination rights of the non-Hawaiian majority living in Hawaii now.

Since 1972, the U.N. Decolonization Committee has called for Puerto Rico's decolonization and for the U.S. to recognize the island's right to self-determination and independence. Most recently, the Decolonization Subcommittee called for the United Nations General Assembly to review the political status of Puerto Rico, a power reserved by the 1953 Resolution. Furthermore, the Young Lords, a Puerto Rican internationalist group founded in Lincoln Park, Chicago, in 1968, called not only for independence for Puerto Rico but also for neighborhood empowerment within cities in the continental United States, which they characterized as self-determination in every barrio or neighborhood.

See also

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