A Fundamental Human Right
It is a melancholy thing to say, but even a preliminary survey of the birth and development of the international human rights system shows plainly that the right to development has been pushed to the margins, and that the machinery for giving it effect has been circumscribed by every available means, so as to preserve a world in which extreme poverty and obscene wealth pass for the ordinary run of things: a wretched arrangement that divides the world into zones of uneven growth and into gaps that widen ever further between peoples and countries.
A report by the World Institute for Development Economics Research of the United Nations University (2006) found that the wealthiest one per cent of the earth’s population own 39.9 per cent of our planet’s wealth. Documented statistics today show that less than one per cent own more than 44 per cent of global wealth, while Oxfam confirms that 80 individuals hold an amount of wealth equal to that held by three and a half billion human beings. And while this paper was being revised, it was reported that Elon Musk’s fortune had reached one trillion dollars.
What is the use of going on parading catastrophic figures that have turned into mere numbers, stirring neither indignation nor protest in those who hear them, or of drawing yet more comparisons between the richest states and the poorest? The facts are not merely shocking; they cast doubt on whether there exist any shared human values capable of moving those who govern this world.
Dr Haytham Manna
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Development A Fundamental Human Right