The Deteriorating International Human Rights for the Disadvantaged People In the Era of Globalization

Assistant Professor and Chairman of Department of Humanities and Information Applications,
Aletheia University / Li-Fu Chen

With the termination of Cold War, we waved farewell to the 20 th century and ushered in economic globalization. In the 21 st century, the formation of European Union inspires numerous developing countries to undertake regional economic integration, which in turn boosts global economic growth. However, these rocketing figures do not necessarily reflect a corresponding improvement in the real life of the common people.

The problem of uneven distribution of wealth worsens in the 21 st century, with the top 1000 billionaires accounting for nearly half of the wealth in the world. The middle class gradually sinks to the lower class in the developing countries as well as in the developed countries. During the financial crisis in early 2009, most countries in the world either appropriated their national savings or raised debts to save the rich and their enterprises. Thus, the phenomenon of unfair distribution of political-economical resources, along with the issues of environmental protection, has become a crucial agenda in the present.

From the mid-19 th century to the mid-20 th century, in order to eliminate the ignorance and oppression of economic human rights, anarchists and communists once resorted to violence, but in vain. Globalization, in the 21 st century, expands the poverty gap by means of global-scale colonization instead of domestic-scale, which enables the rich to be richer, the poor poorer. The disadvantaged people, in a sense, have become the slaves of the multi-national enterprises.

The above-mentioned phenomena cannot be eliminated by the dysfunctional nations. Hence, we call for all Non-Governmental Organizations to fight for survival rights for economically disadvantaged people in the world.