David Cingranelli

Measuring the Level, Pattern, and Sequence of Government Respect for Physical Integrity Rights

We employ a polychotomous version of Mokken Scaling Analysis to create an improved measure of government respect for a subset of human rights known as physical integrity rights. The scale we produce is shown to be unidimensional, and it contains information about the level, pattern, and sequence of government respect for these rights. No previous measure has explicitly addressed the issue of sequence of government respect for human rights. The sequence, or ordering, of respect for physical integrity rights that we find tells us which rights are more commonly respected (the rights not to be killed or disappeared) and which ones are more commonly violated (the rights not to be imprisoned arbitrarily or tortured). Our findings improve upon previous studies that have assumed unidimensionality and that have made a priori assertions of patterns of respect. They also stand in contrast to McCormick and Mitchells (1997) claim that government respect for physical integrity rights is necessarily a multidimensional phenomenon.

The Cingranelli and Richards (CIRI) Human Rights Data Project

The CIRI Human Rights Data Project provides information about government respect for a broad array of human rights in nearly every country in the world. Covering twenty-six years, fifteen separate human rights practices, and 195 countries, it is one of the largest human rights data sets in the world. This essay provides an overview of the CIRI project and our response to some critiques of the CIRI physical integrity rights index. Compared to the Political Terror Scale (PTS), the CIRI physical integrity rights index is focused on government human rights practices, can be disaggregated, is more transparent in its construction, and is more replicable because of the transparency of our coding rules. Furthermore, unlike the PTS, the unidimensionality of the CIRI index has been demonstrated empirically. For these reasons, the CIRI index is a more valid index of physical integrity rights.

Electoral Rules and Incentives to Protect Human Rights

In order to function as an effective constraint on human rights violations, democratic competition must put politicians in a situation where it is electorally beneficial for them to monitor abuses and to expose public officials who fail to protect human rights. In the absence of proper electoral incentives, both incumbent politicians and opposition leaders may strategically choose to ignore poor human rights practices. Building on this logic, we assess the proposition that, among democracies, certain electoral rules are associated with better protection of physical integrity rights. We find that, other things equal, there is higher average respect for physical integrity rights in countries where all members of parliament are elected through low magnitude proportional representation districts, and where voters can cast a vote for individual candidates. Our theoretical approach focusing on incentives for politicians to protect human rights offers a unifying framework for studying institutional and noninstitutional effects on different categories of human rights.

Equity and Urban Policy: The Underclass Hypothesis Revisited

It is premature to reject Lineberrys underclass hypothesis because the internal validity in most previous studies which test it is suspect. With data on the distribution of police expenditures in Boston, Massachusetts in 1971, the authors demonstrate that the methodology employed in analyzing municipal service distributions largely determines the findings. When the internal validity of the research design is improved, the authors find support for both the race preference and power elite aspects of the hypothesis. These findings warrant the exhumation of the underclass hypothesis for further analysis.

Coercion, capacity, and coordination: Predictors of political violence

Using a risk assessment method developed by Gurr and Moore (American Journal of Political Science 41: 1079–1103, 1997) and applying O’Brien’s (Journal of Conflict Resolution 46: 791–811, 2002) risk assessment metrics, we present a global, comparative, cross-national model predicting the states where political violence is likely to increase. Our model predicts more political violence when governments violate the physical integrity rights of their citizens—especially when they frequently imprison citizens for political reasons or make them “disappear”. These coercive techniques may create more citizen dissatisfaction than other types of violations of physical integrity rights, because citizens perceive political imprisonment and disappearances as the direct result of the deliberate policy choices of politicians. Our model also forecasts more political violence in weak states and states that allow dissatisfied citizens to coordinate their anti-government activities. Specifically, we demonstrate that political violence tends to be higher if governments respect their citizens’ right to freedom of assembly and association and offer widespread use of mobile phone and internet technology.

Principals, Agents and Human Rights

This article argues that human rights could be improved by motivating politicians and bureaucrats to put more effort into protecting human rights. It conceptualizes the production of human rights practices as the outcome of two principal-agent relationships that constrain politicians and bureaucrats. Reliance on taxes is a non-electoral, fiscal factor that makes politicians more willing to protect human rights. Increased government revenue, no matter the source, raises bureaucratic compensation and helps create a more accountable bureaucracy. Thus both a higher reliance on taxes and larger state revenues lead to the better protection of human rights. Each fiscal factor promotes a different type of accountability, both of which independently contribute to good human rights practices.

Inhumane, cruel, and degrading treatment of criminal prisoners throughout the world

Recent international policy has focused on assuring the human rights of criminal prisoners. Because of the difficulty and cost of comparative research, little is known about the success of these efforts. In this study, by utilizing a secondary data source, we are able to examine various indicators of inhumane and cruel practices in 155 nations. Substandard conditions and violations of basic human rights are found in over one-half of the nations. The levels of economic development, religion, and political structure are found to be related to a nations prison practices.

A COMPARISON OF NATIONAL CRIMINAL JUSTICE PRACTICES

Abstract Through a content analysis of information contained in the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices (prepared each year by the U.S. State Department), we describe and analyze variations in criminal justice practices among 155 nations. Three major attributes of the criminal justice system in each nation are examined: the severity of punishments, prison conditions, and the rights of the accused. Attention is given to cross-national variations, the covariation of the provision of due process protections and the severity of punitive practices, and the relationship between a nations level of economic development and various attributes of its criminal justice system. Nations of lesser economic development were found to have severer punishments for convicted criminals, harsher prison conditions, and to offer fewer due process protections to those accused of criminal behavior.

Human Rights and Structural Adjustment: A human rights-based approach to economic development

Introduction The findings of our study have ethical and practical implications. Since the passage of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, the promotion of better human rights practices by governments around the world has been one of the most important functions of the United Nations. It is morally wrong for agencies of the United Nations, which include both the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, to undermine one of their parent organizations most important goals, the promotion of good human rights practices (Clapham 2006; Darrow 2003; Skogly 1993; 2001). The practical implication of our findings is that structural adjustment programs are not producing good economic outcomes mainly because they combine relatively ineffective policies with the undermining of a necessary precondition for economic growth – respect for human rights. The World Bank and IMF should be pursuing equitable economic development. We have defined equitable economic development as the simultaneous achievement of economic growth and advancement in protections of economic and social rights of citizens. Achieving one element without the other should be considered “development failure.” We argue that respect for some human rights will promote equitable development. More precisely, respect for some physical integrity and civil rights and liberties will lead to faster rates of economic growth and progress in achieving respect for economic and social rights to such things as health care, education, and housing .

Correlates of Due Process

One widely recognized method of constraining the abuse of coercion by the state is due process, which requires that the government does not deny or remove an individual’s property or freedom without showing cause and following proper legal procedures. The strategy of due process is to ‘present formidable impediments’ to the state’s use of force against its citizens (Packer, 1968, p. 163). Due process is the most fundamental right of free people because it is the primary mechanism through which all other individual rights and liberties are protected from encroachment by the government. In a seminal work, Packer (1968) presented two models of the judicial system representing competing value systems. The central value of his ‘crime control’ model was the repression of criminal conduct. A judicial system incorporating crime control values would operate in a way that would be analogous to an assembly line. The movement from arrest to incarceration would be efficient; though some innocent persons might be punished, few guilty persons would go free. The central value of the ‘due process’ model was protection of individual rights and liberties from violation by the state. If the crime control model resembled an assembly line, the due process model resembled an obstacle course.