In one of his first executive actions, President Donald Trump reinstated Cuba on the U.S. state
sponsor of terrorism list, reversing a Biden administration order from just a week prior. While
over 90 percent of Cubans express “serious difficulties feeding themselves,” many experts
question U.S. policy toward Cuba and the role of the international human rights system in
bringing justice to the island’s 12 million people.
While many historians argue the concept of human rights predates the 20th century, the
formation of the UN in 1945 and international treaties that followed officially established the
modern human rights system. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted in
1948, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), adopted in 1966,
became international standards for human rights protection and implementation. With the 20th
century evolution of human rights, individual countries, too, have taken steps toward protecting
human rights, both domestic and abroad. There are many ways in which international governing
bodies and individual countries enforce human rights, with the two most frequent methods being
sanctions and international law.
Human rights are fundamental to global justice, although the main enforcement methods used
today often fail to deliver meaningful change. To effectively protect human rights globally, the
international human rights regime must be reformed to ensure representation for all nations and
peoples, not just the wealthiest and most powerful.
In the modern era, sanctions have been largely ineffective because they’re often driven by
geopolitical motives rather than a genuine regard for human rights. This is the case for both
unilateral sanctions—those imposed by a single country—and multilateral sanctions—those
imposed by multiple countries or international organizations.
In the case of unilateral sanctions, there are several modern examples of human rights failures,
namely U.S. sanctions on Iran, Israel’s blockade of Gaza, and the U.S. embargo on Cuba, among
others. In Cuba, the United State’s embargo, which turns 63 next month, has inflicted devastating
humanitarian consequences on the island’s civilian population. While the U.S. continually
justifies the embargo as punishment for the Cuban government’s human rights abuses, it has led
directly to island-wide food and medicine shortages. During the COVID-19 pandemic, shortages
of medical supplies, including ventilators, syringes, and vaccine production materials, limited
Cubans access to adequate healthcare. When Cuba requested humanitarian aid in response, many
companies, banks, and NGOs were reluctant to trade with Cuba due to fears of U.S. penalties.
Many activists have long criticized the embargo, arguing its humanitarian consequences far
outweigh the potential benefits of influencing the Cuban government’s human rights record. As
political philosopher Noam Chomskey argues, the embargo ultimately serves to weaken Cuba’s
economy in order to promote civil unrest and punish a regime which escaped US influence.
Since 1992, the UN General Assembly has held annual votes on the US Embargo on Cuba, with
the most recent coming on November 2, 2023. In the 2023 vote, 197 countries voted in favor of a
resolution condemning the embargo, with only two countries voting in favor: the U.S. and Israel.
UN resolutions, however, are unbinding unless approved by the Security Council. As a
permanent member of the Security Council with veto power, the US could unilaterally block this
resolution in the event that it was brought before the council.
In addition to unilateral sanctions, multilateral sanctions, including those directly from the UN,
are frequently geopolitically motivated and counterproductive in addressing humanitarian crises.
Many experts criticize multilateral sanctions, pointing to modern examples in Libya, Iraq, and
North Korea.
Proponents of sanctions may point to more successful sanctions, such as the UN sanctions
against the South African government in the 1980s, which helped unravel the apartheid regime.
Unlike modern sanctions, though, the South Africa case involved a dominant international
consensus, backed not by geopolitical interests, but a global movement against apartheid.
In addition to sanctions, the international legal system is influenced by geopolitics and therefore
fails to protect human rights. Under the Rome Statute, the International Criminal Court (ICC)
can only investigate individuals who belong to an ICC member country, unless the case is
referred by the UN Security Council. Because many powerful countries, including the U.S.,
China, India, and Russia are not ICC members, individuals from these countries often avoid
prosecution for crimes violating international law. Many U.S. officials, for example, avoided
prosecution for war crimes during the Iraq War.
The UN’s primary judicial organ, International Court of Justice (ICJ) also struggles to enforce
international law in defense of human rights. ICJ rulings are subject to enforcement by the UN
Security Council, meaning they can be vetoed by permanent members. This means the five
permanent member countries—China, France, Russia, the U.K., and the U.S.—have the final say
in international legal decisions, not international courts.
If the international human rights system wants to fulfill its goal of representing the rights of all
people, it must detach itself from geopolitics and prioritize justice. Protecting human rights
means not just denouncing unjust governments, but providing access to resources and
opportunities long into the future. In order to resolve the current system’s failures, we must
dismantle the unequal power structure of the UN Security Council, which is inherently
undemocratic. Removing permanent membership, for example, would ensure fair representation
for all countries. John Locke, one of the earliest Western human rights philosophers, said
government is based on a social contract and enforces the “consent of the people”. If we want to
fight an undemocratic system, it will require an international consensus for human rights and
justice for all.
Michael Bryant is a student at The University of Michigan
