Fulfilling U.S. Human Rights Commitments as a First Step in an Anti-racist National Security Agenda by Pratima T. Narayan

Fulfilling U.S. Human Rights Commitments as a First Step in an Anti-racist National Security Agenda

By Pratima T. Narayan

White supremacy; systemic racism; unconscious bias; injustice; polarization; identity politics; domestic terrorism; racial reckoning; intersectionality; renewal; democracy: These words have dominated headlines for the past two years. As President Biden releases his National Security Strategy in the coming months, policymakers, diplomats, and military leaders will have to contend with the prospect that America’s credibility and moral standing on the world stage is at an all-time low.

U.S. foreign policy has always been hampered by its treatment of its Indigenous, Black, and Brown communities. Two years on, the COVID-19 pandemic has both exposed and exhausted the racialized hegemony and systemic inequities that have underpinned nation-states and global systems from their very inception. The killing of George Floyd and at least 181 other Black people as a result of over-policing and militarization within the year after his death have garnered America renewed reproach.

In spite of the momentum created by global protests against police brutality, 89 percent of people surveyed across 27 countries, including the United States, indicated these events increased racial, ethnic, or national origin-based differences or had no impact on opportunities for or access to housing, education, employment, and/or social services in their country. The January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol and the prevailing threat of white supremacist extremism, combined with anti-Asian hate, economic decline, disinformation, and voter suppression, have continued to lay bare our domestic vulnerabilities.

“Build[ing] back better,” “battling for the soul” of the nation, and realizing “America’s founding promise” through a National Security Strategy will require moving beyond the buzzwords and rhetoric of the recent antiracism movement to drive systematic action focused on equality and dignity, rather than America’s dominance and cognitive dissonance. We must embrace our complicated pursuit of democracy with unprecedented truth, accountability, and transparency. This will entail acknowledging our privilege and America’s role in harming its own people of color even as it was threatening communities of color and reinforcing oppressive systems abroad. Two mutually reinforcing domestic and foreign policy priorities will ground such an anti-racist agenda.

I. National Action Plan against Racism

The United States must honor its existing legal obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD). In its last concluding observations to the United States, issued in 2014, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) recommended that America adopt a national action plan to comprehensively promote racial equality in the public and private domains. It is encouraging that the United States has pursued action plans to eliminate racial and ethnic discrimination through bilateral agreements with countries such as Brazil and Colombia. The U.S. Congress and Helsinki Commission also adopted a joint declaration with the European Parliament to combat racism and systemic discrimination in September 2020. Still, a national action plan would provide greater opportunity for introspection and accountability by delineating a system of objectives and activities, ensuring adequate financial and human resources, and measuring progress in addressing racial inequity through time-specific goals and dedicated indicators.

ICERD also provides for affirmative steps to be taken to accelerate the achievement of racial or ethnic equality where specific groups have historically been discriminated against. Since all levels of government are required to comply with ICERD’s provisions, in developing indicators, the United States would have the opportunity to review and report on compliance at the state and local levels where human rights continue to be severely threatened, as opposed to simply reporting on federal policies as it has previously done in international forums.

A national action plan to promote racial equality would serve as an effective tool for reinforcing other regional and international commitments, while educating public officials and communities about their rights and emerging forms of discrimination. It can also foster coalitions between a range of stakeholders advocating for a comprehensive anti-racist agenda in government and civil society whose collective efforts will be necessary to remedy past injustice and advance sustainable reform.

II. Atrocity Prevention to Promote Peace and Security

In its 2005 Declaration on the Prevention of Genocide, CERD also flagged the close relationship between systemic discrimination based on race, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin and the commission of mass atrocities. The same year, along with the rest of the international community, the United States committed to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), which embodies its obligation to protect populations within its borders from genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, in addition to ethnic cleansing. The R2P also lays out the responsibility of the international community to assist the United States. and other states in protecting their populations and the responsibility of the international community when the United States or other states fail to protect their populations.

The Obama administration’s Presidential Study Directive on Mass Atrocities (PSD-10) elevated the prevention of mass atrocities and genocide to “a core national security interest” and moral imperative. The United States further established an Atrocity Prevention Board and enacted several pieces of legislation designed to enhance peace and security. However, America’s atrocity prevention frameworks have generally been applied to combat foreign threats to our national security, rather than domestic threats. This can be clearly seen in the fact that the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect issued an atrocity alert on the United States in June 2020 after the police, state militias, and the National Guard met peaceful Black Lives Matter protests with disproportionate force. Since then, the White House and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence have acknowledged that domestic violent extremists’ (DVE) motivations include biases against “minority” populations. Still, President Biden’s National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism makes no mention of atrocity prevention to address DVE.

Consistent with the United State’s global commitment under R2P, the National Security Strategy should reprioritize the Atrocity Prevention Board and expand its mandate to assess threats posed by DVE. This would increase the range of resources available to combat systemic discrimination, offering greater protection for communities of color, including through gender-sensitive early warning systems. Since American interventions in non-white foreign countries can be influenced by racist viewpoints, it would also ensure greater consistency in how and when we intervene in conflicts abroad in the name of democracy and human rights.

Racial inequality and discrimination have become normalized and deeply woven into America’s social fabric. Recognizing the human rights commitments that America has already made in President Biden’s forthcoming National Security Strategy would be a first step in moving beyond another fleeting season of promises towards genuine, systemic change.