Human Rights or Sovereignty for Israel-Palestine and Sinking Island Nations? Toward a Theory of Territorial Belonging

• In Event: Assessing Ongoing Militarized Conflicts

Abstract

This paper investigates the friction between human rights and sovereignty by looking at two case studies — Israel-Palestine and sinking island nations—weighing the pros and cons of each approach in each specific context. When people lose their land due to historical and military forces or due to climate change, which framework will best protect them: a human rights approach (individual and universal) or sovereignty and self-determination (particular and collective)? In what ways are these frameworks congruent, and where are the points of friction? I will introduce two theories in regard to territorial rights— including attachment and permissive theories—as promulgated by political theorists Kim Angell and Lea Ypi. These theories will help to ascertain how to not only secure minimal safety (human rights) but also how to minimize loss of political identity (sovereignty) in the face of geopolitical conflicts and climate catastrophes that center around territorial claims. I will also offer critiques and potential correctives of these theories to point toward hybrid political solutions that center belonging so as to keep intact some preservation of both universalism and particularism without resulting in unbridled nationalism or assimilationism. Such hybrid solutions begin with an acknowledgement of who belongs to the land and what these people, residing or soon-to-be residing, on the land need and desire. With the struggle over the land of Palestine-Israel sowing historic levels of devastation and with the ruin of land by climate catastrophe looming, the need for innovations and a more expansive political imagination are ever more urgent.

Author

• Julie Schumacher Cohen, Temple University