Small Arms Survey 2004: Rights at Risk

The widespread proliferation and misuse of small arms threatens the realization of basic human rights and security in various ways. In the hands or repressive forces, small arms can serve to intimidate, threaten, and coerce whole communities, limit free movement, and prevent access to basic entitlements and services. Small arms are also routinely used to facilitate or commit human rights abuses, such as extrajudicial executions and torture. In this edition of the Small Arms Survey, subtitled 'Rights at Risk', we examine the complicated relationship between small arms and human rights violations. Our interest in this theme parallels the engagement of major human rights actors with the issue, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. In particular, in 2003 the UN appointed a Special Rapporteur to study the prevention of human rights violations committed with small arms and light weapons, while several NGOs launched the Control Arms campaign with a strong human rights orientation. In identifying the linkages between the proliferation and misuse of small arms and the violation of human rights, we encounter a thorny conceptual problem. Guns are inert objects, which do not as such violate human rights. In this sense, there is some truth in the oft-repeated slogan of the US National Rifle Association that 'guns don't kill people, people kill people'. Guns do not by themselves breach anyone's rights, but people with guns can-and do-violate human rights on a regular basis, in a variety of ways and contexts. One must construct a complex causal (and sometimes legal) chain of reasoning to show how individuals who produce, hold, export, or use guns can be held responsible for the misuse of these weapons. Certainly this principle has been advanced in tort law. In the United States, various groups have attempted unsuccessfully to hold weapons manufacturers and dealers legally accountable for the misuse of weapons they have produced or sold, especially those used most prominently in crime (such as the so-called 'Saturday night specials').