ASIA

2001 World Report Entry

2000 World Report Entry

1999 World Report Entry

1998 World Report Entry
 

ASIA
Asia -- Impact on Labor Rights & Migrant Workers in Asia
The collapse of the Asian economy has given rise to massive layoffs of workers and wage and benefit cuts, not only in those countries worst affected by the economic crisis, but region-wide. Human Rights Watch is concerned about the likelihood of increasing violations of workers' rights as a direct consequence of the crisis in countries where labor conditions already fell well below the International Labor Organization's (ILO) core standards. Workers in most countries in Asia are denied freedom of association and the right to organize and bargain collectively, or are severely restricted in their exercise of these rights. In many enterprises, both state and private, wages are being slashed. With little or no legal channel to voice their grievances or represent their interests, workers whose jobs are threatened or who have been laid off already have little choice but to take to the streets to protest. Labor activists are in an even more vulnerable situation than during times of economic prosperity as they speak out for workers' rights.
(C1002) 3/98, 22pp., $3.00
 Order online

HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE APEC REGION: 1995
Covering the human rights situations in 11 of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) countries, the evidence presented here suggests that economic growth alone has not led to greater human rights protection. Yet human rights was the issue that would not go away for Asia in 1995 as it became an economic issue, a determinant of aid and an irritant to trade from Burma to Indonesia. Workers rights practices in the region intensified debate over the desirability of a "social clause" in multilateral trade arrangements, and human rights abuses led to demands at home and abroad for increased corporate responsibility on the part of foreign business as investment in the region grew.
(C715) 11/95, 46 pp., $5.00/£2.95
Order online

HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE APEC REGION: 1994
Many of the 18 countries comprising the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group came to the 1994 summit in Jakarta with impressive economic growth rates and poor human rights records. The Asia-Pacific region has generated a debate about the relationship between economic development and human rights. The simple answer is that there is no generalization about the impact of economic growth on human rights that is applicable across the region. But as the entries in this report covering a selection of APEC countries illustrate, there is certainly no evidence to suggest that economic growth by itself is any guarantor of human rights protection.
(C613) 11/94, 36 pp., $5.00/£2.95
Order online

HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE APEC REGION: 1993
While human rights violations continued throughout the APEC region, the major story during the year and described in this report was not so much the nature of the abuses, but the debate over how to address them. Two factors had a major impact on this debate: the increased visibility of Asian nongovernmental organizations and the growing economic power of East Asia. Asian NGOs were able to articulate a vision of human rights that differed radically from that of their own governments and thus called into question the ability of the latter to define what is "Asian." They also helped to redefine the priorities for the human rights movement in a way that rendered obsolete the old division of labor among human rights, development, women's rights and environmental organizations.
(C519) 11/93, 60 pp., $7.00/£5.95
Order online
 
 

Email Human Rights Watch