Learning norms or changing them? State actors, state violence, and human rights education in India

How do perpetrators of state violence understand their actions, and how do their perceptions inform their responses to human rights education and activism? I examine this question through twelve months of fieldwork with 33 police, military and paramilitary officers who were participating in human rights education in North India. The research is based in social constructivist scholarship on international norm diffusion. Officers express beliefs about human nature and justice that conflict with the human rights ethos and support violations such as torture. Rather than prioritize the protection from harm as the human rights movement does, officers believe that what matters is harm to whom and for what reason. At the same time, officers admit that they use torture more widely than their own conceptions of justice would allow. But because they believe that torture is sometimes right, they see this as an imperfect implementation of their principles rather than as a violation of them. This does not mean, however, that they reject human rights education. Instead, they interpret human rights in ways that support their actions, using the language and logic of rights to defend violations. This reveals how state actors can accept norms without changing their beliefs or behavior. Finally, these findings do not suggest a tension between "local" beliefs and "international" norms. The course in which officers are enrolled emphasizes the connection between human rights principles and many Indian religious, cultural, and national traditions. Officers acknowledge these connections. But they prioritize competing conceptions of justice, which are also "local," and their perception of what is required in their work as law enforcers. This indicates the importance not of "local" beliefs in general, but of the specific roles people play within a society and their perceptions of what these roles require. Furthermore, officers draw from competing international norms to justify their actions. They reference norms of state security and the actions of countries such as the United States to defend torture and other violations, further complicating any presumed dichotomy between "local" and "international" norms. I close with the implications of the findings for human rights education and activism.