Sammendrag
Civil Society, Civil and Political Rights in the Self-Ruled Palestinian Areas
The polity at the centre of this study is the Palestinian Interim Self-Government Authority (PNA) in the self-ruled areas in the West Bank and on the Gaza Strip. This authority does not enjoy sovereignty, but a limited autonomy. An implication of this limited autonomy is that the PNA s authority is circumscribed by Israeli priorities.
The transfer of power from the Israeli military government and its Civil Administration to the PNA, initiated by the Declaration of Principles (13 September 1993) and furthered by subsequent agreements, marks a new stage for the Palestinian aim of establishing a territorial state on every part of Palestinian land to be liberated.
Both the Israeli government and the PLO have committed themselves to international human rights and democracy in the agreements that have been negotiated for the interim period in the self-ruled Palestinian areas. These rights can be said to embody a normative standard for democratic practices that has become an important source of legitimacy for political regimes all over the world. It is argued that indispensable civil and political rights in a democratic civil society necessarily go together with democratic citizenship relations and a democratic political system. This argument is undertaken by applying civil society theory and citizenship theory as theoretical tools. It investigates the rights and obligations attributed to Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as members of a polity (the PNA) and the nature and shape of the polity itself.
The fundamental presumption for the case-study is therefor that; the exercise of political authority, as this should be identified in the independent variables has negative consequences on civil and political rights and inhibits freedom in the sphere of civil society in the Palestinian self-ruled areas.
*The first independent variable is the Israeli occupation regime.
*The second independent variable is to be found in the tradition of the Palestinian society in general, and in the PLO regime in particular.
*The Interim Government will be treated as an intervening variable, a product of the two previously mentioned independent variables.
The arguments of this thesis are put forth to make clear that one-sided focus on the Interim Government s responsibility for the lack of respect of civil and political rights does not offer a complete picture of the situation.
The Israeli government is so deeply involved in the establishment of the PNA and delimitation of its powers, that it is highly irresponsible to overlook the consequences for the Palestinian proto-citizenship and the basic civil and political rights which should be included in it. Both authorities can be criticised for their human rights records.