Whether, for example, caniqg or killing convicted criminals falls under this prohibition is a matter of legitimate disagreement and variation. "Everyone is entitled to full equality to a fur and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal." (Aitide 1๐) "Independent" and "impartial" certainly are subject to a variety of legitimate — and illegitimate — interpretations. And although "full equality" would seem to require some sort of right to competent legฝ advice, the particular form may vary with differing national conceptions of fairness (as well as differing levels of available resources).
Internationally recognized human rights concepts may be interpreted and implemented in significantly divergent ways. Different states and societies may even weigh particular rights differently. But legitimate variations are limited to the (relatively narrow) range specified by the core concept of the right in question, and countries cannot legitimately pick and choose among internationally recognized human rights.
Consider a few Asian examples. James c. Hsiung presents the Northeast Asian practice of permanent employment as a distinctively Asian style of implementing economic and social rights.66 Likewise, families in Asia are often seen as bearing social welfare obligations that in the West today fall more on the state. International human rights standards leave Asians entirely free to follow these preferences, so long as the state assures that firms and families discharge their obligations and that people who are not adequately cared for by these preferred mechanisms have another recourse.
Deference to seniority and hierarchy is often presented as characteristic of Asian societies. As Lawrence Beer notes of Japan, "ranking may stifle the free expression of individual thought."67 But this deference is largely a matter of informal social sanction, not government policy. It is a matter of how people in Japan typically choose to interact with one another, how they choose to exercise their rights of free speech - which are legally guaranteed. As Beer himself emphasizes, despite such cultural differences in standard patterns of verbal interaction, "freedom of expression is viable and protected in Japan."68
"Rulers in Korea have always been father figures. A super-father figure like Kim Il-sung ... is not an accidental phenomenon, for the principles of hierarchy and deference to superiors remain deeply ingrained in the behavior of all Koreans."69 Citizens may exercise their political rights to select and