United Nations Human Rights Council File Photo: VCG

By safeguarding people's rights to subsistence and development and promoting the comprehensive and coordinated development of economic, social and cultural rights as well as the civil and political rights of its citizens, China has advanced the cause of human rights with a holistic approach, said a think tank report.
 
Experts said that compared with the Western personal-freedom-dominated view of human rights, China's view and approach in protecting human rights are more optimistic and pragmatic. China's emphasis on development rights and coordinated promotion for other rights may provide a reference for some developing countries.
 
Jointly released by the China Foundation for Human Rights Development and the New China Research under Xinhua News Agency on Monday, the report said living a life of contentment is the ultimate human right when elaborating on China's outlook and practice in safeguarding human rights.
 
According to the report, mass poverty on an enormous scale was once the biggest obstacle in China's human rights cause.By putting people's right to survive and development at the top over decades of effort, the living standards of Chinese people, which accounted for one-fifth of the world's population, have been raised from poverty to bare subsistence, from moderate prosperity in general to moderate prosperity in all aspects.
 
Besides safeguarding people's rights to subsistence and development, China has promoted the comprehensive and coordinated development of other kinds of human rights, said the report, including making sure that people enjoy better education, more stable employment, more reliable social security, higher-level medical and health services, more comfortable housing, a more beautiful environment and a richer cultural and spiritual life.
 
China's experience suggests that a path based on the realities of the country itself is the only one that can work well and win the support of its people, and paths imposed by others usually lead to nowhere, whereas blind imitation often backfires, the report pointed out
 
By emphasizing creating all kinds of opportunities to first meet people's survival needs and then safeguarding rights in other areas, China's view on protecting human rights is more optimistic and pragmatic compared with the West's, said Chang Jian, director of the Research Center for Human Rights at the Tianjin-based Nankai University.
 
Chang told the Global Times on Monday that the West's freedom-dominated human rights outlook is kind of pessimistic, because it just asks the government not to interfere in personal freedom but doesn't talk much about how to guarantee people's rights to education, healthcare and social security.
 
The report stressed that there is no single fixed model nor perfect "utopia" for human rights development given the differences in history, culture, social systems, and economic and social development of different countries, but it notedChina's explorations and experiences are of great value for the reference of some developing countries.

 

Graphic: Xu Zihe/GT

 

Graphic: Xu Zihe/GT

 

Graphic: Xu Zihe/GT

 

Graphic: Xu Zihe/GT