Conscientious objection is not just a chapter in the history books Photo: © Quaker Tapestry. www.quaker-tapestry.co.uk
Still objecting!
A spate of news stories has reminded the British public that conscientious objectors have not been consigned to history. Derek Brett shows that conscientious objection is very much a live issue
The Quaker Tapestry panel showing public humiliation, hostile tribunals and jail reflects the ongoing stark reality that faces conscientious objectors in many parts of the world today.
In Britain, we only remember conscientious objectors in the two world wars. My generation has been able to lead our entire lives as civilians, leaving the armed forces to those who volunteered or were recruited. And we think this is normal, just as our countrymen did in the nineteenth century. Without exception, the rest of Europe considered it normal that every young man would spend time in the army.
History
After the Boer war (1899-1900), a campaign for the introduction of conscription sparked a vigorous public debate that brought together an unlikely coalition of religious pacifists (including Quakers), left-wing politicians and atheist intellectuals like Bertrand Russell. Only during this debate did the phrase ‘conscientious objection’ become shorthand for the specific objection to military service.
Eighteen months into the ‘Great War’, the conscriptionists finally prevailed, but the Military Service Act of 1916 permitted conscientious objectors to apply for exemption. At the time this was unique but by the end of 1917 New Zealand, Canada, the USA and Denmark were also conscripting with provision for conscientious objectors.
But even in 1950, when the European Convention on Human Rights was agreed, the only signatories with conscientious objection provisions were the UK, the Nordic countries and the Netherlands. The clause banning forced labour except military service could have been a problem for them, so they added: ‘or, in the case of conscientious objectors in countries where they are recognised, service exacted instead of compulsory military service.’
Recent developments
This allowed many states to argue before the European Court of Human Rights that governments have absolute discretion whether to allow for conscientious objection. Not until the Bayatyan case last month (see ‘In the news’) did the court rule, like the UN, that conscientious objection is protected under the ‘freedom of thought, conscience and religion’, irrespective of national law.
This would never have happened without the enormous increase (see graph below) in the number of countries acknowledging the right of conscientious objection to military service. At the same time, state after state has been ‘professionalising’ its armed forces. So, although there are still countries with conscription and no conscientious objection provisions, these are now the minority (pie chart opposite) and in most of them the issue has yet to be raised. Within the last year Maikal Nabil (see ‘In the news’) and Soufiane Ababou have been the first conscientious objectors to come forward in Egypt and Algeria.
Only a handful of countries are left where conscientious objectors routinely suffer imprisonment because the right is not recognised in law – Colombia, Eritrea, Israel, Singapore, South Korea, Turkey and Turkmenistan – but problems persist in many other countries. In Armenia, more than sixty Jehovah’s Witnesses are currently imprisoned, some for three years, for refusing both military service and the supposedly civilian alternative run by the military.
Even the countries that recognise that some people who willingly joined the armed forces do later become conscientious objectors make it hard to get out, as Izbicki and Lyons found (see below) – especially when,
like Lyons, starting from a selective objection to a particular war. Enormous difficulties face conscientious objectors who seek political asylum because they would be forced into military service, or punished for evasion, were they to return to their home countries.
Who are they?
Historically, many conscientious objectors were from the peace churches – Quakers, Mennonites and Brethren – but today few are. Their members mostly live where military service is no longer obligatory. Nowadays, the majority of conscientious objectors are Jehovah’s Witnesses, because they actively evangelise in all countries. But, like a century ago, alongside religious objectors are many others whose objection is purely on grounds of conscience.
An international movement has developed whose members see themselves first and foremost as conscientious objectors – who see their objection as being to all forms of militarism – a movement moreover in which women play as important a part as men.
To be a conscientious objector can mean very different things in different countries, or at different times. It is an obscure term. The soldiers in Syria who were executed for refusing to fire on protesters didn’t call themselves conscientious objectors. And if there are no conscientious objection provisions, why tell recruiters you are a conscientious objector? There are always more effective ways of avoiding military service – in most countries with obligatory military service less than half of those eligible actually end up doing it!
Sometimes large numbers of religious objectors feel the need to bear witness but elsewhere, at different times, a campaign for conscientious objection recognition has looked to only a few pioneers who suffered the penalties for refusing enlistment. Once the campaign succeeded, it sometimes became the norm to apply for civilian service. Conscientious objection became conformist!
As conscription is rolled back, does conscientious objection disappear? Not at all. Only last year the forty-seven member states of the Council of Europe accepted the right of serving military personnel to leave for reasons of conscience. And civilians, too, can have conscientious objections, whether to working in support of military activities or to paying taxes to fund military adventures.
Derek Brett represents Conscience and Peace Tax International at the UN.
In the news . . .
These conscientious objectors made headlines this year:
Michael Izbicki was released from the US Navy after the American Civil Liberties Union invited the federal court to examine the Navy’s handling of his conscientious objection application – in the course of which Quakers had been dismissed as ‘a Jones-like’ cult’. (the Friend 18 March)
Michael Lyons, a UK submariner medical assistant, was court-martialled for ‘wilful disobedience’ after requesting to be excused firearms training while his conscientious objection application was under consideration. (the Friend 15 July)
Maikel Nabil, the first recorded conscientious objector in Egypt, was charged with insulting the military after reporting their activities during the revolution on his website. He was sentenced to three years imprisonment. (the Friend 15 April)
Vahan Bayatyan, a Jehovah’s Witness, was jailed for refusing military service in Armenia when no alternative was available. The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that this was a violation of his freedom of thought, conscience and religion. (the Friend 15 July)
