IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2023 - 55

overarching objective of the discourse, in general,
and the resolutions, in particular, appear to be filling
the gap in properly understanding the impact,
be it positive or negative, of new and emerging technologies,
including on human rights. In an attempt
to address this " understanding " lacuna, the resolutions
emphasize the virtues of an " inclusive, holistic,
and comprehensive analytical " approach [8]. This
phrasing implicitly endorses the virtues of a multistakeholder
approach to the governance of new and
emerging technologies.
Against this background, this article considers
the prospect of the ongoing discourse at the UN in
developing into a global human rights-based framework
on emerging technologies and human rights.
It explores the extent to which the discourse at the
UN, especially at the HR Council, may evolve into
a framework that effectively addresses the human
rights implications of new and emerging technologies
such as AI. The rest of the article moves as
follows. We first briefly lay out the evolution of UN
discursive processes on the governance of new
and emerging technologies from the Cold War era
to the present. This provides the historical background
against which the normative boundaries of
the ongoing UN discourse on emerging technologies
and human rights are explored. The discussion
shows the ways in which the ongoing discourse at
the HR Council interacts with other related, ongoing,
as well as longstanding but thematic discussions
focusing on specific human rights such as the right
to privacy. The article closes with a set of calls for
action. For the sake of convenience, the terms " discourse "
and " resolution(s) " are used interchangeably
in this article where the word " discourse " is
meant to represent ongoing discussions at the UN,
including through the adoption of resolutions. References
to " digital human rights " in this article concern
issues at the intersection of human rights and
digital technologies.
UN, human rights, and new
technologies-A timeline
At its 41th session in mid-2019, the HR Council
broached a new discourse on the subject of digital
human rights with the adoption of a resolution on
" New and Emerging Digital Technologies and Human
Rights " [8]. A sequel but a slightly elaborate resolution
was also adopted at its 47th session in July 2021
[9]. Related resolutions but focusing on the human
March 2023
rights implications of specific technologies, namely
neuro and military technologies, were adopted at the
Council's 40th and 42nd sessions, respectively. We
will return to this tendency of discursive fragmentation
later in this article. But these resolutions form
part of the broader initiatives at the UN, including
the series of resolutions of the UN General Assembly
(UNGA) that deal with the role of new and emerging
technologies in achieving sustainable development
goals (SDGs) [10], [11] as well as related initiatives
of the UN Secretary General [12], [13], [14].
Such discussions have several historical antecedents,
however. Initiatives aimed at understanding
and responding to new technologies have existed
since the founding of the UN. But human rights
were not always at the center of the discussion. For
instance, the UNGA adopted a resolution in 1946-a
year after its founding-that established a commission
following the discovery of atomic energy [15].
As can be gleaned from a report of the commission
[16], this first UN initiative paid no direct attention
to the human rights implications of the then novel
technology of atomic energy. It was only during the
height of the Cold War era that UN discussions about
new technologies involved consideration of their
human rights implications. In particular, the Tehran
Conference-held on the occasion of the 20th Anniversary
of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(UDHR)-is where the human rights implications of
new and emerging technologies came to the fore in
earnest in UN processes.
Held merely two years after the adoption of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR), the Tehran Conference was seized with
issues surrounding " scientific and technological
developments " and their impact on human rights
[17]. In his forward-looking opening address, then
UN Secretary General U Thant broached the subject
as follows [18]:
" The unprecedented technological development
of the last two or three generations has already
and will increasingly have effects on the status and
self-respect of the individual. The promise which
science offers is understandably high but having
invented and perfected the machine, is man
going to become himself the slave of the machine
or of those few in number who will be in the position
to manipulate it? Can man and his essential
right to minimum of privacy be protected against
55
IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2023

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - March 2023
