Each 20 December is celebrated as United Nations (UN) International Human Solidarity Day.

Solidarity is a noun that entered the English language in the early 1800s, derived from a French term meaning shared interests and responsibilities.

As the UN website notes,

The Sustainable Development Agenda is centred on people & planet, underpinned by human rights and supported by a global partnership determined to lift people out of poverty, hunger and disease. It will, thus, be built on a foundation of global cooperation and solidarity.

International Human Solidarity Day is:

• a day to celebrate our unity in diversity;
• a day to remind governments to respect their commitments to international agreements;
• a day to raise public awareness of the importance of solidarity;
• a day to encourage debate on the ways to promote solidarity for the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals including poverty eradication;
• a day of action to encourage new initiatives for poverty eradication.

The Thammasat University Library collection includes several books about different aspects of human solidarity.

The UN webpage for this day offers the following information:

Background

Solidarity is identified in the Millennium Declaration as one of the fundamental values of international relations in the 21st Century, wherein those, who either suffer or benefit least deserve help from those who benefit most. Consequently, in the context of globalization and the challenge of growing inequality, strengthening of international solidarity is indispensable.

Therefore, the UN General Assembly, convinced that the promotion of the culture of solidarity and the spirit of sharing is important for combating poverty, proclaimed 20 of December as International Human Solidarity Day.

Through initiatives such as the establishment of the World Solidarity Fund to eradicate poverty and the proclamation of International Human Solidarity Day, the concept of solidarity was promoted as crucial in the fight against poverty and in the involvement of all relevant stakeholders.

The UN and the Concept of Solidarity

The concept of solidarity has defined the work of the United Nations since the birth of the Organization. The creation of the United Nations drew the peoples and nations of the world together to promote peace, human rights and social and economic development. The Organization was founded on the basic premise of unity and harmony among its members, expressed in the concept of collective security that relies on the solidarity of its members to unite “to maintain international peace and security.”

It is in the spirit of solidarity that the Organization relies on “cooperation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural or humanitarian character” as well.

The General Assembly, on 22 December 2005, by resolution 60/209 identified solidarity as one of the fundamental and universal values that should underlie relations between peoples in the twenty-first century, and in that regard decided to proclaim 20 December of each year International Human Solidarity Day.

By resolution 57/265 the General Assembly, on 20 December 2002, established the World Solidarity Fund, which was set up in February 2003 as a trust fund of the United Nations Development Programme. Its objective is to eradicate poverty and promote human and social development in developing countries, in particular among the poorest segments of their populations.

The UN appoints an Independent Expert on human rights and international solidarity as

an expression of a spirit of unity among individuals, peoples, States and international organizations.

It encompasses the union of interests, purposes and actions and the recognition of different needs and rights to achieve common goals.

International solidarity is a foundational principle underpinning contemporary international law in order to preserve international order and to ensure the survival of international society.

The general objective of international solidarity is to create an enabling environment for: Preventing and removing the causes of asymmetries and inequities between and within States, and the structural obstacles that generate and perpetuate poverty and inequality worldwide; Engendering trust and mutual respect between States and non-State actors to foster peace and security, development and human rights;

Promoting a social and international order in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized…

International cooperation is the core of international solidarity, but that international solidarity is not limited to international assistance and cooperation, aid, charity or humanitarian assistance. International solidarity should be understood in a broader concept that includes sustainability in international relations, especially international economic relations, the peaceful coexistence of all members of the international community, equal partnerships and the equitable sharing of benefits and burdens, refraining from doing harm or posing obstacles to the greater wellbeing of others, including in the international economic system and to our common ecological habitat, for which all are responsible.

Among research produced at the UN on this theme is The role of the expression of international solidarity for the fuller realization of human rights within the context of economic security and insecurity.

Here are some thoughts about human solidarity from authors, most of whom are represented in the TU Library collection:

Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind then that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it; and while there is a criminal element, I am of it; and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.

• Eugene V. Debs, Statement to the Federal Court, Cleveland, Ohio, upon being convicted of violating the Sedition Act (18 September 1918)

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.

• John Donne, Meditation XVII

This solidarity can grow only in inverse ratio to personality…. Solidarity which comes from likenesses is at its maximum when the collective conscience completely envelops our whole conscience and coincides in all points with it…. when this solidarity exercises its force, our personality vanishes, as our definition permits us to say, for we are no longer ourselves, but the collective life.

• Émile Durkheim, The Division of Labor in Society (1947)

Unlike solidarity, which is horizontal and takes place between equals, charity is top-down, humiliating those who receive it and never challenging the implicit power relations.

• Eduardo Galeano, in Upside Down: A Primer for the Looking Glass World (2000)

Solidarity always operates in tension with logics of domination.

• Rubén A. Gaztambide-Fernández, “Decolonization and the pedagogy of solidarity,” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education and Society, Vol. 1, No. 1, 2012

Speak out on behalf of the voiceless, and for the rights of all who are vulnerable.

Speak out in order to judge with righteousness and to defend the needy and the poor.

• The Bible, Book of Proverbs 31:8-10

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)