LGBT rights in foreign policy: the case of the United States

Abstract

In recent years, a lot of political attention has been paid to LGBT- Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender persons equality worldwide (also known as SOGI- sexual orientation and gender identity). The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted the LGBT resolution in September 2014 and it was supported by many governments around the world, including the United States which has actively been pushing for LGBT issues to be discussed in global forums. Recently it has become a more prominent international relations problem when other states have started aligning with the Western idea of modernity and equality which are perceived as the active proponents of LGBT equality agenda. International action and support over the LGBT issue gained a lot of attention and because of it a backlash occurred- some countries aligning themselves as protectors of LGBT rights and others as the opposition to such rights. The United States was the first country to release a global strategy in 2011.12.16 presidential memorandum to battling LGBT discriminations but how does this Western power shape this problem and how does it frame the issue in regard to itself and other states? This paper seeks to research how the LGBT issues are constructed and perceived during the presidency of Barak Obama. The aims of this research are: (1) to make a methodological framework to aid the analysis; (2) to analyse LGBT human rights issue framing in the United States during B.Obama’s administration before the presidential memorandum of 2011.12-06, and (3) to analyse LGBT human rights issue framing in the United States during B.Obama’s administration after the memorandum of 2011.12.06. The main goal of the paper is to see how these perceptions are formulated in the selected period’s rhetoric. In the paper, constructivism was the main theory of international relations used. Other theories include work done on international norm diffusion by Katherine Sikkink et al., and coercive rhetoric theory to help analyse the effect of the speeches. 16 documents and fact sheets published by the United States government were analysed, along with 2630 speeches of B. Obama and other governmental officials. The documents and speeches were analysed using content and document analysis methods and the research provided answers according to a pre-determined set of criteria: (1) whether LGBT rights are framed as a human rights issue; (2) how exactly LGBT rights are framed as a human rights problem, (3) whether some countries are named as violating LGBT rights more than other in the view of the U.S.; (4) what action plan the U.S. proposes to the global community in the context of LGBT rights issue; (5) how does the U.S. positions itself regarding this issue. The results of the research confirm the hypothesis that the U.S. officials frame LGBT rights only as human rights by framing the LGBT community to be within the vulnerable group of minorities. The results showed a contrastive framing of LGBT issues, presenting some states as the opposition to these rights and urging other states to take sides. B. Obama, H.Clinton, and other officials primarily stressed the U.S. role as the role of a leader facing this issue.