The Idea of Human Rights Flashcards
What are Human Rights?
Human rights empower the right-holders, and gives them a weapon they can wield in certain circumstances demanding a particular behaviour to stop, which is prescribing certain behaviours from others.
2 things that must be taken into account when interpreting a right
- The purpose of the norm that was created. A literal interpretation of the norm that undermines the very purposeful which the norm was created, cannot be considered a valid interpretation.
- Interpret it in light of another norm. This particular norm must be interpreted in light of other norms that are enforced. Obligation goes beyond a specific norm.
Remedial claim
Putting the right into practice, wielding the right as a weapon.
Objective enjoyment
Usually rights are taken for granted, and the objective enjoyment happens without the need for rights-holders to make a claim, because the duty-bearer is complying with their obligation. Logic of appropriateness: people comply without thinking of them.
Active respect
The duty-bearer performs their duty after considering on its own initiative the right-holders entitlement in virtue of that right. You are enjoying your freedom, but not passively. It happens as a result of someone taking into account your right.
Active respect: Logic of appropriateness vs Logic of consequences
Logic of appropriateness: The right thing for me to do is to let her talk.
Logic of consequences: She has the right to speak, which means I have an obligation to let her speak, but I don’t care about the obligation. However, I do care about the consequences that will follow if I try to shut her up.
Assertive Exercise
Right-holder makes claim against duty-bearer with respect to X, the duty-bearer may choose to respect the right, or violate it. When they choose to violate it, that’s when enforcement mechanisms come into play. Possession paradox: having a right is of most value precisely when one does not have the right.
Specific aspects of human rights
- They are equal rights: All human rights enjoy equal/same rights.
- These rights are inalienable: You enjoy them in virtue of you being a human. They cannot be taken away.
- These rights are universal: We are all human, so everyone has the same rights. Race, gender, sexuality does not change these rights.
Human rights as a standard of political legitimacy: Domestically & International
- Domestically: Government stability. Many regimes have fallen because of their lack of human rights.
- International: Limits on sovereign prerogatives. Making sovereignty more permeable (there are certain lines you can’t cross as a sovereign).
The source of human rights
The socially constructed moral nature of the human person. Dignity is a crucial concept at the very core of the project of human rights. Those table to enjoy human rights will be estranged from their moral nature.
Human rights as a self-fulfilling prophecy, but a never-ending project
The idea shapes reality vertex, but reality updates the idea. The bar is constantly raised. Human rights are always going to demand more of society.
Human rights project
About bringing legal and political practice in line with a moral model of the human person.
Human rights are
The minimum set of goods, services, opportunities, and protections that are widely recognized today as essential prerequisites for a life of dignity: and a particular set of practices to realize those goods, services, opportunities, and protections.
Negative rights (prescriptions)
All you have to do is not do anything. No one can point to lack of development of resources to say this is why certain states did not comply.
Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
The right to education, regulation of workplace, right not to be discriminated against, respect for cultural diversity.
Rights of individuals (persons)
Identifying states as the main danger to individual human rights. The individual remains the main holder in international human rights, but overtime more and more collective rights have made it into human rights movement.
Right of collectivities (people, minority groups)
The state has the power to repress a certain group of people, so the right to self determination as a collective right became crucial as the normative basis of decolonization. Women’s rights are not collective rights but individual rights.
Core rights
Defined by being non-derogable. Non-derogable: the government endorsing a human rights treaty cannot bring up a situation to temporarily suspend those rights. They must be complied with at all times and circumstances.
Peripheral rights
Supplementary rights that are connected to a primary right. Freedom of thought, belief, opinion, expression. Right to a fair trial. Freedom from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment.
