The End of Human Rights

The introduction ofthe Human Rights Act has led to an explosion in books on human rights, yet nosustained examination of their history and philosophy exists in the burgeoningliterature. At the same time, while human rights have triumphed on the world stageas the ideology of postmodernity, our age ha [...]
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The introduction ofthe Human Rights Act has led to an explosion in books on human rights, yet nosustained examination of their history and philosophy exists in the burgeoningliterature. At the same time, while human rights have triumphed on the world stageas the ideology of postmodernity, our age has witnessed more violations ofhuman rights than any previous, less enlightened one.a This book fills the historical andtheoretical gap and explores the powerful promises and disturbing paradoxes ofhuman rights. Divided in two partsand fourteen chapters, the book offers first an alternative history of naturallaw, in which natural rights represent the eternal human struggle to resistdomination and oppression and to fight for a society in which people are no longerdegraded or despised.a At the time oftheir birth, in the 18th century, and again in the popular uprisings of thelast decade, human rights became the dominant critique of the conservatism oflaw.aBut the radical energy, symbolicvalue and apparently endless expansive potential of rights has led to theiradoption both by governments wishing to justify their policies on moral groundsand by individuals fighting for the public recognition of private desires andhas undermined their ends.a Part Two examinesthe philosophical logic of rights. Rights, the most liberal of institutions,has been largely misunderstood by established political philosophy andjurisprudence as a result of their cognitive limitations and ethicallyimpoverished views of the individual subject and of the social bond.a The liberal approaches of Hobbes, Locke andKant are juxtaposed to the classical critiques of the concept of human rightsby Burke, Hegel and Marx. The philosophies of Heidegger, Strauss, Arendt andSartre are used to deconstruct the concept of the (legal) subject. Semioticsand psychoanalysis help explore the catastrophic consequences of bothuniversalists and cultural relativists when they become convinced about theircorrectness.Finally, through a consideration of the ethics of otherness, andwith reference to recent human rights violations, it is argued that the end ofhuman rights is to judge law and politics from a position of moraltranscendence. This is acomprehensive historical and theoretical examination of the discourse andpractice of human rights.a Using examplesfrom recent moral foreign policies in Iraq, Rwanda and Kosovo, Douzinasradically argues that the defensive and emancipatory role of human rights willcome to an end if we do not re-invent their utopian ideal.CONTENTS PART 1a THE GENEALOGY OF HUMAN RIGHTS 1 The Triumph ofHuman Rights 2 A Brief History ofNatural Law I: The Classical Beginnings 3 A Brief History ofNatural Law II: From Natural Law to Natural Rights 4 Natural Right inHobbes and Locke 5 Revolution andDeclarations: The Rights of Men, Citizens and Few Others 6 The Triumph ofHumanity: From 1789 to 1989 and from Natural to Human Rights PART 2a THE PHILOSOPHY OF HUMAN RIGHTS 7 The ClassicalCritiques of Rights: Burke and Marx 8 Subjectum andSubjectus: The Free and Subjected Subject 9 Law's Subjects:Rights and Legal Humanism 10 Hegel's Law:Rights and Recognition 11 PsychoanalysisBecomes the Law: Rights and Desire 12 The ImaginaryDomain and the Future of Utopia 13 The Human Rightsand the Other 14 The End of HumanRights