Limit this search to....

Human Rights as Social Construction
Contributor(s): Gregg, Benjamin (Author)
ISBN: 1107612942     ISBN-13: 9781107612945
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
OUR PRICE:   $39.89  
Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats
Published: August 2013
Qty:
Additional Information
BISAC Categories:
- Political Science | History & Theory - General
- Political Science | Civil Rights
Dewey: 323.01
Physical Information: 0.57" H x 6" W x 9" (0.81 lbs) 272 pages
 
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc.
Publisher Description:
Most conceptions of human rights rely on metaphysical or theological assumptions that construe them as possible only as something imposed from outside existing communities. Most people, in other words, presume that human rights come from nature, God, or the United Nations. This book argues that reliance on such putative sources actually undermines human rights. Benjamin Gregg envisions an alternative; he sees human rights as locally developed, freely embraced, and indigenously valid. Human rights, he posits, can be created by the average, ordinary people to whom they are addressed, and that they are valid only if embraced by those to whom they would apply. To view human rights in this manner is to increase the chances and opportunities that more people across the globe will come to embrace them.

Contributor Bio(s): Gregg, Benjamin: - Benjamin Gregg teaches social and political theory at the University of Texas, Austin. He is the author of Thick Moralities, Thin Politics: Social Integration across Communities of Belief (2003) and Coping in Politics with Indeterminate Norms: A Theory of Enlightened Localism (2003). His articles have appeared in Political Theory, the Review of Politics, Theory and Society, Polity, Ratio Juris, Comparative Sociology and the International Review of Sociology.