Category: human rights

IC, CP, This section discusses the current human rights debate between a number of East Asian states intent on economic development and Western states’ views of basic human rights and universalism. A first perspective comes from Bilhari Kausikan. In his comment, Kausikan argues that human rights touch upon delicate matters of culture and values. In […]

AM, NA This reading reviews the development of the formation of universal children’s rights. The main document in question is the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), ratified by 191 states excluding only Somalia and the United States. The convention includes articles concerning a variety of rights among them the preservation of […]

INTL254 Introduction to International Human Rights Professor Nadya Nedelsky reaction essays prepared by students AM, NA

“Gender” JU, SL Part I: Feminism and Female Genital Mutilation This section begins by reformulating the conflict between the objectives of human rights treaties, on the one hand, and customary laws and practices as well as religious beliefs on the other within the context of gender-related issues. As a starting point for discussion, Tracy Higgins […]

Discussion Group 9 Reaction Paper: This section further discusses whether rights are universal or relative in character. Advocates of universality argue that certain rights such as equal protection, freedom of speech and religion are common and thus can transcend cultures. In opposition, cultural relativists argue that rights and rules of morality are encoded in a […]

Group 8: AT, AW, Yongho Kim Response to The Notion of “Rights”: Origins and Relations to Duties. Monday, September 22nd. Chapter 5 provides a close-up of the notion of rights and their historical evolution. The notion of rights emerged as a refining of the concept of ‘natural law’ coined in the 17th and 18th centuries […]