Abstract
The question of the universality of human rights has much in common with the question of the universality of ethics. In the form of a multidisciplinary reflexive survey, the aim of this article is to show how human rights discourses derive from more basic principles related to basic needs. These needs are the universal grammar for moral principles, which will be distinguished from ethical norms. Ethical norms, I will argue, are rules that develop in social groups to put into effect moral principles through communicative action and therefore develop as culturally specific norms, which guide behaviour within these social groups. This will explain why ethical norms contain some universal principles, but are largely culturally specific. In order to shed some light on the universality debate, I will show how moral principles translate into ethical norms and might manifest through communicative action in human rights law. For this purpose the article develops a socio-legal account on social norm-creation that bridges moral universality and legal universality via ethical pluralism, which in effect explains why despite the universality of moral principles, the outcomes of ethical rationales can vary extremely.
Highlights
In many ways natural rights have found their way back into common discourse
This article tries to place these debates in a broader socio-legal framework functioning as a conceptional link. The argument that this socio-legal account puts forth is that due to our commonness in needs and vulnerabilities we all share common moral principles; but due to different mechanisms to protect from threats to needs and to alleviate vulnerabilities, which developed differently within different cultures, ethical norms are not universally the same, but on the contrary are very different; eventually, through international ethical discourse states are able to negotiate norms that are universally valid on legal grounds based on the acceptance of all states
There seems to be some consensus concerning the existence of very basic moral principles. This is not to say that there is consensus on the justifications applicable to deviate from moral principles such as: what constitutes the greater good, avoiding a terrorist attack by retrieving information from suspects through torture or not living in a society in which torture is the sword of Damocles hanging over everyone's head who might be identified as a potential bearer of valuable information? The section will discuss moral universalism and relativism to shed some light on what could constitute the universal core and what the relativist elements of human rights
Summary
In many ways natural rights have found their way back into common discourse. Statements of politicians and even court decisions account for that. This article tries to place these debates in a broader socio-legal framework functioning as a conceptional link The argument that this socio-legal account puts forth is that due to our commonness in needs and vulnerabilities we all share common moral principles (moral universalism); but due to different mechanisms to protect from threats to needs and to alleviate vulnerabilities, which developed differently within different cultures, ethical norms are not universally the same, but on the contrary are very different (ethical pluralism); eventually, through international ethical discourse states are able to negotiate norms that are universally valid on legal grounds based on the acceptance of all states (legal universality). The overarching objective of this essay is to lay the groundwork for future questions in the study of politics and ethics that aim to go beyond the contemporary tendency of scholarship to give priority to certain ethical concepts such as justice, whilst ignoring the canon of other concepts such as beneficence, magnanimity, mercy etc. as well as the pertaining question of vices and evil in international politics
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