Human Rights in Political and Economic Context: Competing Views

Abstract

The Politics of Human Rights. By Andrew Vincent. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. 272 pp., $35.00 paperback (ISBN-13: 978-0-199-23897-2). Human Rights in the Global Political Economy: Critical Processes. By Tony Evans. Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2010. 232 pp., $59.95 hardback (ISBN-13: 978-1-588-26719-1). Human Rights in the Twentieth Century. Edited by Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. 366 pp., $28.99 paperback (ISBN-13: 978-0-521-14257-1). The three books reviewed here nicely demonstrate the interdisciplinary nature of the idea of human rights, as well as some of the competing approaches to understanding that vibrant but controversial concept. Andrew Vincent of the University of Sheffield is interested primarily in political theory, Tony Evans of the University of Southampton is interested mostly in political practice, and Stefan-Ludwig Hoffmann of the Center for Research in Contemporary History at Potsdam is interested in cultural, intellectual, and political history. In The Politics of Human Rights , Vincent attacks the notion that human rights are grounded in natural law. Rather he situates human rights in the customary behavior of the “civil state” which he says emerged from 1945 largely as a reaction to genocide. In Human Rights in the Global Political Economy: Critical Processes , Evans, consistent with his other publications, sees the predominance of human rights language since that time mostly as a cover for US hegemony or imperialism, with the emphasis on civil and political rights obscuring exploitation. Hoffmann, after reviewing various versions of the origins of human rights in argumentation and practice, organizes his edited and diffuse volume, Human Rights in the Twentieth Century , around notions of “contested hegemonies” or “political contestations” and the “historical contingency of our normative concepts.” All three agree that human rights norms have importance in international relations. All agree that human rights standards manifest problems and weaknesses. All agree that the development of human rights is fundamentally a matter of politics focused on the importance of the individual, whether viewed singly or in communities. In different ways, all three books reinforce Michael Ignatieff's (2001) pithy interpretation that human rights are a matter of politics and idolatry—a matter of human beings engaging in political struggle to emphasize or worship the value of human beings. …