"Join the Cause" – Human Rights on the Internet

Abstract

Human rights are “basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled”. Proponents of the concept usually assert that all humans are endowed with certain entitlements merely by reason of being human. Human rights are thus conceived in a universalist and egalitarian fashion. Such entitlements can exist as shared norms of actual human moralities, as justifi ed moral norms or natural rights supported by strong reasons, or as legal rights either at a national level or within international law. However, there is no consensus as to the precise nature of what in particular should or should not be regarded as a human right in any of the preceding senses, and the abstract concept of human rights has been a subject of intense philosophical debate and criticism. As the new millennium emerges, trends in global human rights are changing. Human rights issues are crossing sovereign boundaries and are no longer just issues of the state. As more and more non-governmental organizations are growing, and the Internet expands and facilitates a quicker spread of information, there are more and more people raising concerns about human rights related issues. Some of these come from the increasingly larger and infl uential commercial sector including large, multinational companies, while the others are raised by ordinary people, being parts of diff erent networks. The aim of this article is to examine the way social networks influence and change the methods of raising the awareness concerning human rights on one hand, but, on the other hand, to analyse how new media contribute to deepening global inequalities.