The place of human rights in the foreign policy of Cameron’s conservatives: Sceptics or enthusiasts?

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to explain the place of human rights in the foreign policy thinking of David Cameron’s Conservatives (2005–2016). The article asks three interrelated questions: First, what role has human rights come to acquire in international political discourse? Second, did the Conservative Party’s view on the place of human rights result in a change to their approach to foreign policy on humanitarian intervention? Third, to what extent was there a tension between increasing scepticism towards the Human Rights Act and the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights and the Conservative Party’s approach to foreign policy? The authors employ a mixed methodological approach which combines hermeneutic textual analysis of speeches from leading Conservatives with semi-structured, elite interview material from four former Conservative Foreign Secretaries.