Christianity and Human Rights Reconsidered

Offers the first global examination of the historical relationship between Christianity and human rights in the twentieth century.

Sarah Shortall (Edited by), Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins (Edited by)

9781108424707, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 24 September 2020

300 pages
16 x 23.5 x 2 cm, 0.58 kg

'A wide-ranging volume with original and insightful contributions. Some of them enter a dialogue with Samuel Moyn's provocative work on human rights; others are free-standing and help us rethink the relationship between politics and Christianity in the twentieth century more broadly.' Jan-Werner Müller, Princeton University

This is the first global examination of the historical relationship between Christianity and human rights in the twentieth century. Leading historians, anthropologists, political theorists, legal scholars, and scholars of religion develop fresh approaches to issues such as human dignity, personalism, religious freedom, the role of ecumenical and transatlantic networks, and the relationship between Christian and liberal rights theories. In doing so they move well beyond the temporal and geographical limits of the existing scholarship, exploring the connection between Christianity and human rights, not only in Europe and the United States, but also in Africa, Latin America, and China. They offer alternative chronologies and bring to light overlooked aspects of this history, including the role of race, gender, decolonization, and interreligious dialogue. Above all, these essays foreground the complicated relationship between global rights discourses - whether Christian, liberal, or otherwise - and the local contexts in which they are developed and implemented.

Preface Samuel Moyn
Introduction Sarah Shortall and Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins
Part I. General reflections: 1. The last christian settlement: a defense and critique, in debate with Samuel Moyn and John Milbank
2. The alpine climb between Paris and Rome Julian Bourg
Part II. European catholicism and human rights: 3. Explaining the catholic turn to rights in the 1930s James Chappel
4. Catholic social doctrine and human rights: from rejection to endorsement? Carlo Invernizzi Accetti
5. Radical orthodoxy and the rebirth of christian opposition to human rights Udi Greenberg
6. The biopolitics of dignity Camille Robcis
Part III. American protestant trajectories: 7. William ernest hocking and the liberal protestant origins of human rights Gene Zubovich
8. Inside the cauldron: rawls and the stirrings of personalism at wartime princeton P. MacKenzie Bok
9. The dignity of Paul Robeson Vincent Lloyd
Part IV. Beyond Europe and North America: 10. On chinese rites and rights Albert Wu
11. 'Expert in humanity': an African vision for the catholic church Elizabeth Foster
12. Neoliberalism, human rights, and the theology of liberation in Latin America David Lantigua
13. Two Sudans, human rights, and the afterlives of St. Josephine Bakhita Christopher Tounsel
Index.

Subject Areas: Educational: Religious studies: Christianity [YQRC], Religious freedom / freedom of worship [JPVH4], Human rights [JPVH], Christianity [HRC]