Who Believes in Human Rights?
Reflections on the European Convention

Commentary on the European Convention and a groundbreaking work of theory which challenges human rights orthodoxy.

Marie-Bénédicte Dembour (Author)

9780521683074, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 19 October 2006

340 pages, 4 tables
22.9 x 15.3 x 2.1 cm, 0.553 kg

'The themes [the author] discusses so eloquently have long constituted the key sites of human rights criticism. But they are rarely treated as discursively and revealingly as here.' The Modern Law Review

Many people believe passionately in human rights. Others - Bentham, Marx, cultural relativists and some feminists amongst them - dismiss the concept of human rights as practically and conceptually inadequate. This book reviews these classical critiques and shows how their insights are reflected in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. At one level an original, accessible and insightful legal commentary on the European Convention, this book is also a groundbreaking work of theory which challenges human rights orthodoxy. Its novel identification of four human rights schools proposes that we alternatively conceive of these rights as given (natural school), agreed upon (deliberative school), fought for (protest school) and talked about (discourse school). Which of these concepts we adopt is determined by particular ways in which we believe, or do not believe, in human rights.

Table of cases
1. Introduction
2. The Convention in outline
3. The Convention in a realist light
4. The Convention in a utilitarian light
5. The Convention in a Marxist light
6. The Convention in a particularist light
7. The Convention in a feminist light
8. The human rights creed in four schools
9. Conclusion: In praise of human rights nihilism
Appendices
Select bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: International humanitarian law [LBBS], Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography [JHMC]