Challenges for a Theory of Human Rights

Authors

  • Daniel Peixoto Murata Faculdade de Direito do Largo de São Francisco (FDUSP).

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12957/publicum.2016.22786

Keywords:

Human Rights, Secularization, Consumption Society, Hannah Arendt, James Griffin.

Abstract

This essay intends to map some of the biggest difficulties faced by any attempt to theorize about human rights. The theme of human rights, notwithstanding its wide evocation in political, legal and social debates usually is not handled with proper philosophical care. I want to present two of the philosophical challenges such concept faces: (1) the way how secularization of society drained away the content of natural rights, thus emptying also human rights content; and (2) the way human rights became trivialized in contemporary consumption society. The combination of such challenges places an inconvenient question: why not abandon human rights discourse? I intend to tackle this question in the last section of the essay, arguing that human rights are embedded in our legal and moral culture. We can’t forfeit them, and more importantly, the lack of content that the idea of human rights faces does not mean that the idea is without redemption. By the end, I intend to present an answer to the challenges of trivialization and secularization in two phases, one existential and another conceptual in character.

Author Biography

Daniel Peixoto Murata, Faculdade de Direito do Largo de São Francisco (FDUSP).

Masters in Philosophy and General Theory of Law candidate - Faculdade de Direito do Largo de São Francisco (FDUSP); Law degree at FDUSP; Visiting student at University of Glasgow and member ot Tutorial Teaching Program in Sociology of Law at FDUSP.

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Published

2016-12-31

How to Cite

Murata, D. P. (2016). Challenges for a Theory of Human Rights. Revista Publicum, 2(2), 45–66. https://doi.org/10.12957/publicum.2016.22786

Issue

Vol. 2 No. 2 (2016)

Section

Artigos Científicos

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