Human Rights Universal Declaration Of Human Rights

If a right is inalienable, that means it cannot be bestowed, granted, limited, bartered away, or sold away (e.g., one cannot sell oneself into slavery). The issue of which rights are inalienable and which are not (or whether any rights are inalienable rather than granted or bestowed) is an ancient and ongoing controversy. Rights may also be non-derogable (not limited in times of National Emergency)- these include the right to life, the right to be prosecuted only according to the laws that are in existence at the time of the offence, the right to be free from slavery, and the right to be free from torture.

1 Universal Declaration of Human Rights

In 1948, the United Nations created the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This Declaration introduced the notion in the public realm that rights are universal, inalienable,and inherent to the well being of an individual. Specifically, the Declaration limits the behaviour of the state, which now has duties to the citizen (rights-duty duality). The roots of this notion can be drawn as far back as the Ancients (the role of the individual in the state) but the idea of civil and political rights stems from liberal freedoms advocated by John Stuart Mill in " On Liberty". Economic, Social and Cultural Rights can be traced back to Hegel's " Elements of the Philosophy of Right".

Other Human Rights Conventions of note include: Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime to Genocide (entry into force: 1951)[3], The Convention against TortureTorture is the infliction of severe physical or psychological pain as a means of cruelty, intimidation, punishment, for the extraction of a confession or information or simply for the entertainment of the perpetrator. Signatories of the Third Geneva Conve (entry into force: 1984)[4],the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (entry into force: 1969) [5],The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (entry into force: 1981)[6], UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (entry into force:1989 [7]and the Rome Statute for International Criminal CourtThe International Criminal Court (ICC) was established in 2002 as a permanent tribunal to prosecute and try individuals for the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, as defined by several international agreements. Note that Internati (entry into force: 2002).

2 Origins of rights

Human rights can be divided into two categories: negative human rights (rights to be free from) and positive (rights to). In law, human rights are usually, however, divided into three generations of human rightsThe division of human rights into three generations was initially proposed in 1979 by the French jurist Karel Vasak at the International Institute of Human Rights in Strasbourg. His division follows the three great watchwords of the French Revolution: Lib: first-generation civil and political rights (right to life and political participation), second-generation economic, social and cultural rights (right to subsistence) and third-generation solidarity rights (right to peace, right to clean environment). The first- and second-generation rights are enshrined in international legal documents, while third-generation rights remain controversial. These categorisations are, however, misleading since it is usually impossible to implement first-generation rights without implementing some second-generation rights. Thus rights are often interconnected. For example: to really use your right to political participation, you must also have basic education and basic subsistence.

Positive human rights follow mainly from the RousseauianJean Jacques Rousseau ( June 28, 1712 July 2, 1778) was a Swiss-French philosopher, writer, political theorist, and self-taught composer. Biography of Rousseau Rousseau was born in Geneva, Switzerland, and died in Ermenonville (28 miles northeast of Paris Continental legal tradition, and are things to which every person is entitled and for which every state is obligated. Examples of such rights (not all are universally agreed upon) include: the rights to educationEducation encompasses teaching and learning specific skills, and also something less tangible but more profound: the imparting of knowledge, good judgement and wisdom. One of the fundamental goals of education is to impart culture across the generations (, to a livelihoodEmployment is a contract between two parties, one being the employer and the other being the employee . In a commercial setting, the employer conceives of a productive activity, generally with the intention of creating profits, and the employee contribute, and legalThis article is about law in society. For other possible meanings, see law (disambiguation). Law (a loanword from Danish-Norwegian lov , in politics and jurisprudence, is a set of rules of conduct which mandate or proscribe (or both) specified relationshi equalitySee also the disambiguation page titled equality for the mathematical and geographical topics. Equality is a social state of affairs in which certain different people have the same status in a certain respect. There are different forms of equality, depend. Positive rights have been codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in many 20th century constitutions.

Negative human rights follow mainly from the Anglo-American legal tradition, and are rights which denote actions that a government should not take. These are codified in the United States Bill of Rights and the English Bill of Rights and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms include freedoms of speech, religion and assembly.

There are a number of theories of where rights come from. The theory espoused by the US Declaration of Independence and ingrained in Anglo-American legal thought is that rights arise from the Judeo-Christian God. /*Refer to Declaration of Independence paragraph 2 sentence 1 for reference to Creator with a capital C*/ This theory is considered antiquated in moral philosophy.

Religious societies tend to try to justify human rights through religious arguments. For example, liberal movements within Islam have tried to use the story of Adam in the Qur'an to support human rights in a Muslim context.

There are a number of controversies regarding human rights including:

Are human rights political, moral or legal entities (or all three at the same time)?
Is there or should there be a hierarchy of human rights?
Do human rights impede on state sovereignty? What if the state itself has ratified international conventions?
Should human rights be used as a context for economic or military intervention? (Often leads to a worsening of the human rights situation in the target country)
Questions of Cultural Relativism-- e.g. "Political participation is not a part of African culture. Who are you to say that we should have political participation?" These arguments can also be made on religious basis "In our religion marriages have always been arranged, why should we not continue this practise?" The increasing number of third-world states parties to international human rights treaties has made these arguments weaker but not disappear altogether.
Who should hold the moral duty to uphold rights? For civil and political rights, the answer is the state but it is not quite so clear who should be responsible for promoting economic, social and cultural rights (do we have a global duty). This debate mirrors debates between communitarianism and cosmopolitanism.

One is what rights are included as fundamental human rights, or even if there is such a thing. Another controversy is how best to enforce human rights and in particular the relationship between human rights and national sovereignty. One point of view is that human rights are universal and therefore it is proper for any national to attempt to enforce human rights through international courts or domestic law. The opposing view is that having human rights override national sovereignty is a form of imperialism in which powerful countries dictate which rights they consider most important against less powerful countries. Canada attempts to resolve this tension by allowing legislative primacy on a temporary and renewable basis notwithstanding that the law infringes the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The most powerful human rights organisation is the European Court of Human Rights, which is the only international court with jurisdiction to deal with cases brought by individuals (not states).

3 Hate crimes laws

With the advent of the concept of human rights, various countries and American states have attempted to enact laws against what are called hate crimes. A hate crime is defined as a crime committed with direct influence by the minority status of the victim. A hate crime law would bring greater penalty to the perpetrator based on the hateful intent.

Conservatives in the United States often oppose hate crime laws, on the grounds that punishing crimes based on perceived or unprovable intentions or emotions is unjust. They feel that substantively similar crimes should be punished equally, rather than based on a constructed notion of hate. In other words they consider the magnitude of a crime equal reguardless of motivations such as greed, hate, fear, etc.

Liberals often support hate crime laws, stating that by enacting them individuals would face greater discouragement from committing hate crimes. They also point out that all laws are subjective, and that if society can determine that one crime deserves more punishment than another (ie: murder vs. involuntary manslaughter), then it can also determine what motivations deserve more stringent punishments.

4 See also

5 External links

6 Human rights organizations

Better World Links on Human Rights Organizations
Amnesty International: http://www.amnesty.org
Freedom House: http://www.freedomhouse.org
International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights: http://www.ihf-hr.org
International Volunteer Public Organization MEMORIAL: http://www.memo.ru/eng/
The Carter Center: http://www.cartercenter.org
Human Rights Watch: http://www.hrw.org
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: http://www.ohchr.org
University of Minnesota Human Rights Library : http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/
International Freedom of Expression eXchange : http://www.ifex.org
Human Rights Campaign: http://www.hrc.org
Montagnard Foundation: http://www.montagnard-foundation.org/homepage.html

Human rights Rights

<Hide>

Home > Human rights