UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS: In Theory and Practice

In the third edition of his classic work, revised extensively and updated to include recent developments on the international scene, Jack Donnelly explains and defends a richly interdisciplinary account of human rights as universal rights. He shows that any conception of human rights—and the idea of human rights itself—is historically specific and contingent. Since publication of the first edition in 1989, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice has justified Donnelly’s claim that “conceptual clarity, the fruit of sound theory, can facilitate action. At the very least it can help to unmask the arguments of dictators and their allies.”

Contents
Part I. Toward a Theory of Human Rights
1. Th e Concept of Human Rights
2. Th e Universal Declaration Model
3. Economic Rights and Group Rights
4. Equal Concern and Respect
Part II. The Universality and Relativity of Human Rights
5. A Brief History of Human Rights
6. Th e Relative Universality of Human Rights
7. Universality in a World of Particularities
Part III. Human Rights and Human Dignity
8. Dignity: Particularistic and Universalistic Conceptions in the West
9. Humanity, Dignity, and Politics in Confucian China
10. Humans and Society in Hindu South Asia
Part IV. Human Rights and International Action
11. International Human Rights Regimes
12. Human Rights and Foreign Policy
Part V. Contemporary Issues
13. Human Rights, Democracy, and Development
14. Th e West and Economic and Social Rights
15. Humanitarian Intervention against Genocide
16. Nondiscrimination for All: Th e Case of Sexual Minorities