What Are Human Rights?

The strong claims made by the doctrine of human rights continue to provoke considerable scepticism and debates about the content, nature and justifications of human rights to this day. It has also been argued that human rights are "God-given", although this notion has been criticized. In some cases, the perceived need to protect human rights and maintain peace has led to humanitarian intervention. There is evidence that internationally we are moving towards the notion that governments have not only a negative duty to respect human rights, but also a positive duty to safeguard these rights, preserve life and protect people from having their rights violated by others. Many believe that states' duties to intervene should not be determined by proximity, but rather by the severity of the crisis. They include civil and political rights, which refer to a person’s rights to take part in the civil and political life of their community without discrimination or oppression.

Article 12

The conference noted the predicament of indigenous peoples who have no real representation in the UN because it is state centered. Although there were plans to discuss caste, India lobbied against having this subject on the agenda. There was mention made of the special types of discrimination against women, children, individuals affected by HIV/AIDS. Although women’s rights were traditionally relegated to the Commission on the Status of Women, which was set up at the same time as the Commission on Human Rights, in the 1990s human rights institutions began to embrace women’s rights as well. In the 1990s there was a movement to focus attention on the experience of women.

United Nationsuniversal Declaration Of Human Rights

All human rights are equally important, and all governments must treat human rights in a fair and equal manner, on the same footing and with the same emphasis. All states have a duty, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights for everyone without discrimination. We shall look at the legal mechanisms that exist for protecting the different areas of people's interests. In Europe – but also in Africa and the Americas, there is a court to deal with complaints about violations – the European Court of Human Rights. Even where complaints do not fall under the jurisdiction of the European Court, we shall see that there are other mechanisms for holding states accountable for their actions and forcing them to comply with their obligations under human rights law. It helps that the law is there, even if there are not always legal means of enforcing compliance by states.

With Human Rights Defenders, We Work For A World That Is More Just, Equal And Sustainable For All

These provide brief responses to some of the more common questions often asked about human rights. Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible." Man being… by nature all free, equal and independent, no one can be… subjected to the political power of another, without his consent. The teachings of Confucius (c. 500 bce) contain the concept of ren or compassion and loving others as a central theme.

What my right to life really means is that no-one ought to take my life away from me; it would be wrong to do so. Human rights simply extend this understanding on an individual level to every human being on the planet. Individuals from some countries may also be able to take a complaint of human rights violations to a United Nations committee of experts, which would then give its opinion. Ideas about justice were prominent in the thinking of philosophers in the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and the Enlightenment.