The Limits of Human Rights

Edited by Bardo Fassbender and Knut Traisbach

Assembles leading scholars to consider the inherent limits of human rights from interdisciplinary perspectives
Examines the functional, pragmatic, and ideological limits of human rights without denying their relevance and value
Each contribution is followed by a response from another scholar, provoking further engagement and debate

The Limits of Human Rights

Edited by Bardo Fassbender and Knut Traisbach

Description

The continuous expansion of human rights can often appear to be both positive and limitless. The limitation of classical State sovereignty, the transformation of the fundamental idea of State will, the emergence of an international community, the carrying out of humanitarian interventions, the idea of a 'responsibility to protect', the concepts of peremptory norms and obligations erga omnes, and a renewed concern for the unity of the international legal order would all not have the same prominent place in legal discussion if not for the centrality of human rights to the international order.

Yet the ubiquitous presence of human right has provoked critical voices. Concerns are uttered about the role of 'droits-de-l'hommistes' and humanitarians, the continued presence of a 'civilizing mission', and the assumption of the 'trans-civilizational' universality of human rights. Fassbender and Traisbach assemble a team of experts to examine the issue from multiple disciplinary perspectives, and to analyse the limits of our current discourse of human rights. Declaring that the validity of a human right should not be taken as self-evident but instead should be contested, defended, and reformulated, this volume disputes the notion that the internationalisation of human rights proves that the world is moving from bilateralism to community interests, stating that contentious processes of supervision, evaluation, and substitution are far more common than genuine cooperation.

The Limits of Human Rights

Edited by Bardo Fassbender and Knut Traisbach

Introduction: A Ride on the Human Rights Bus,Bardo Fassbender and Knut Traisbach
Prologue: Limits and their Varieties,Henry J. Steiner
Part 1. Limits of Ideas, Limits of Communities: Paradigms and Biases
1: Humanity and the Claim to Self-Evidence,Lynn Hunt
2: The Self-Evidence of Human Rights: Origins and Limits of an Idea,Bardo Fassbender
3: Human Rights, Global Justice, and the Limits of Law,Kate Nash
4: Human Rights beyond the Double Bind of Sovereignty: A Response to Kate Nash,Mark Goodale
5: Emergencies and Human Rights: A Hobbesian Analysis,David Dyzenhaus
6: Reason, Faith, and Feelings: A Response to David Dyzenhaus,Conor Gearty
Part 2. Limits of Functions, Limits of Uses: Actors and Practices
7: Being a Realist about Human Rights,Christian Reus-Smit
8: Political Limits of International Human Rights: A Response (or a Rejoinder) to Christian Reus-Smit,Basak Çali
9: Human Rights Bodies and the Structure of Institutional Obligation,Jan Klabbers
10: Dissecting the Institution: A Response to Jan Klabbers,Rosa Freedman and Ruth Houghton
11: Differentiating Fundamental Rights and Economic Goals,Aryeh Neier
12: Advocating for Social and Economic Rights-Critical Perspectives: A Response to Aryeh Neier,Jeremy Perelman
Part 3. Limits of Scope, Limits of Recognition: The Case of Women's Rights
13: Between the Margins and the Mainstream: The Case of Women's Rights,Hilary Charlesworth and Christine Chinkin
14: Women's Rights are Human Rights: A Response to Hilary Charlesworth and Christine Chinkin from a Chinese Perspective,Bai Guimei
15: Women's Progress and Women's Human Rights,Martha C. Nussbaum
16: The Limits of Law: A Response to Martha C Nussbaum,Fareda Banda
Part 4. Limits of Pragmatism, Limits of Compromise: The Case of Armed Conflict
17: The Limits of the Laws of War,Frédéric Mégret
18: The Banality of Humanity (as an Absolute): A Response to Frédéric Mégret,Knut Traisbach
19: The Limits of Human Rights in Times of Armed Conflict and Other Situations of Armed Violence,Andrew Clapham
20: The End of the War/Peace Limit on the Application of International Human Rights Law: A Response to Andrew Clapham,Yuval Shany
Part 5. Limits of Prospects, Limits of Means: An Outlook
21: The Limits of Human Rights in a Moving World-Elements of a Dynamic Approach,Mireille Delmas-Marty
22: Where are the Limits of Human Rights? Four Schools, four Complementary Visions: A Response to Mireille Delmas-Marty,Marie-Bénédicte Dembour
23: Strategizing for Human Rights: From Ideals to Practice,Douglas A. Johnson and Kathryn Sikkink
24: Historical Strategies for Human Rights: A Response to Kathryn Sikkink and Douglas Johnson,Micheline Ishay

The Limits of Human Rights

Edited by Bardo Fassbender and Knut Traisbach

Author Information

Bardo Fassbender, Professor of Public International Law, European Law, and Public Law, University of St Gallen,Knut Traisbach, Associate Professor of International Law (adjunct), University of Barcelona

Bardo Fassbender is Professor of International Law at the Bundeswehr University in Munich. He studied at the University of Bonn and holds an LL.M from Yale Law School and a Doctor iuris from the Humboldt University in Berlin. Before joining the Bundeswehr University, he taught in Berlin, St Gallen, and Munich (Ludwig Maximilians University). His principal fields of research are international law, United Nations law, German constitutional law, comparative constitutional law and theory, and the history of international and constitutional law. Among his many publications are the books UN Security Council and the Right of Veto: A Constitutional Perspective (The Hague/London/Boston, 1998), Der offene Bundesstaat: Studien zur auswartigen Gewalt und zur Volkerrechtssubjektivitat bundesstaatlicher Teilstaaten in Europa (Tubingen, 2007), and The United Nations Charter as the Constitution of the International Community (Leiden/Boston, 2009).

Knut Traisbach is Associate Professor of International Law (Adjunct) at the University of Barcelona and tutor for three international postgraduate programmes in International Affairs and Diplomacy organized by UNITAR and UOC. He also teaches human rights at ESADE Law School in Barcelona. He holds degrees from Humboldt University Berlin, the European University Institute and was a visiting researcher at Yale Law School. He has held positions as lecturer, programme director, researcher and course convenor in the areas of international law, human rights and international relations at various higher education and research institutions in Berlin, Florence, Venice and Barcelona. His main research interests include meaningful interdisciplinary and critical approaches to international law, human rights and international relations theory.

Contributors:

Bardo Fassbender
Knut Traisbach
Henry J. Steiner
Lynn Hunt
Kate Nash
Mark Goodale
David Dyzenhaus
Conor Gearty
Christian Reus-Smit
Basak Ãali
Jan Klabbers
Rosa Freedman
Ruth Houghton
Aryeh Neier
Jeremy Perelman
Hilary Charlesworth
Christine Chinkin
Bai Guimei
Martha C. Nussbaum
Fareda Banda
FrÃ©dÃ©ric MÃ©gret
Andrew Clapham
Yuval Shany
Mireille Delmas-Marty
Marie-BÃ©nÃ©dicte Dembour
Douglas A. Johnson
Kathryn Sikkink
Micheline Ishay