Today it is usually not long before a problem gets expressed as a human rights issue. Indeed, human rights law continues to gain increasing attention internationally, and must move quickly in order to keep up with a social world that changes so rapidly.
This Very Short Introduction, in
its second edition, brings the issue of human rights up to date, considering the current controversies surrounding the movement. Discussing torture and arbitrary detention in the context of counter terrorism, Andrew Clapham also considers new challenges to human rights in the context of privacy,
equality and the right to health. Looking at the philosophical justification for rights, the historical origins of human rights and how they are formed in law, Clapham explains what our human rights actually are, what they might be, and where the human rights movement is heading.
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Preface
1. Looking at rights
2. Historical development and contemporary concerns
3. Human rights foreign policy and the role of the United Nations
4. Torture
5. Deprivations of life and liberty
6. Balancing rights - free speech and privacy
7. Food, education, health,
housing, and work
8. Discrimination and equality
9. The death penalty
Final remarks
References
Further reading
Annex: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Index
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Andrew Clapham is Professor of Public International Law at the Graduate Institute of International Studies, Geneva. Before he joined the Graduate Institute of International Studies Institute in 1997, he was the Representative of Amnesty International to the United Nations in New York. He was
the Director of the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights from 2006 until 2014. His publications include The 1949 Geneva Conventions: A Commentary, co-edited with Paola Gaeta and Marco Sassòli, (OUP 2015) and The Oxford Handbook of International Law in Armed Conflict,
co-edited with Paola Gaeta (OUP 2014).
Special Features
New to this Edition
- Explains the scope of human rights today, and how they are used in both national and international law.
- Looks at the past, present, and future of human rights, and questions whether they are under threat as they come to be seen by some as obstacles to peace,
development and security.
- Provides an introduction that is completely up-to-date, accounting for recent national and world events.
- Discusses the role of human rights in law, philosophy, and politics, to reveal the role played by human rights in the contemporary world.
- Brings the Bush
Administration's approach to the war on terror up to date by referencing Obama's reversal of some policies.
- Accounts for new issues of restrictions on speech and press freedom in the wake of the emerging concerns for privacy and cyberbullying.
- Acknowledges issues related to climate change and
the debate over "climate justice" and "climate refugees" that have generated a new dimension to the human rights debate.
- Provides a more intense discussion of hate speech, islamophobia, and what is referred to as "defamation of religion" in light of the situations in Libya and Syria.
- Part of
the bestselling Very Short Introductions series - over seven million copies sold worldwide.
