1st Edition

Wronging Rights? Philosophical Challenges for Human Rights

Edited By Aakash Singh Rathore, Alex Cistelecan Copyright 2011
    224 Pages
    by Routledge India

    224 Pages
    by Routledge India

    This book brings together two of the most powerful and relevant philosophical critiques of human rights: the post-colonialist and the post-Althusserian, its balanced internal structure not just throwing these two critiques together, but actually forcing them to enter into confrontation and dialogue.

    The book is organised in three parts: at each end, the post-colonialist and the post-Althusserian critiques are represented by some of their main thinkers (Ratna Kapur, G. C. Spivak, Upendra Baxi; Slavoj Žižek, Jacques Rancière), while in the middle, an American intermezzo (Richard Rorty, Wendy Brown) functions as a genuine Derridian supplement: always already contaminating the purity of the two theoretical schools, preventing their enclosure and, hence, fuelling and complicating further their mutual confrontation. As in any authentic dialogue, the introduction and the conclusion each claim victory for one of the sides by changing the very terms and rules of the dialogue, picturing it as a confrontation between emancipatory universalism and inefficient particularism (from the perspective of the post-Althusserians), or as a split between hypocrisy and truth (from the perspective of the post-colonialists).

    Acknowledgements. Introduction 1. Which Critique of Human Rights? Alex Cistelecan Part One: Post-colonial Perspectives 2. Human Rights in the 21st Century: Take a Walk on the Dark Side Ratna Kapur 3. Critiquing Rights: The Politics of Identity and Difference Upendra Baxi 4. Righting Wrongs Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak Part Two: An American Interlude 5. Human Rights, Rationality, and Sentimentality Richard Rorty 6. ‘The Most We Can Hope For . . .’: Human Rights and the Politics of Fatalism Wendy Brown Part Three: Post-Althusserian Perspectives 7. Against Human Rights Slavoj Žižek 8. Who is the Subject of the Rights of Man? Jacques Rancière 9. Conclusion: Wronging Rights? Re-evaluating the Alternatives Aakash Singh Rathore. About the Editors. Notes on Contributors. Index.

    Biography

    Aakash Singh Rathore is Research Professor at Luiss University, Rome.

    Alex Cistelecan is a doctoral candidate at Luiss University, Rome.