From History of Human Rights

Human rights, however, are but one path to implement a particular conception of social justice. In fact, the idea of human rights — the notion that all human beings, simply because they are human, have certain inalienable rights that they may exercise against society and their rulers — was alien in all major pre-modern Western and non-Western societies.

Nearly all pre-modern societies saw rulers as obliged to govern wisely and for the common good. This mandate, however, arose from divine commandment, natural law, tradition, or contingent political arrangements. It did not rest on the rights (entitlement) of all human beings to be ruled justly. In a well-ordered society, the people were to benefit from the political obligations of rulers. But the people had no natural or human rights that could be exercised against unjust rulers.

Human rights entered the mainstream of political theory and practice in 17th-century Europe. John Locke's Second Treatise of Government, published in 1688, presented the first fully developed theory of natural rights.

Locke's theory begins with a pre-social state of nature in which equal individuals have natural rights to life, liberty, and estates. In the absence of government, however, these rights are of little value. They are almost impossible to protect by individual action, and disputes over rights are themselves a powerful cause of conflict. Therefore people form societies, and societies establish governments, to enable themselves to enjoy their natural rights.

Government, according to Locke, is based on a social contract between rulers and ruled. Citizens are obliged to obey only if the government protects their human rights, which are morally prior to and above the claims and interests of the government. Government is legitimate to the extent that it systematically protects and furthers the enjoyment of the human rights of its citizens.

The idea of human rights initially was associated with the middle classes. Against the claims of high birth and traditional privilege, the rising bourgeoisie of early modern Europe advanced political claims based on natural human equality and inalienable natural rights. The bourgeois political revolution, however, had severe limits. For example, Locke, despite the apparent universalism of the language of natural rights, actually developed a theory for the protection of the rights of propertied European males. Women, along with "savages", servants, and wage laborers of either sex, were not recognized as rights- holders.

But once the notion of equal and inalienable rights held by all was advanced, the burden of proof shifted to those who would deny such rights to others. Claims of privilege could be rationalized by, for example, arguments of racial superiority or assertions of superior acquired virtue. Privilege could be, and regularly was, protected through force. But having accepted the idea of human rights, dominant elites found it increasingly difficult to escape the logic of human rights. Many of the great political struggles of the past two centuries have revolved around expanding the recognized subjects of human rights. Efforts to extend the right to vote beyond a small, propertied elite provoked intense controversy in most European countries in the 19th century. The claims of working men for fair wages, for the right to organize themselves, and for safe and humane working conditions led to often violent political conflict until World War I in most of Europe, and much longer than that in the United States. Ending the systematic denial of human rights inherent in colonialism was a major global political issue during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. And struggles to eliminate discrimination based on race and gender have been prominent in many countries over the past 30 years.

In all of these situations, dispossessed groups used the rights they did enjoy to press for legal recognition of the rights being denied them. For example, workers used their votes, along with what freedom of the press and freedom of association were allowed them, to press for eliminating legal discrimination based on wealth or property. They also demanded new rights that would bring true liberty, equality, and security to working men (and later women). Racial, ethnic, and religious minorities, women, and peoples suffering under colonial rule have likewise used what rights were allowed them to press for full recognition and participation as equal members of society. In each case, the essence of their argument was that we, no less than you, are human beings. As such, we are entitled to the same basic rights as you and to equal concern and respect from the state. And in each case, acceptance of such arguments has led to radical social and political changes.

In the past decade, the revolutionary force of the demand for human rights has become unusually clear. Across the globe, regimes that had cynically manipulated the language of human rights have been sent packing by citizens that insisted on taking human rights seriously. The spread of human rights is neither natural nor inevitable. Regression is possible, even likely in some cases. The world's remaining repressive dictatorships may prove quite long lived. But the lesson of the past decade has proved that wherever people are given the chance to choose, they choose internationally recognized human rights.

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