ITRL 140: Human Rights Theory

Number of Sections: 1 | Day and Time: Tuesday & Thursday (7:30-9:00 AM ICT)

Course Description

This course will introduce you to enduring and emergent issues in the theory of human rights. It will begin by situating human rights within the history of colonialism, which undergirds the ongoing debates surrounding universalism and cultural relativism, individual rights and collective rights, and reconciliation after genocide. 

In the middle of this course, we will examine human rights case studies from South and Southeast Asia, Africa, and Central America. These provide opportunities to trace the junctures between human rights theory and norms, laws, institutions, and sociocultural groups. The salience and promise of human rights depend on their grounded instantiations, and thus the theory of  human rights will never be too far from its practice.

Towards the end of the course, we will explore a variety of emerging approaches to human rights. These will be discussed as a ‘pluriversality’ of possibilities that are yet to be formulated and enacted. By the end of this course, students will be ready to engage with and navigate the rapidly transforming terrain of human rights, in theory and in practice.