LAW 507

Human Rights and Moral Questions

Law School

Recommended for route(s):

[ Litigation ] Criminal Law: General

General course Description:

The proliferation of human rights in the discourse of international justice has raised a number of important questions in both moral and legal theory. What are human rights? How should they be conceptualized? Who ought to bear the duties associated with them? Can their protection justify military interventions into sovereign states? This course will cover topics in moral and legal theory surrounding human rights. The course has three main focuses. The first concerns the question of what these rights are. The second focus is on the various substantive moral justifications for the protection of human rights. The third is on the moral issues raised by the dominance of human rights in international law and relations: can any rights be universal? How are these rights to be framed in the light of cross-cultural values and claims about cultural dominance? A theme throughout will be the connections between these questions. The way we answer the question
of what human rights are, and how they can be morally justified, will substantially determine the way we assign duties in respect of them.

Course Style: A Substantive course teaches the law, theory, and policy in a particular area of law

Course Frequency: Varied, check w/ registrar

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