Sociology and human rights: confrontations, evasions and new engagements

Hynes, Patricia; Lamb, Michele; Short, Damien; Waites, Matthew

doi:10.1080/13642987.2010.512125

Cited by 63 publications

(48 citation statements)

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“…The sociologist Michael Freeman (2011) considers that one task of social science is to bring human rights supporters and lawyers back to reality, by connecting abstract notions of rights into their social contexts, structures and meanings, where normative philosophy, law and social science meet. Woodiwiss (2005) and Hynes et al (2011) also contend that sociology can analyse the complex meanings and relevance of human rights in numerous social processes and relationships. Freeman (2011:118) believes that divisions between social science and philosophy, which attempt to "purify" the disciplines, have advantages but also costs.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Young Children’s Human Rights: a sociological analysis

Alderson¹

2012

Int J Child Rights

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Children tend to be missing from the literature on human rights. Sociology can help to fill the gap by providing evidence about the importance and benefits of recognising children's human rights, the dangers of not doing so, and joint rights-promoting work by adults and children. However, sociology has paid relatively little attention to human rights, and to the related topics of the Holocaust, human nature, real bodies, universal principles and moral imperatives. This paper examines splits in sociology around a central absence, which could partly explain these omissions. Then it considers how inter-disciplinary approaches and critical realism can help to theorise and validate "the inherent dignity and...the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family". The youngest children's rights illuminate meanings in all human rights, which depend less on the rational person approach than on recognising human nature, vulnerability and solidarity interacting with social structures.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Young Children’s Human Rights: a sociological analysis

Alderson¹

2012

Int J Child Rights

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“…Such sociological research is now gathering pace. Indeed, the British Sociological Association now has a 'Sociology of Rights' study group, from which has already emerged a major contribution to the subfield entitled 'Sociology and Human Rights: New Engagements' (Hynes, Lamb, Short, and Waites 2011).…”

Section: Sociological Insightsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Researching and studying human rights: interdisciplinary insight

Short¹

2016

Contemporary Challenges in Securing Human Rights

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Since 1948, the study of human rights has been dominated by legal scholarship that has sought to investigate the development of human rights law, emerging jurisprudence, regional systems, the decisions and recommendations of human rights mechanisms and institutions and to a lesser extent the 'compliance gaps' between state commitments and actions. Even so, in all of these spheres there are elements that cannot be fully understood through a purely legal lens, moreover, if we understand 'human rights' more broadly, and look into the practical world of human rights work and human rights discourse, advocacy and activism, then we need to go beyond legal analysis. Indeed, to understand the world of human rights in both theory and practice requires interdisciplinary insight, as it covers an enormous range of social, political, economic and environmental issues. In this chapter, I will outline the contributions of two disciplines that were slow to contribute to the field of human rights but which offer vitally important insights that can guide both academic research and human rights advocacy.

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“…Several sociologists of human rights have called for greater engagement with the role of agency (Hynes et al, 2010;Turner 2002), and Kennedy and Riga's article responds to this call, arguing for a sociology of human rights that appreciates the social location in which individual actors are embedded as providing a specific articulation, interpretation and actualisation of human rights in practice. The empirical evidence for their arguments lies in the experiences of a relatively small group of political elites and lawyers advising on US policy for ending the conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina in the mid-1990s.…”

Section: Introducing the Articlesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Stimulated by this, Morris (2006) argued that a sociological contribution should be developed through a 'theory of practice' rather than a search for foundations. The recent volume Sociology and Human Rights: New Engagements continued this momentum forward and our introductory essay for that volume provided a preliminary mapping of the field (Hynes et al, 2010(Hynes et al, , 2011.…”

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confidence: 99%

Editorial Foreword

et al. 2012

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If sociology is to be revitalised to address power, inequalities and resistance in the contemporary global context, then the development of the sociology of human rights is an urgent necessity. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) proclaimed in 1948 that 'recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world' (United Nations, 1948). Since that Declaration was made, the governmental institutionalisation and cultural circulation of human rights have increased the utilisation of such rights in many contexts, such that the need for a dynamic sociology of human rights should be increasingly apparent. In this foreword to The Sociology of Human Rights we first introduce human rights and existing sociological research on human rights before outlining the Special Issue's key themes and the articles in turn.

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Sociology and human rights: confrontations, evasions and new engagements

Cited by 63 publications

References 0 publications

Young Children’s Human Rights: a sociological analysis

Young Children’s Human Rights: a sociological analysis

Researching and studying human rights: interdisciplinary insight

Editorial Foreword

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