Human Rights : A Political and Cultural Critique.

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- 1 Human Rights as a Metaphor -- The Metaphor of Human Rights -- The Grand Narrative of Human Rights -- The Metaphor of the Savage -- The Metaphor of the Victim -- The Metaphor of the Savior -- 2 Human Rights as an Ideology -- The Authors of Human Rights -- A Holy Trinity: Liberalism, Democracy, and Human Rights -- The Conventional Doctrinalists -- The Conceptualizers -- The Cultural Pluralists -- Political Strategists and Instrumentalists -- 3 Human Rights and the African Fingerprint -- Africa in a Rights Universe -- Human Rights in Precolonial Africa -- The Dialectic of Rights and Duties -- The Duty/Rights Conception -- Whither Africa? -- 4 Human Rights, Religion, and Proselytism -- The Problem of Religious Rights -- Demonizing the "Other -- Proselytization in Africa -- The Legal Invisibility of Indigenous Religions -- Ideals Versus Realities -- The Moral Equivalency of Cultures -- 5 The African State, Human Rights, and Religion -- Religion and African Statehood -- Identity Disorientation -- The Culture of Silence and Postcolonialism -- Counterpenetration as a Farce -- Benin Returns to Its Roots -- 6 The Limits of Rights Discourse -- South Africa: The Human Rights State -- The Rights Framework as an ANC Strategy: A Snapshot of Apartheid -- The Evolution of a Rights Approach -- The Compromise of the Interim Constitution -- The 1996 Constitution as a Normative Continuum -- The ANC's Gradualist Rights Approach -- Land Reform as a Central Plank of the Struggle -- Women in Post-Apartheid South Africa -- The Status and Orientation of Post-Apartheid Courts -- Humanizing the Instruments of Coercion -- Rights Discourse-Not a Panacea -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Index -- Acknowledgments.

Human Rights: A Political and Cultural Critique provides a bracing and controversial analysis of the scope of human rights and lays the groundwork for a multicultural and more universal understanding of these rights.

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Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2024. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.