The quest for cultural accommodations in a rule of law context : a right-based approach

Abstract

This thesis examines the relation between human rights and culture. It holds that culture is a quality of the individual seriously affecting the capacity to utilize rights and freedoms in a way that is effective and meaningful to the right-holder. Culture does not primarily connote a set o f community-oriented concerns as much as it purports to tell us something about what people, in fact, try to be and do when they exercise their rights and freedoms. It also informs us about the nature of some obstacles or barriers that undeniably impede these endeavours. This reality, it is argued, calls for a sustained shift of focus onto a range of issues that still stands in need o f serious attention and redress in the theory and practice of human rights. Those arc the issues that shall be of main concern in this study. The introductory part consists of four sections. I first introduce the background to the thesis and then articulate the main elements of my argument. Thereafter follows a comment on the reasons for my choice of method. I then briefly discuss the cosmopolitan assumptions central to my approach. The fourth section, finally, presents an outline of the various chapters.