Ideological (Mis)Use of Human Rights - David Chandler

128 DAVID CHANDLER
7. In what ways do human rights approaches challenge traditional understandings of war? Is war more
or less permissible under human rights frameworks?
8. Are human rights interventions subject to the same strategic and instrumental processes of guidance
as more interest-based or traditional policy interventions?
GROUP DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. How can we explain the rise of human rights frameworks and understandings? Is this purely the
exercise of power interests? Does it refl ect the congruence of interests and ethical outlooks?
2. Will human rights approaches result in a more ethical or a more peaceful or a more equal world?
3. Do human rights constrain power or facilitate power?
FURTHER READING
Chandler, D. (2006). From Kosovo to Kabul: Human Rights and International Intervention (2nd edn). London:
Pluto.
A study of human rights approaches as a challenge to universal frameworks of formal rights protection.
Douzinas, C. (2007). Human Rights and Empire: The Political Philosophy of Cosmopolitanism. London: Routledge
Cavendish.
An analysis of the double-edged nature of human rights as a tool both to challenge power and to enforce it.
Duffi eld, M. (2007). Development, Security and Unending War: Governing the World of Peoples. Cambridge:
Polity.
An analysis of human rights frameworks in relation to the use of development interventions as mechanisms of
international domination.
Ignatieff, M. (1998). The Warrior’s Honor: Ethnic War and the Modern Conscience. New York: Chatto & Windus.
A study of the challenge that human rights approaches pose for the traditional humanitarianism of the ICRC.
Laïdi, Z. (1998). A World without Meaning: The Crisis of Meaning in International Relations. London: Routledge.
An analysis of the problems that Western governments have in developing clear foreign policy goals and the
shift from interests to ethics.
Sellars, K. (2002). The Rise and Rise of Human Rights. Stroud: Sutton.
A history of the development of human rights approaches during the Second World War and the US-led revival
of human rights concerns in the 1970s.
Zolo, D. (2002). Invoking Humanity: War, Law and Global Order. London: Continuum.
An analysis of the challenge that human rights approaches pose to international law and the restrictions on war.
WEB LINKS
http://www.counterpunch.org CounterPunch. An online newsletter of critical journalism and comment.
http://www.dissentmagazine.org Dissent. A quarterly magazine of politics and culture.
http://www.newleftreview.org New Left Review. A bi-monthly independent journal.
http://www.spiked-online.com Spiked. An independent website with journalistic commentary and analysis.
http://www.zmag.org/zmag Z Magazine. An independent monthly magazine with critical analysis.
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