Deploying Cognitive Sociology to Advance Human Rights

Gregg, Benjamin

doi:10.1163/156913210x12459795840783

Cited by 6 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…33. For a pluralistic conception of human rights, and of the human rights project as an enduring variety of cognitive communities, sustained by a variety of learning processes, see Gregg (2010b). There I address some of the problems generated by pluralism.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Rights as Metaphor for Political Community beyond the Nation State

Gregg

2016

Critical Sociology

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One generally enjoys rights, if at all, then only as a member of a particular political community. The nation state’s territorial sovereignty precludes the possibility of human rights. I propose a ‘human rights state’ whose members seek the corresponding nation state’s embrace of human rights. It functions as a metaphor with ‘deontic power’, with each member carrying these deontic powers in a ‘human rights backpack’. Metaphorical thinking is more plausible than theology or metaphysics on the approach I adopt: social construction. Accordingly, all norms are human inventions and at best emerge through ongoing self-reflective politics: rejected or embraced on the basis of critical examination and justification. Creating justice begins with an act of imagination, envisioning better alternatives, and resisting taking for granted many aspects of the communities we are born into. Metaphorical thinking facilitates creating justice in this sense: limiting the sovereignty of the nation state to the extent necessary to allow for human rights.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Rights as Metaphor for Political Community beyond the Nation State

Gregg

2016

Critical Sociology

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“…When a group of batterers is taught not to hit in Hong Kong, this is presented as part of Confucian ideas of marriage" (Merry 2006, p. 220). On framing human rights more generally, see Gregg (2010Gregg ( ). 2004.…”

Section: Features Of Self-authorshipmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individuals as authors of human rights: not only addressees

Gregg

2010

Theor Soc

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I propose human rights as self-authored through a personality structure of "assertive selfhood." To that end I identify three features of self-authorship: emergent through collective political action; as a critical stance; and borne by nonidiosyncratic norms. So conceived, human rights require a field of recognition as a social structure supportive of claims to assertive selfhood. I show that the capacity to self-grant depends critically on the participant's personality structure as well as on the structure of some of the social institutions he or she inhabits. But like any political vision, the project for self-granted human rights has distinct limits, above all with respect to the many inequalities among potential self-authors.We have no evidence that human rights exist independently of human imagination and social constructions, which is to say: no evidence that humans are endowed with pre-political, universally valid rights a priori. Why anyone might hope for such evidence is obvious: it might endow the human-rights idea with moral objectivity and universal validity. At the same time it would relieve humans of the burden of moral invention (and what might weigh more heavily than providing for the moral welfare of all others?). Most efforts to provide such evidence claim a theological or metaphysical origin. They have never worked. This is still an issue because those efforts are again and again renewed instead of abandoned. But if, as I propose, Theor Soc (2010) 39:631-650

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At the Intersections: Supporting Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion on Campus—A Northern Ontario Experience

Drazenovich

Mazur

2022

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Deploying Cognitive Sociology to Advance Human Rights

Cited by 6 publications

References 36 publications

Human Rights as Metaphor for Political Community beyond the Nation State

Human Rights as Metaphor for Political Community beyond the Nation State

Individuals as authors of human rights: not only addressees

At the Intersections: Supporting Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion on Campus—A Northern Ontario Experience

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