The universality of human rights against cultural relativism: between fiction and reality

This paper aspires to defend the universality of human rights against cultural relativism. The relativism claims that human rights are not universal enough, but even if they were, it would not imply they should always prevail over other moral or legal norms. This paper advocates the opposite: the human right corpus is universal enough because it has been drafted and approved by representatives of all cultures which are dominant in the current globalized world in the context of actual or latent international political conflicts. The intercultural consensus on human rights is overlapping, i.e., the human rights corpus contributes to realizing the comprehensive doctrines of good that are held in all participating cultures. Although the consensus on human rights does not inevitably lead to a uniform moral and legal practice, it also plays a crucial role in a purely declaratory level – it creates a common language through which various cultures can conceptualize their different moral and legal attitudes. Therefore, the language of human rights should take at least prima facie precedence over other moral systems whether stemming from a religion or a particular moral or political philosophy.