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177 Human Rights Research Topics: Bright Ideas List 2023

Do you have a college research project or thesis on human rights and have been wondering how to prepare a good paper? You need a number of things, such as good research, analytical, and writing skills. However, the first step is getting the right topic. This is very challenging for most students, but we are here to help. This post provides a 177 human rights topics list that you can count on for the best grade. We will also tell you how to craft a great university human rights dissertation.

A Brief about Human Rights

Human rights are the basic freedoms and rights that belong to all persons in the globe, starting from birth to death. These rights apply irrespective of where you are, personal beliefs, or the way you decide to live your life. They cannot be taken away but can be restricted in some cases, such as if you break the law.

The basic rights are anchored on shared values, such as dignity, fairness, equality, independence, and respect. They are all protected by law. Because of their wide applications in areas such as the justice system and employment-related topics, you can expect to get many related school assignments and projects on it.

How to Write a Good Human Rights Thesis or Dissertation

Before we can look at the best human rights thesis topics, let’s look at the best process of writing it. This can be divided into six main steps:

Identify the study topic in line with your class teacher/professor’s recommendations. You can use our list of basic human rights topics that comes shortly after this guide.
Research the topic well to ensure it has ample resources. Then, identify the main points that will be covered during the study. It will be good to think about the entire dissertation right from the start because all parts are interconnected.
Develop a thesis statement. This is very important because it will be tested after analyzing the results.
Develop a good structure for the thesis. This is the outline that will guide you on what to include at what point. Carefully look at the current recommendation from your school. One of the best outlines you might want to consider include:

Introduction Literature review Methodology Results Analysis and discussion Conclusion Bibliography

Prepare the first draft.
Write the final draft by redefining the first draft. At this point, it will be a good idea to consider editing services from experts.

Next, we will highlight the main topics that you should consider in human rights. However, we’d like to remind that you can only pay for thesis and not waste your time over a tone of assignments.

Argumentative Human Rights Topics

Is violation of human rights allowed during times of war?
Circumcision of infants: Does it violate their human rights?
Should women and men have varying rights?
What is the link between human rights and traditions?
Capital punishment: Should it be considered a violation of human rights?
Right for freedom to education: Should it be made available for all?
Social media networking services: Should they guarantee privacy for all the clients.
Is the US policy on immigration discriminatory?
Interest of states: Should it take precedence over an individual’s human rights?
Developed countries have a duty to promote human rights in the developing states.
Pet ownership should be considered a universal human right.
Childhood concept differs from one culture to another: Should the notion of child labor also vary?
What are inappropriate ways of fighting for human rights?
Development of a country: Does it depend on the country’s defense of human rights?
From a human rights perspective, which is the most important amendment to the US constitution?
Comparing Apartheid and Holocaust: Has justice been done for the victims.
Human rights in the 21 st century: Is the globe doing enough to address the crisis in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia and Afghanistan?
What are the most important lessons on human rights from World War II?
Human rights violations in West Bank: Has the globe done enough?

International Human Rights Topics

What does the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccines tell us about human rights internationally?
A review of cases of human rights in the United States between the 1950 and 2000.
Analyze the impacts of discrimination based on color and race.
A thematic review of modern human rights movements.
Trace the evolution of human rights starting from the ancient times to the age of globalization.
What is the relationship between human rights and peace in a country? A case study of the Netherlands.
Disability in the UK is under attack: Discuss.
Who should people running away from human rights violations turn to?
Is it appropriate to deny human rights on the basis of religion and gender?
Violation of human rights in North Korea: How is the developed world preparing to tackle it?
Violation of human rights in Venezuela: Should the United States get involved?
The right to stay silent in a court of law: How is this likely to affect the accused person?
What are the best remedies for addressing violations of women’s rights in the Middle East?
Will the world ever get to a point where people will live without worrying about human rights violations?
What makes it so difficult to introduce gun control in the United States?
Who should be held responsible for cases of mass shootings in schools?

Controversial Human Rights Topics

What are the similarities and differences between human and civil rights?
Evaluate the violation of human rights in Syria in the 21 st century.
Police-related human rights violation: How can we prevent it?
Should prisoners have a right to vote?
Assisted euthanasia is a violation of human rights: Discuss.
Should persons who try to take their own lives be charged in a court of law?
What is the best way to punish states for violating human rights?
Countries arming themselves with nuclear weapons are readying to violate human rights.
How effective are laws on domestic violence in the UK?
All cases of human abuses in history should be tried and concluded.
Is the UN doing enough to protect human rights?
Holocaust: Is it possible for the world to heal completely?
Do you think that the Rwanda Genocide could have been avoided?
It is time to act: How do you think the global community should handle the problem of immigrants trying to cross from Africa into Europe?
The hidden danger of not addressing bullying in school.
Is disciplining a child a violation of human rights?
Are correctional facilities doing enough to correct the behavior of inmates?
Is imprisonment enough to punish murder criminals?
Making a case for life imprisonment and the death penalty for murder criminals.
Is abortion a violation of human rights?

Human Rights Discussion Topics

What is your view on the famous revolt of the Cockroach People?
Discuss the outcomes of the LGBT movements in the 20 th century.
A deeper look into civil rights movements from Malcolm X point of view.
Interaction between Japan and China during WWII: How did it impact human rights issues in the two states?
Discuss the biggest human rights violations in South Africa after Apartheid.
UN Refugee program: How does it help enhance refugees’ welfare across the globe?
French Revolution and human rights: A thematic review.
Human rights in medieval Europe.
Human Rights Act in New Zealand in 1993: What is its significance?
Which human rights did women across the globe find hard to access in the 20 th century?
Police brutality in Brazil: Are the efforts taken by the government enough?
Discuss transgender rights in Europe.
A review of transgender human rights issues in the United States.
Disability rights in the UK.
Comparing disability policies in the US and India.
Racial profiling by police.
What are the roots of racism in the United States?
Review the Trail of Broken Treaties.
A deeper look at the Chattel Slavery in the Colonial America.
Review the African-American male experience.
Reviewing the history of the Bill of Rights in the United States.
Analyzing the American Indian Movement: How does it compare with other human rights movements?
Human rights in modern cinema: How are whites and people of color-treated?

Interesting Civil Rights Topics

Black Power Movement: How did it impact the Black Lives Matter in 2020 and 2021?
Are the 20 th Century civil rights movements sustainable?
Comparing women rights movements in 2020 and the 20 th century.
How did Martin Luther influence the civil rights approaches that came after him?
Comparing the scientific Revolution, Reformation and Renaissance movements’ impacts on western thought.
Protestant Reformation: Discuss how Catholic Church’s corruption and crusaders of war contributed towards its formation.
A closer look at the human rights movements during the Industrial Revolution of between 1760 and 1840.
How did the teachings of the American Revolution help the secession movement and Civil War?
How did Teddy Roosevelt impact the progressive movement?
The impact of communism impacts world history.
The location of a civil movement is the most important thing in its success: Discuss.
What made people start nationalist movement in Prussia?
Discuss the results of anti-nationalist movements in New York.
Female and Islam oppression on the globe.
Reinventing a revolution: A closer look at the Zapatista Movement.
What is the link between music, protest, and justice?
Confederate Flag: Is it a symbol of oppression?
Review the voting rights of 1965.
The West Memphis Three.

Special Human Rights Debate Topics

Women rights in the first half and second half 20 th century.
Legalization of same sex marriage and its impact on global fights for human rights.
Human rights movements in the US and their impact on federal policies.
International human rights movements: How has it influenced the UK judicial policies?
Responsibility to protect: How is it related to the issue of human rights?
Suffrage rights in ancient Greek: A holistic review.
Human rights presentation in the philosophy of enlightenment.
Human rights violations during the First World War.
What are lessons did we learn from Hitler and Holocaust during WWII.
These five reasons are the main causes of human rights violations in the 21 st century.
The main causes of gender disparity in the US.
Comparing the state of human rights in the UK and Qatar.
Do you think the bible violates human rights?
Environmental racism: What are the main effects?
The importance of the judiciary in protecting human rights.
Women rights in the Roman Empire.
Segregation is a violation of human rights.
Discussing critical human rights issues in India.

Unique Human Rights Topics for Research

The collapse of the Soviet Union and Rise of Communism in Russia.
Comparing the Pan-African movement to the 20 th -century cultural nationalism of Latin America.
A review of the Hong Kong Umbrella Movement’s goals and methods.
Abolition of death penalty: Why it is a major human rights issue.
Popularity of social media and its impact on human rights. A closer review of Arab countries in North Africa.
International Calvinism: What was the impact on European Culture?
Why do other countries not intervene in North Korea where massive abuses of human rights have been reported?
A statistical review of human trafficking in the 20 th century.
How can a person as an individual help to promote human rights?
Utilitarianism contravenes human rights.
Human rights institutions and their efforts in protecting human rights in Africa.
Military actions to protect human rights: Does it make sense?
Black Lives Matter Movement protests: What does the movement say about human rights today?
Does the UK constitution comprehensively cover the issue of human rights?
Global manufacturing: How has it impacted the rights of workers?
Has the International Labor Organization done enough to protect the plight of workers on the globe?
How does poverty impact human rights in developing countries?

PhD Topics in Human Rights

A review of the parts of the globe with the worst cases of human rights violation.
How does the internet promote human trafficking? A thematic review.
A comprehensive review of factors that impact the outcome of different trials in a court of law.
Legitimate forms of the death penalty.
What factors prevent people from getting justice? A literature review.
A comprehensive review of the impacts of legalizing drug use.
What factors prevent equal representation of women in top leadership roles in the developing world?
What are the major problems faced by LGBT couples? Propose possible solutions.
Racial profiling by police: A case study of Mexico.
A comparative review of human rights policies of three countries of your choice in Europe.

Need Assistance in Writing Your Research Papers on Human Rights?

One thing we must indicate is that writing a dissertation is never easy. It is the last and biggest academic project before graduating. Therefore, it is very important to get it right. The best way to achieve this is by seeking the help of a dissertation writing service.

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100s of Free Human Rights Law Dissertation Topics and Titles

Published by Grace Graffin at January 6th, 2023 , Revised On May 17, 2024

Introduction

Writing a dissertation is a long process that requires good research skills and decent expertise in the field. Depending on the researcher’s university’s academic requirements, some different prerequisites and requirements should be fulfilled before writing the dissertation (thesis).

For instance, the supervisor may ask the researcher to provide a dissertation proposal with topics based on current legal trends. Once the dissertation topic is approved, the researcher will have to provide the supervisor with the research aim and problem statement alongside a good methodology .

Human Rights Law Dissertation Topics

Topic 1: how the social rights of immigrants are protected under international human rights law: a primary investigation in the uk.

Research Aim: The research will aim to investigate the protection of the social rights of immigrants given in international law in the UK. Many human rights contracts clearly forbid discrimination centred on state origin and want states to guarantee that immigrants’ human rights are treated equally. Moreover, immigrants, like other particularly vulnerable groups, have been granted additional safeguards under international law to address situations in which their rights are most in danger, such as employment. The research will focus on the immigrants and their social rights in the UK.

Topic 2: The role of social media apps in spreading awareness among youth about human right

Research Aim: The research will aim to explore the part social media plays in spreading awareness of human rights among the young. In today’s world, people use social media more than reading newspapers, and social media has also helped many people get justice. Young or old, every age group is active on social platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc., and these apps have brought a new way to learn things. So, this study will specifically focus on social media apps and how they are contributing in spreading awareness about human rights among people.

Topic 3: What obstacles do international human rights policies encounter in terms of implementation? An academic review

Research Aim: The research will aim to investigate the challenges and problems international human rights face during implementation. There are many factors that make it difficult to implement the policies in a country or an organisation. There should be solutions to the problems and challenges in the implementation of international human rights. This study will explore and explain the challenges and try to give solutions to tackle the challenges.

Topic 4: How are the rights of men being violated in the society? A human right perspective

Research Aim: The research aims to find the reason men’s rights are violated in society. Men’s rights are violated in society more often now. Men also get raped, beaten, killed without anyone questioning the abuser. Even after getting hit by a woman, people blame the man. Violence against males is a severe violation of human rights. The government’s role is to guard males from abuse, including domestic violence.

Topic 5: Define the rights to ethics, religion and life in the context of human rights law in US

Research Aim: The research will aim to define the basic human rights to culture, religion and life in the human rights law in the US. The research will explain the fundamental rights given to human beings, freedom of speech, and a thorough explanation of the human rights law article. The study will also describe the acts that violate fundamental human rights.

Topic 6: Investigating the impact of nationalist movements and ideologies on the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in India

Research Aim: The study investigates how nationalist movements and ideologies impact the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in India. It will also assess the role of governments in promoting or suppressing minority rights in such contexts.

Topic 7: Examining the rights and legal status of stateless persons who are forced to flee their countries of origin

Research Aim: The study aims to examine the rights and legal status of stateless persons who are forced to flee their countries of origin. This research will focus on the challenges they face in accessing protection and assistance in the absence of citizenship.

Topic 8: Investigating the tension between national security concerns and the protection of refugee rights

This research explores the tension between national security concerns and the protection of refugee rights. It discusses the context of border control policies, immigration detention, and anti-terrorism measures.

COVID-19 Human Rights Law Research Topics

Impacts of coronavirus on human rights.

Research Aim: This study will highlight the impacts of Coronavirus on human rights.

International human rights law and COVID-19

Research Aim: This study will address the current pandemic crisis and international human rights law status in response to COVID-19.

United Nations on human rights during COVID-19

Research Aim: This study will review the United Nations’ response to human rights for protecting human health and rights during COVID-19.

The role of National Human Rights Institutions during COVId-19

Research Aim: This study will highlight the role of National Human Rights Institutions during COVID-19.

Dissertation Topics in Human Rights Law and Society

Human Rights is an important area of the law inherent to all human beings, regardless of their race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, and other status forms. Human Rights can be seen as the most significant law area that has taken place since the end of the Second World War.

According to Rehman, even though the world has evolved over the years, human rights continue to be constrained and limited. Research in this particular area of the law is important to know its weaknesses and limitations in the 21st century.

This document contains a wide range of dissertation topics based on the area of Human Rights or Fundamental Rights. These topics provided by our PhD-qualified writers are based on the current legal trends, which tend to assess different topics related to Human Rights in the 21st Century.

Most of the themes provided have never been researched before, and a desk-based or comparative analysis approach is used to provide a meaningful contribution to human rights.

Some topics are aimed at the thesis, which should implement an international aspect of Human Rights. On the other hand, the other topics are focused on specific jurisdictions such as the United Kingdom or the European Union.

You can also start your dissertation by requesting a brief research proposal from our writers on any of these topics, including an introduction to the topic, research question , aim and objectives, literature review , and the proposed research methodology to be conducted. Let us know if you need any help in getting started.

Check our dissertation example to get an idea of how to structure your dissertation .

Review the step-by-step guide on how to write your own dissertation here .

Topic 1: An assessment of life imprisonment under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Research Aim: The research will be based on fundamental rights, more specifically on the European Convention on Human Rights. The research will use a desk-based approach to assess Article 3 of the ECHR, which prohibits inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment. The research critically assesses how the EU Member States deal with life imprisonment based on their domestic legislation.

Topic 2: Should prisoners be allowed to exercise their right to vote in a democratic society?

Research Aim: Disfranchisement is known as the revocation of the fundamental right to vote in a democratic society. The research will assess if there is a need to make the right to vote a basic fundamental right that can be exercised by prisoners. The research will use be a comparative assessment based on different jurisdictions.

Topic 3: The European Court Of Human Rights and its effectiveness amongst the EU member states

Research Aim: The research will assess the role of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in safeguarding the rights of EU Citizens. The research will evaluate the EU Supremacy and its authority over the EU Member States regarding human rights. In this line, the research will demonstrate how The ECtHR should balance the EU Law’s fundamental rights and the Member State’s Constitution on fundamental rights.

Topic 4: The link between human rights and same-sex marriage

Research Aim: The Universal Declaration on Human Rights recognises same-sex marriage as a basic right to marriage. However, it can be seen that most countries do not recognise this right. The research will assess different jurisdictions where same-sex marriage is considered legal to enforce this right amongst the signatory countries.

Topic 5: Assessment of human rights in the workplace

Research Aim: Basic Human Rights, such as protection from slavery or inhuman treatment, are available under the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. However, the research will assess human rights’ employment, such as fair treatment, equal pay, and minimum wage. The research will use a comparative analysis to evaluate how different jurisdictions view human rights regarding employment.

Topic 6: The right to life and death penalty in the 21st century

Research Aim: The fundamental right to life is enshrined under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. On the other hand, the death penalty seems to be against the right to life and the protection of life preservation. The research will assess how to strike a balance between the right to life and capital punishment.

Topic 7: Should the death penalty be reinstated in the United Kingdom post-Brexit?

Research Aim: The 13th Protocol of the European Convention on Human Rights has prohibited the restoration of the United Kingdom’s death penalty since 2004. The research will assess if the United Kingdom should reinstate the death penalty after Brexit. Since the United Kingdom will leave the European Union, it will no longer be a party to the convention and will be able to reinstate the death penalty.

Topic 8: Social media and the right to hold an opinion

Research Aim: The research will assess if the current Freedom of Speech and the Right to hold an opinion is adequate to be used online. The research will demonstrate a need to reform the Universal Declaration on Human Rights for online use.

Topic 9: Should Article 14 of the Human Rights Act 1998 be amended to implement more protected characteristics?

Research Aim: Article 14 of the Human Rights 1998 has a minimal number of protected characteristics. Following Brexit, the United Kingdom nationals may lose the protection of the European Convention on Human Rights. In this line, the research will assess whether there is a need to review Article 14 of the Human Rights Act 1998.

Topic 10: Should Human Rights be ignored when taking counter-terrorism measures?

Research Aim: The research will assess if Human Rights should be overlooked when dealing with counter-terrorism measures. The research will aim to demonstrate if there is a need to protect a presumed or prospective terrorist’s basic human rights.

Topic 11: The EU Supremacy and the Constitutional Rights of the Member States

Research Aim: The EU Supremacy imposes authority and control over the EU Member States. In this line, a Member State should remove all conflicting laws that are incompatible with the EU Law. The research will assess the extent to which Member States have accepted the authority of the EU supremacy regarding human rights. In other words, the research will demonstrate if the European Convention on Human Rights has adequate fundamental rights for the Member States.

Topic 12: The importance of Human Rights in a democratic society

Research Aim: The research will assess the importance of human rights, which is a pivotal requirement for democracy. The research will use a comparative analysis of how fundamental rights have been adopted around the world. Furthermore, the research will assess how certain countries that do not follow the Universal Declaration on Human Rights may suffer from the lack of democratisation.

Topic 13: The role of courts in safeguarding fundamental rights in their domestic jurisdiction

Research Aim: The research will demonstrate the courts’ key role in safeguarding the fundamental rights enshrined in a country’s Constitution.

Topic 14: Does the General Data Protection Regulation Act as a Safeguard to the Basic Right To Privacy?

Research Aim: The research will assess the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and its safeguards regarding the right to privacy. The research demonstrates how the GDPR can have an important human rights aspect, such as when dealing with a consumer or an online user.

Topic 15: Should Countries Implement A Constitutional Court for Fundamental Rights Breaches?

Research Aim: The research will assess how each country deals with breaches of fundamental rights. The research aims to provide recommendations in implementing a higher domestic authority to treat only constitutional matters like the Constitutional Court of South Africa.

Topic 16: Can Torture Be Justified Under Human Rights?

Research Aim: Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides that no individual shall be subjected to torture. The research will assess whether torture can ever be justified under the law. For instance, the research will aim to demonstrate whether there are justifiable grounds to inflict torture on criminals in certain cases such as terrorism with the view of getting confessions.

Topic 17: CCTV Surveillance and the Right to Privacy

Research Aim: The Research will assess the use of CCTV surveillance and its effect on Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The research will demonstrate if covert surveillance can either undermine or positively affect the right to privacy. The research will further critically analyse the right to privacy against public policy for the common good.

Topic 18: The Need to Standardise Disability Rights around the World

Research Aim: The Research compares and contrasts different disability rights under certain jurisdictions. The research will assess whether there is a need to standardise disability rights under one convention or treaty.

Topic 19: Should the Right to Education Be Extended to Tertiary Education

Research Aim: The research will access the right to education as found under Article 26 of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. The right to education applies to only fundamental stages of education, such as primary and secondary education. The research will aim to demonstrate if the right to education should be extended to tertiary education.

Topic 20: The Role of Legislators and the Right to Education in the Sub-Saharan Region

Research Aim: The research will assess legislators’ role with regard to the right to education. The research will demonstrate whether Sustainable Development Goal No. 4 (SDG4) is implemented in various sub-Saharan regions. The research will prove whether legislators are implementing appropriate safeguards to remain in line with SDG4 and promote quality education.

How Can ResearchProspect Help?

ResearchProspect writers can send several custom topic ideas to your email address. Once you have chosen a topic that suits your needs and interests, you can order for our dissertation outline service , which will include a brief introduction to the topic, research questions , literature review , methodology , expected results , and conclusion . The dissertation outline will enable you to review the quality of our work before placing the order for our full dissertation writing service !

List of the Best Human Rights Law Dissertation Topics in Critical Issues

An analysis of the link between human trafficking and armed conflict: trafficking for sexual exploitation and forced recruitment of child soldiers.
The impact of technology on the protection of human rights in the digital age.
Exploring the role of international criminal law in prosecuting human rights violations.
The effectiveness of regional human rights mechanisms in addressing human rights abuses.
Analysing the relationship between environmental law and human rights protection.
Investigating the challenges and opportunities of implementing economic, social, and cultural rights.
Examining the intersection of gender equality and human rights law.
Assessing the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in advancing human rights agendas.
The implications of counter-terrorism measures on human rights and civil liberties.

Important Notes:

As a human rights law student looking to get good grades, it is essential to develop new ideas and experiment with existing human rights law theories – i.e., to add value and interest to your research topic.

The field of human rights law is vast and interrelated to so many other academic disciplines like law , business law , cybercrime , and more. That is why it is imperative to create a human rights law dissertation topic that is particular and sound and actually solves a practical problem that may be rampant in the field.

We can’t stress how important it is to develop a logical research topic based on your entire research. There are several significant downfalls to getting your topic wrong: your supervisor may not be interested in working on it, the topic has no academic creditability, the research may not make logical sense, and there is a possibility that the study is not viable.

This impacts your time and efforts in writing your dissertation , as you may end up in a cycle of rejection at the initial stage of the dissertation. That is why we recommend reviewing existing research to develop a topic, taking advice from your supervisor, and even asking for help in this particular stage of your dissertation.

While developing a research topic, keeping our advice in mind will allow you to pick one of the best human rights law dissertation topics that fulfil your requirement of writing a research paper and add to the body of knowledge.

Therefore, it is recommended that when finalising your dissertation topic, you read recently published literature to identify gaps in the research that you may help fill.

Remember- dissertation topics need to be unique, solve an identified problem, be logical, and be practically implemented. Please look at some of our sample human rights law dissertation topics to get an idea for your own dissertation.

How to Structure Your Human Rights Law Dissertation

A well-structured dissertation can help students to achieve a high overall academic grade.

A Title Page
Acknowledgements
Declaration
Abstract: A summary of the research completed
Table of Contents
Introduction : This chapter includes the project rationale, research background, key research aims and objectives, and the research problems. An outline of the structure of a dissertation can also be added to this chapter.
Literature Review : This chapter presents relevant theories and frameworks by analysing published and unpublished literature on the chosen research topic to address research questions . The purpose is to highlight and discuss the selected research area’s relative weaknesses and strengths whilst identifying any research gaps. Break down the topic and key terms that can positively impact your dissertation and your tutor.
Methodology : The data collection and analysis methods and techniques employed by the researcher are presented in the Methodology chapter, which usually includes research desig n, research philosophy, research limitations, code of conduct, ethical consideration, data collection methods, and data analysis strategy .
Findings and Analysis : The findings of the research are analysed in detail under the Findings and Analysis chapter. All key findings/results are outlined in this chapter without interpreting the data or drawing any conclusions. It can be useful to include graphs, charts, and tables in this chapter to identify meaningful trends and relationships.
Discussion and Conclusion : The researcher presents his interpretation of the results in this chapter and states whether the research hypothesis has been verified or not. An essential aspect of this section of the paper is to link the results and evidence from the literature. Recommendations with regard to the implications of the findings and directions for the future may also be provided. Finally, a summary of the overall research, along with final judgments, opinions, and comments, must be included in the form of suggestions for improvement.
References : This should be completed following your University’s requirements
Bibliography
Appendices : Any additional information, diagrams, and graphs used to complete the dissertation but not part of the dissertation should be included in the Appendices chapter. Essentially, the purpose is to expand the information/data.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How to find human rights law dissertation topics.

To find Human Rights Law dissertation topics:

Study recent legal developments.
Examine global human rights issues.
Analyse case law and controversies.
Explore intersection with other fields.
Consider cultural and social aspects.
Select a topic resonating with your passion and research objectives.

199 Human Rights Essay Topics & Examples

Human rights, the foundational pillars of a just society, go far beyond governments and cultures. In this collection of human rights research topics, explore the multifaceted dimensions of human rights, from historical struggles to contemporary debates. Try to understand the profound impact of human rights on societies and the pursuit of a better future.

⚖️ TOP 7 Human Rights Topics

🏆 best human rights essay topics, 🎓 interesting human rights research topics, 👍 human rights essay examples, 🔥 hot human rights topics to write about, 💡 simple titles for a human rights essay, 📌 easy human rights topics, ❓ more human rights topics for research paper.

Privacy as a Basic Human Right
The Right to Healthcare as a Basic Human Right
Responsibility of Mltinational Corporations in the Field of Human Rights
Human Rights Role in International Relations
The Nature of Human Rights
Human Rights Violation in the World
Human Rights: Historical and Conceptual Evolution
Human Rights and Feminist Perspectives in Social Work This paper aims to review the main principles of human rights in order to understand the connections between the narratives of human rights and feminism.
Government Responsibility Regarding Human Rights This paper discusses the primary responsibility of governments in promoting and protecting human rights and outlines legal instruments and conventions that governments use.
Business Practices and Human Rights Human rights refer to the fundamental rights of every human being, irrespective of race, sex, religion, political affiliation, social standing or any other feature.
Feminist Movement: Women’s Rights Are Human Rights Women across the globe deserve a voice and equal human rights, and they should be appreciated, and their contributions to society acknowledged.
Human Rights in Sociology and Philosophy The concept of human rights is among the most popular issues throughout the world in contemporary society today.
Networked Society: Connectivity as a Human Right The media text focuses on the collaborative aspect of the internet in which people are able to add their own ideas, assumptions and create their own content for public viewing.
Circumcision: Ethical Dilemma and Human Rights Circumcision is a complex phenomenon that can result in ethical dilemmas. To put it simply, circumcision consists of surgical operations on female and male genitals.
Universal Conception of Human Rights and Its Challenges Human rights are intercontinental customs, which dictate and determine how different countries handle their citizens and residents.
Universal Human Rights and Cultural Values The universality of human rights is a question for debate because of the impact of cultures on people’s acceptation and interpretation of these rights.
Human Rights in United Arab Emirates The constitution of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) officially recognizes different rights and freedoms which its citizens and foreigners are entitled to.
Human Rights in Brunei: Impact of Cultural Practices Human rights and culture contradict because of their origins, and for a country like Brunei, Islamic culture will undoubtedly affect the rights of women and LGBT+ people.
Healthcare as a Basic Human Right The right to have unlimited access to healthcare services is linked inseparably to the right to live, which is why accessibility to healthcare must be regarded as a human right.
Human Rights Related to Immigration The essay discusses human rights related to immigration and analyzes if there are any ways to improve the situation of migrants.
A Form of Discrimination and Human Rights Violations Based on the relevance of the problem, models and methods of assistance to victims of domestic violence have been developed.
Role of Civil Society in Realization of Human Rights This essay discusses how civil bodies interact with the state to guarantee fundamental rights and freedoms in socio-political and economic facades.
Slavery and Human Rights Violation The work presents three stories from various time periods and places, but they are common in the fact that, due to greed, some people are ready to sacrifice all human qualities.
Violation of the Human Right to Life: Death Penalty The problem of the death penalty cannot be separated from the general concept of human rights as it violates the paramount right of a human to life.
Human Rights in Israel-Gaza and West Bank Regions The conflict in the Gaza region was a violation of human rights because the sovereignty of the state was not respected by foreign powers.
W. Kymlicka on Human Rights and Culture Protection Every society has a distinct culture that differentiates it from others and members of the society can interact freely even if they are from different cultural backgrounds.
Healthcare as a Human Right: Addressing Access Disparities The healthcare system in the United States faces several challenges, including inequalities in access to care and health outcomes.
Transitional Justice: Human Rights Violations The paper discusses transitional justice. It alludes to the procedures and systems in place to resolve human rights violations and other offenses.
Importance of the UN Declaration of Human Rights Today The paper states that understanding the importance of the UN Declaration is critical because it affects the quality of interpersonal relationships.
The 1807 Abolition Bill: Continuing Human Rights Struggle A research question concerns the effectiveness of the 1807 Bill in the fight against slavery and its contribution to the further fight against the issue.
Human Rights Violations and Prosecutions of Perpetrators This paper discusses the challenges associated with human rights violations regarding international programs and the conditions under which prosecution is not effective.
The Issue of Human Rights Violation This paper states that human rights violation remains a significant issue. Aligning them with the current forms of human mistreatment is necessary.
Having Children as a Human Right The massive significance of parenthood as a concept raises the question of whether people should be entitled to have children as a part of their basic set of rights.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Constructivists’ Views Constructivists’ views better than other approaches explain why such an initiative as the development of the declaration of universal human rights was even possible.
Human Rights and Discrimination Discrimination is against human rights and should be condemned because it has negative effects such as reduced productivity, feelings of anger, and anxiety.
Recognition of Human Rights for LGBT Individuals The paper discusses the importance of studying the issue of LGBTQ people discrimination, including its causes, harmful effects, and current state.
American Freedom and Human Rights American spirit consists of a dream of innocence and freedom. It is every American’s duty to create justice, and every person has the power to do so.
History, Oppression and Human Rights Violation in India The caste system is not entirely eliminated and still exists in modern-day India expressed in property ownership and governance.
Human Rights and Freedom in Modern Society
Citizen Journalism Protects Human Rights
Human Development and Human Rights: South African Country Study
The Black Lives Matter’s Fight for Human Rights in America
The Black Lives Matter and Philosophies of Henry Shue and Thomas Pogge on Human Rights
The Different Human Rights Violation in China
The Bottled Water Industry and the Violation of Human Rights on a Global
Government Reforms and Basic Human Rights
The Death Penalty and Violations of Human Rights
The Challenges and Struggles of Viola Desmond to Fight for Equal Human Rights
Exploring the Relationship Between Military Spending & Human Rights Performance in South Asia
How Effective Does the Human Rights Act 1998 Promotes
Examining Coca Cola Human Rights Violations in Colombia
The International Courts and Tribunals’ Success in Upholding Human Rights
The Similarities and Differences in the Level of Development, Human Rights Protection, and Environmental Conditions Between the North and South
Civil and Human Rights: Excessive Use of Force
The History and Role of the Human Rights Watch, a Nonprofit Human Rights Organization
Humanitarian Intervention and Human Rights Violationss
Human Rights and Justice: Forms and Mechanisms of Oppression
The Violation and Protection of Human Rights in Society
Slavery as a Human Rights Issue The paper argues slavery in underdeveloped countries, especially Africa, continues to be a pressing and contemporary problem.
Human Rights from a Historical Perspective Recognizing the value of human rights guarantees that arbitrariness will not be tolerated and that democracy exists in society.
The Fundamental Human Rights Speech Human rights, in plain terms, are the entitlement to the fundamental rights that are given to every individual. We are given these rights, which we retain until we die.
Human Rights and Public’s Right to Know The issue of sharing every kind of information with members of the public remains sensitive and capable of affecting the interests of both citizens and governments.
Freedom of Speech: The Basic Human Right Freedom of speech allows everyone to receive and impart information. People and communities should articulate their thoughts and ideas without fear of any form of intimidation.
Violations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in China China has a long history of suppressing authors and freedom of speech. Liu Xiaobo is a literary critic, known for their participation in the social and political spheres.
Social Inequality and Human Rights in the Modern World This paper theorize civil rights to be the basis of developing the main social fields of education, healthcare, and career opportunities.
Bartolome De Las Casas and Human Rights in the Age of Exploration Bartolome De Las Casas was a pivotal factor in the emergence of what is currently termed human rights principles, as shown by his deeds and ideas.
Human Rights in China and the USA Every country has a different attitude toward human rights. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the problem of human rights in China and the USA.
The Abortion Issue Regarding Human Rights This article raises the question of how people should determine what rights should be guaranteed by the constitution and what rights are core rights from birth.
Black Sports Activism: Olympic Project for Human Rights Black activism has been fundamental in reducing institutional racism and the mistreatment of African-Americans’ rights in the larger society.
Human Rights and Labor Laws Violations in Foreign Countries This discussion explores the situation in Chile and China, where workers have experienced labor laws and human rights violations in recent times.
Indigenous People and Human Rights This work examines what rights a person has in the process of acculturation, how acculturation affects the indigenous people of many countries, its tendencies in the modern world.
Human Rights and the Burqa Ban in France This paper expounding on how the affected French citizens may go about opposing the ‘burqa ban’ in the court of law.
Human Rights Under Russian Leadership Human rights are among the essential norms which standardize human behavior and are protected by local and international laws.
The Universality of Human Rights “Human rights are “universal” rights in the sense that they are held “universally” by all human beings”. This report discusses the universality of human rights.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights The current paper reflects these rights to understand their impact on ending atrocities of unpleasant events that occurred in the past, such as war.
Prisoners’ Human Rights Protection For the protection of human rights in prisons, it is important to examine the existing practices and incorporate the knowledge about the methods of promoting social justice.
Human Rights as an Essential Part of the Societal Structure Human rights are vital to any social structure as they create guidelines for the people based on their needs and desires.
Human Rights in Brown v. Board of Education Case The Brown v. Board of Education case was a fundamental court decision since it secured the rights of millions of children but also the rights of the African American population.
Human Subjects Protection: International and Regional Human Rights Standards Any clinical expertise must be integrated with the best possible scientific evidence. Otherwise, it is impossible to provide patients with all the needed options.
Medicine and Public Health, Ethics and Human Rights Nowadays one can observe the tense connection between public health, medicine, human rights, and ethics; it can be explained by a number of medical challenges, etc.
Human Rights and International Trade Human rights in international trade precipitated the formation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) which caters to the welfare of the workers and other interest groups.
The Issues of Public Health, Ethics, and Human Rights Human awareness of medical care limits, the recognition of societal structure influence, etc. provide a wide link between healthy vision and ethical norms perception.
The Human Right to Equality and Racial Issues in the US This paper examines the issue of the human right to equality and non-discrimination, which is in question in the United States.
UK Anti-Terrorism Strategy and the Human Rights Implications on its Implementation The prevention of terrorism has been given a higher priority, and the new legislation has drawn on new instruments equivalent to the European levels.
The Convention for Safeguarding the Human Rights and Fundamental Freedom of the EU Citizens The convention for safeguarding the Human rights and fundamental freedom of the EU citizens were drawn up by the European Council on November 4th, 1950, and enforced in 1953.
Human Rights Cities: Mountain View This blog post describes the records and the solutions of Mountain View city’s compliances to the global universal rights of an individual.
Human Rights Violation in Ethiopia The purpose of this paper is to draw the public’s attention to the terrifying events that are happening in Ethiopia and demand justice and freedom for the Oromo people.
Affordable Care Act as a Fundamental Human Right Healthcare should be recognized as a fundamental human right, which can be based on a new Medicare for All program to be cost-effective and affordable.
Declaration of Human Rights Influence on Government In this article, the author examines the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its impact on the governments.
Human Rights and the Rwandan Genocide In the first half of 1994, Rwanda lost approximately 800,000 citizens due to tribal clashes that led to what is referred to now as the Rwandan Genocide.
The Mutual Relationship Between the Fields of Human Rights and Environmental Protection
The Relationship Between Intellectual Property and Human Rights International Law
The Constitution and the Declaration of Human Rights
The Concepts and Significance of Human Rights in Society
Children, Guantanamo Bay and the Violation of Human Rights
Civil Liberties and Violations of Human Rights
The Reason Why Countries Signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Human Rights and Latin American Indigenous Women
How the Death Penalty Is Against Our Human Rights
The Criminal Defence and Human Rights Lawyer
Effective Practices for Infusing Human Rights
How Being Homeless Affects an Individual’s Human Rights
Gay Marriage: The Recognition of Equal Human Rights
The Black Codes: Limiting Basic Human Rights and Civil Liberties of Blacks
Human Rights and International Investment Law
Exponential Innovation and Human Rights: Implications for Science and Technology Diplomacy
The World Struggle for Human Rights and the Rights of Self
Child Soldiers Are Abused and Deprived of Human Rights
Business and Human Rights: The Evolving International Agenda
Development and Human Rights as Addressed by Bolivian President Evo Morales
Civil Rights Movement and Actual State of Human Rights Ending racial discrimination and equalization of rights between the variety of ethnic groups found on the territory of the United States is a struggle with a long history.
Immigrants Human Rights Violation in the United States The research question addresses the need to halt family separations at the border by launching long-term cooperation with other states, such as Mexico.
Ethical Cases: Human Rights To Decide on One’s Life From medical ethics, care providers must follow the principles of autonomy and beneficence, but they are opposed to each other in these ethical cases.
Human Rights and Gender Issues: “The Love Suicides at Amijima” & “Tale of Kieu” Comparing “The Love Suicides at Amijima” and “Tale of Kieu”, while representing different time periods, addresses the same problem of human rights and gender inequalities.
Human Trafficking: International Human Rights International human rights law defines human trafficking as the violation of an individual’s right to liberty through appropriation of their legal personality, labor and humanity.
UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights The U.N. Guiding Principles are a necessary but still insufficiently effective tool to protect human rights from large business structures.
Global Human Rights Progress and the Role of National Cultural Value Systems This paper aims to investigate arguments in favor and against the claim that there has been progressing in developing global human rights over the last twenty years.
Human Rights Violations in Hong Kong The article is about the arrest of district councilor Cheng Lai-king on March 26, 2020, after being accused of seditious intent.
Confucianism and Human Rights Development The work highlights the main ideas of Confucianism, describes how it has changed over time under the influence of Western culture and what impact it has on our lives.
Human Trafficking as Violation of Human Rights Human trafficking is a heinous issue that is very serious and dangerous for our society. It is widely known that human trafficking has become an expanding issue across the world.
Sudan, Oil, War, and Human Rights This paper aims to address the main issues for why despite the end of the formal conflict in Sudan; global human rights actors have remained unable to stop the war-like patterns.
Are Human Rights Universal? The author argues that the concept of “human rights” serves as an instrument of political propaganda, and not a legal mechanism for protecting the well-being of people.
Human Rights: Social Relations and State and Citizens Relations Human rights play a crucial role in social relations and relations between the state and citizens. In the integral approach human rights are not made subservient to any ideology.
Human Rights Problem of Domestic Help in El Salvador The condition of human rights in El Salvador concerning the domestic helps has been steadily deteriorating over the years
Human Rights Conservation and the War on Terror Public Safety is the concept of governmental organizations concerned with protecting their citizens from all kinds of threats.
Cultural Relativism, Universal Jurisdiction and Human Rights The Human Rights area of different countries has its own peculiar features and structure. Human Rights are the result of people’s fight for independence.
Modern World Politics and the Cause of Human Rights Human rights, democracy and terrorism act as a triangle which bounds modern world politics to a certain limitation.
Circumcision as a Human Rights Issue in the US Circumcision can be considered one of the disputable practices that are still used on infants because of outdated believes and issues.
Human Rights Violation During Hong Kong Protests This paper discusses the violation of human rights as applied to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and applied to the context of the Hong Kong protests in 2019.
Remote Sensing to Monitor Human Rights Violations The use of modern technologies provides multiple options for various agencies that assess situations regarding human rights and their violations.
Donald Trump’s Policies of Poverty and Human Rights One of the events related to an acute social issue of poverty in the United States involves the U.N. report on extreme U.S. poverty and human rights in the context of Donald Trump’s policies.
Same-Sex Marriages and Human Rights Many people acknowledge that same-sex marriage is something that should be analyzed using this law. This discussion gives my personal perspective of this issue.
Human Rights, Globalization and Economic Development Based on Bryzk’s definition of globalization, it is clear that a globalized world makes it easy to have a free flow of information and ideas across the border.
Universal Human Rights in Political Ideologies The major contention of Communitarian with the ideologies of Universalism can be traced to the major element that each ideology advocates.
Human Rights Advocates vs. Terrorism Victims In this study, we seek to find out the implication of terrorism on human rights and the impact of terrorism on global security.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Crises This paper gives a detailed analysis of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights from different perspectives.
High-Resolution Satellite Imagery and Human Rights The focus of this assignment is the use of high-resolution satellite imagery for detecting mass graves in Sheberghan, an area in Afghanistan.
Childhood Obesity Study, Ethics, and Human Rights The present paper discusses ethical considerations and plans in the protection of human rights in the childhood obesity issue, possible limitations, and implications of the study.
Canada’s Commitment to Human Rights Principles Human rights refer to those aspects that uphold the outmost virtues of humankind. This paper is an evaluation of Canada’s commitment to human rights principles.
Islamic State and Values of Human Rights This paper gives a reflection and analysis of Islamic culture using the ideas gained from the movie “Islam in America”.
Heart Failure Study and Human Rights Protection The present paper discusses ethical considerations and plans in the protection of human rights during the study on congestive heart failure (CHF) patients post-discharge.
Canadian Studies: Sexuality and Human Rights The history of Canada cannot be imagined without a chapter of same-sex struggle that, in many ways, defined the development of ethical principles of the country.
Human Rights and Ethnic Groups in American History The paper argues that the United States protects human rights and minority ethnic groups. It discusses American history, its political, economic, and civil rights aspects.
The Human Rights Act as a Protection Tool in the UK The HRA (Human Rights Act) was introduced in the UK in 1998 as a means of implementing an internal judicial method of addressing human rights concerns.
Discrimination and Human Rights Laws The paper discusses solutions of closing the gap between the reality of ongoing oppression and discrimination and the promises held out by our human rights laws.
Circumcision: Medical, Ethical and Human Rights Issues Human genitals is a matter that is to be treated with utmost care. Genital mutilations are mainly referred to as “a cultural practice”.
The Gay Human Rights: Harvey Milk Contributions Harvey Milk and his contribution in the struggle to preserve gay human rights are discussed from a theoretical perspective. This paper provides an in-depth understanding of gay human rights.
Understanding Human Rights: Labor Rights in a Globalizing World and Gender Rights Labour rights are human rights which encompass “the right to collective bargaining; the elimination of forced and slave labour.
Human Rights in Contemporary World In this paper discusses an example of human rights abuse in contemporary world. The human rights abuse selected shows a clear conflict between universalism and cultural relativism.
Human Rights and Development: The Antithesis of Armed Conflicts and War
The Coca-Cola Company’s Abuse of Its Employees Through the Violation of the Code of Human Rights
How Has the Human Rights Act Affected Parliamentary Supremacy
Community Service Can Restore Social Justice and Uphold Human Rights
Human Rights Act and Parliamentary Sovereignty
Human Rights and Freedom of Expression and Opinion
Human Rights and Criminal Justice in the United Kingdom
How Far Has the Government Gone to Compromise Our Basic Human Rights
Does Mental Health Treatment Infringe Human Rights?
The Link Between Corruption and Human Rights Violations
Are New Democracies Better Human Rights Compliers
Connection Between Democracy and Human Rights
Ethical and Philosophical Nature of Human Rights
The Connection Between Torture and Sin as a Theological Theme in the Conference Torture, Human Rights, War on Terror
The Pros and Cons of the Declaration of Human Rights
China Internet Censorship Against Human Rights
Human Rights and Civil Liberties in Canada
Examining the Links Between Human Rights and Different Models of Disability in Education
How Does Being Homeless Affect an Individual‘s Human Rights?
How Far Has the Government Gone to Compromise Our Basic Human Rights?
Are Security and Human Rights Mutually Exclusive?
Are Human Rights Issues Valid?
How Has Globalization Impacted Human Rights?
How Can Community Service Improve Human Rights and Our Society as a Whole?
How Did the Development of Human Rights Affect the Caste System in India?
Are Human Rights Practices Improving?
Are Human Rights Innate and Universal?
Are Human Rights “Subversive to the Current” Society of States?
How Does Human Rights Affect Multi-National Companies on Their Marketing Strategies?
Does the Canadian Charter Effectively Protect Our Human Rights?
Are Bangladeshi Women Enjoying Human Rights Properly?
Are Human Rights Infringed in Treatments for Mental Health?
Does Terrorism Threaten Human Rights?
Are Human Rights Truly Universal?
Are Human Rights Universal and Does It Matter?
Does the Human Rights Act Protect Civil Liberties?
Does the Terrorism Act Infringe Upon Our Human Rights?
Are Human Rights Human?
How Effectively Does the Human Rights Act 1998 Promote?
Are Rich Nations Violating the Human Rights of the World’s Poor?
Are Human Rights Universal Philosophy?
Are Human Rights and Economic Well-Being Substitutes?
Are Human Rights Protected?
Are New Democracies Better Human Rights Compliers?
Does the Human Rights Act 1998 Promote or Hinder Democracy?
Are Worker Rights Human Rights?
Does the WTO Violate Human Rights?

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StudyCorgi. (2021, September 9). 199 Human Rights Essay Topics & Examples. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/human-rights-essay-topics/

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StudyCorgi . "199 Human Rights Essay Topics & Examples." September 9, 2021. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/human-rights-essay-topics/.

StudyCorgi . 2021. "199 Human Rights Essay Topics & Examples." September 9, 2021. https://studycorgi.com/ideas/human-rights-essay-topics/.

These essay examples and topics on Human Rights were carefully selected by the StudyCorgi editorial team. They meet our highest standards in terms of grammar, punctuation, style, and fact accuracy. Please ensure you properly reference the materials if you’re using them to write your assignment.

This essay topic collection was updated on June 23, 2024 .

240 Human Rights Essay Topics & Examples

Whether you’re interested in exploring enduring issues, social justice, or democracy, see the ideas below. Along with human rights topics for essays and other papers, our experts have prepared writing tips for you.

✅ Tips for Writing Essays on Human Rights

🏆 Best Human Rights Topic Ideas & Essay Examples

🥇 most interesting human rights topics for essays, 🎓 simple & easy human rights essay topics, 💡 great human rights research topics, 🔎 interesting topics to write about human rights, ❓ essay questions on human rights.

If you’re starting a discussion on human rights, essay examples on the subject can really help you with argumentation. And if you’re assigned to come up with a research paper or speech on it, a good idea is a must for an excellent grade. Good thing you’ve found this list of human rights essay topics!

✅ 9 Tips for Writing Essays on Human Rights

The recognition of people’s rights through proper laws preserves human dignity. This broadness means that human rights essay topics range in scope drastically, requiring you to bring together different kinds of ideas in a single paper.

Thus, you may need to keep in mind particular tips, from structural advice to correct terminology, to write an excellent human rights essay.

Do your research before you start working on your outline. Searching for book and journal titles beforehand will not only help you understand your topic better but also help you structure your thoughts, affecting your structure for the better.

Compiling a bibliography early will also save you from the mess, which comes from ordering and standardizing your sources as you go.

After you have your reference page ready, draft a human rights essay outline.

Make it as detailed or as simple as you need, because what is essential is that you divide your topics evenly between your paragraphs or subheadings.

Doing so will ensure that you have a comprehensive essay that helps advance academic knowledge on a particular subject, rather than an overpowered paper aimed at a single problem.

Write your thesis statement as your final prewriting step. Excellent thesis examples should state the theme explicitly and leave your reader with an accurate understanding of what you are trying to achieve in your paper.

Skipping or ignoring this phase may leave your work disoriented and without a definite purpose.

Keep in mind your chosen human rights essay questions when writing. Going off theme will never get you good marks with your instructor.

If you are writing from a cultural relativism point of view, then do you have the word-count to argue about moral relativism? Do not forget that everything you write should advance your central thesis and never undermine it!

Get a good grasp on the relevant terminology. Confusing human nature with the human condition is never a good start to a paper that aspires to shed light on one subject or the other.

You can start writing down the terms that you find useful or intriguing during your research phase to help you gain a better understanding of their meaning.

Understand the correct time and place to qualify or refute certain statements. Arguing against the children’s right to basic needs may never be appropriate in an academic setting. Acknowledge the arguable cases, and subvert these to your benefit, as an essayist.

Interest your audience with essay hooks and exciting facts. Academia is not a dull place, and your readers may find themselves more willing to engage with your work if they find it enjoyable, rather than dry and formalistic. Doing so will also demonstrate your good grasp on the subject!

Remain respectful of your chosen case, and remember that you are writing about a subject that experiences hundreds of daily violations.

Recognizing the dangerous nature of your paper will not only help you separate beneficial facts from superficial ones but may also allow you to hone your academic integrity.

Read sample essays online to gain a better understanding of what essay mechanics will work and which you can leave unused. This extra reading may also give you good human rights essay ideas to begin writing your paper!

However, remember that plagiarism is a punishable offense, unlike the simple act of becoming inspired by others’ work. Want to see some samples? Head over to IvyPanda and jump-start your paper!

Three Generations of Human Rights Development The current legal recognition of human rights attainment originated from various declarations and the most pronounced included the Magna Carta declaration in the thirteenth century that curtailed the royal powers, the American declaration of independence […]
McDonald’s: Human Rights and Environmental Sustainability Core values of the company One of the core values of the company is the respect for the fundamental rights of human beings.
Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies for Human Rights Established in 1919 as the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the organization has been very instrumental in championing the improvement of human rights and the reduction of human suffering.
The Challenge of Human Rights and Cultural Diversity It is however true that the existence of universal human rights is compromised by cultural relativism. In addition, it is wrong to assume that cultural relativism would interfere with the efficacy of these universal human […]
How Nike Sweatshops in Asia Violate Human Rights Factors that facilitated the emergence and development of Nike sweatshops included the availability of cheap labor, lower costs of production, lower wages, the restriction on the labor movements by the local authorities, and the poor […]
Basic Human Rights Violation The Human Rights Watch was formed in the year 1978 following the creation of the Helsinki Watch. The issue of terrorism has posed the greatest challenge in the operations of the Human Rights Watch.
Effects of War on Humanity in Terms of Human Rights The effects not only affect the coalition governments in war, but also members of the attacked countries for instance, Iraq people recorded the greatest number of fatalities and casualties during the Iraq war.
Human Rights and Social Transformation Skeptics challenges the origin, contribution of globalization to the advancement of human rights, tension posed on security due to strict adherence to codes of human rights, human rights contribution to universality evaluated in relation to […]
The Case of Malala: Is Education a Basic Human Right? Additionally, understanding the social and cultural dimensions of gender inequality in education allows one to determine the policy issues that cause the problem and thus establish a mechanism for preventing its reoccurrence in the future.
Impact of Human Rights on Society Democratic space is an indication of tolerance and consideration of the people on the part of the government, since it shows that the voice of the people has a preference over any single person.
Human Rights Poster Design and Analysis First, I realised that placing the title or theme of the poster at a strategic point goes a long way to draw the attention of the target audience.
United States and UAE Human Rights Comparison The nation’s denial of freedom of expression and religion, as well as its discrimination against women and the punishment of same-sex intercourse with the death penalty, are among the most prominent issues.
Human Rights in the Movie Escape From Sobibor As a result of the escape, the Nazi Authorities were made to shutdown the camp and planted trees The Second World War was a period during which a lot of violations of the human rights […]
The Universality of Human Rights In contrast to the other institutions that suggest a single form of the notion existing in the given society, the area of human rights allows to switch the shapes of the very notion of human […]
Current Human Rights Issues Social rights go hand in hand with human rights since most of them are defined in declarations and treaties of human rights.
Malala Yousafzai – Pakistani Human Rights Activist The world learned about the girl after a gunman burst into a school bus and shot the girl in the head, thereby avenging her criticism of the Taliban and neglecting the prohibition to attend school.
What Are Human Rights? Nevertheless, even though that nowadays the concept of ‘human rights’ is being commonly discussed, as such that applies to all people, regardless of what happened to be the specifics of their ethno-cultural affiliation and their […]
Global Community and Human Rights The development of a global community holds a lot of promise for the improvement of human rights. This is attainable by implementing a common code of human rights across the globe along the lines of […]
Human Rights History and Approaches Further development of the concept of human rights was reflected in the European Middle Ages, the eras of renaissance and enlightenment, and the idea of empowering all people, based on the concept of “natural law”.
Child Labor Issue According to the Human Rights The International Labor Organization defines child labor as “work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential, and their dignity, and that is harmful to physical and mental development”1 Being a United Nations agency, ILO […]
The Origin of the Human Rights Concept This point out to the fact that there were rights in the document that are common to different parts of the world and that they were not only obtained from the western nations’ practices of […]
Social Media: A Force for Political and Human Rights Changes Worldwide In this essay, I will discuss the effectiveness of traditional media and social media, and how social media has a better participation in changing the world in terms of politics and human rights.
“Women’s Rights Are Human Rights” by Hillary Clinton Hillary Clinton’s speech about women’s rights effectively convinces her audience that women rights are an indispensable part of human rights through the use of logical argument, repetition, historical facts, and emotional stories.
Basic Technology and Human Rights If some people are able to enjoy the facilities being introduced as a result of technological improvisations, and it reaches to a chosen few, with no chance in sight of reaching out to large number […]
Human Rights: Fredin v. Sweden Legal Case In this situation, the court considered a case that affected the protection of nature and the human right to own property and sentenced in favor of the state.
Freedom from Poverty as a Human Right and the UN Declaration of Human Rights This reveals the nature of the interrelatedness of the whole boy of human rights and the need to address human rights in that context.
Human Rights Violations in Today’s World This paper addresses questions regarding human rights, including the United Nations’ involvement in enforcing those rights violations and the role of non-governmental organizations in addressing the issue.
Human Rights, Education and Awareness But the progress is underway, and while there is still much to be done in terms of securing even the basic human rights, the strategies and the general principles of achieving equality can be outlined.
Torture and Human Rights Violation The researcher notes that the government never provided a clear explanation of the events and their position on the possibility of resorting to torture.
Thomas Jefferson as a Defender of Human Rights In conclusion, Thomas Jefferson was a steadfast defender of human rights, but most importantly, he fought for the rights of black people.
Strategic Planning: Human Rights Watch The company’s competitive position represents the largest coverage of countries in various areas: monitoring military conflicts, protecting access to medicine, addressing and the rights of vulnerable segments of the population.
Human Rights and Justice Sector: Article Review The central problem is the complex of new African American control institutions made up of the carceral system and the ruins of the dark ghetto.
The Native Human Rights: Intergenerational Trauma Following are some strategies for addressing Indian citizens’ unique status, ways in which the fundamental right of Indians adheres, the practice of civil rights, the right to ownership of water, the right to be allowed […]
Human Rights Reforms in the Arab World In modern history, the theme of human rights reformations in the Arab World has been influenced by the French and America Revolutions.
Freedom of Speech as a Basic Human Right Restricting or penalizing freedom of expression is thus a negative issue because it confines the population of truth, as well as rationality, questioning, and the ability of people to think independently and express their thoughts.
Violation of Human Rights: Tuskegee Syphilis Study The authors of the study and the authorities tried to justify human rights violations by saying that they were analyzing the effects of fully developing syphilis on Black males.
Human Rights Violation in US Sports Despite the advancement in human rights in the most significant part of society, sports in various parts of the globe continue to cultivate actions of human rights violation.
How Corruption Violates Fundamental Human Rights of Citizens This essay seeks to establish how corruption leads to breach of fundamental human rights of citizens and determine which rights in particular are mostly risky due to corruption.
Cultural Heritage and Human Rights in France For example, the imagination of the inhabitants of this region manifested itself vividly in many ways during the development and construction of the famous Notre Dame Cathedral.
Retirement Options: Putting Human Rights to Work The employers consider terminating the old employees for their personal safety and the company’s economic stability. Therefore, public awareness stimulates action against discrimination and allows the employees to support the older people at work.
Environmental, Social, and Governance Relating to Human Rights It is impossible to ignore the fact that the ESG trend can significantly affect the sphere of human rights in the energy sector.
Biomedical Research Ethics and Human Rights This paper aims to discuss the impact of the history of research ethics on modern approaches and the protection of the rights of human subjects.
The Absolute Human Right Not to Be Tortured The case against the prohibition of absoluteness contrary to torment and associated types of cruelty in universal law queries the ethical and legal conventions that form the foundation of the event of terrorism.
Human Rights Issues: Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans Hurricane Katrina is considered one of the worst calamities in the history of the United States. The law of the United States gives the government the responsibility to protect the lives of its citizens.
Rhetoric and Reality of Human Rights Protection For example, the prohibition of homosexuality in many countries of Africa and the Middle East, the restriction of China and Russia’s citizen’s freedoms, and the dictatorship of Africa and Latin America.
Why Do Good? Human Rights Violations in Afghanistan To be more specific, this is because the main essence of Bentham’s philosophical standpoint is that only those actions which bring happiness and pleasure to others are morally right.
Human Rights and the United Nations Charter The most significant resemblance of the New Laws of The Indies and Human Rights Law of the United Nations is the obligation to consider human rights as the primary basis for establishing the local regulations.
Understanding Human Rights in Australia Needless to say, the key objective of this Act has been to improve the standards of legislation processes in the region.
Understanding of Human Rights This provides us with a clue, as to what should account for the line of legal reasoning, regarding the illegality of the ‘burqa ban’, on the part of French Muslims in the European Court of […]
Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Protest as a Violation of Human Rights Standing Rock claims that the pipeline would damage the sacred sites of their ancestors and is potentially harmful to the local environment and the economic situation of the tribe.
Bridging the Line Between a Human Right and a Worker’s Choice Workers’ rights, in that sense, constitute one of the most important aspects of the human rights issue because many workers are willing to face peril if the market is able to pay a sufficient price.
The UN Declaration of Human Rights & The UN Millennium Project Human rights are “international norms that help to protect all people everywhere from severe political, legal, and social abuses”.
Social Media and Human Rights Memorandum Considering a recent scandal with Facebook’s failure to protect people’s data in the Cambridge Analytica breach, it is feasible to dwell on the topic of human rights protection within the Internet.
Definition of Human Rights Human rights are freedoms established by custom or international agreement that impose standards of conduct on all nations.
Labor and Monopoly. Human Rights Simultaneously, the laborers do not enjoy any control on design and production over the work, thus, the staff are uncomfortable with their work. However, in the case of flight attendants, the profession is different in […]
Reaction Paper about Treaty Bodies of Human Rights 2020 Therefore, it is important to evaluate the prospects of budget issues due to COVID-19, communication challenges due to reduced human contacts and pandemic concerns affecting human right defense as well as the general secretary’s rejection […]
Human Rights in Islam and West Instead, it would stick to drafting standards and stay out of the actual developments and problems of the Stalinist Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and its colonies, and the segregationist United States and other powers […]
African Human Rights Protection Many human rights activists have come forward to champion the rights of the minorities and in some instances agitate for democratic governance.
Joseph Kony’s Violations of Human Rights Even so, conflicts in the 21st century are unique in that the warring parties are obliged to follow some rules of engagement and to respect human rights.
Human Rights: Violated Historical and Ethical Principles The people in most of the research did not have a choice. The people in the experiments did not have the right to beneficence.
Public International Law of Human Rights The present paper examines three important decisions issued by the International Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights in the field of state responsibility, human rights, and rights and duties of international […]
US & UK Human Rights While Countering Terrorism The threat of terror and the further legal reactions of the nations to the problem were considered as challenging, and it is necessary to examine differences and similarities associated with the promotion of human rights […]
Dignity: Is It a Basic Human Right and How to Protect of Self-Worth and Self-Determination? The problem has raised the issue of assisted suicide to end a life of suffering and the role of such a patient in deciding when and how they will die rather than waiting for the […]
International Human Rights Opinion and Removing a Constitutionally Elected Government in Fiji It is believed that the gross overreaction of the military in the internal affairs of the Methodist church in Fiji has paved the way for international focus to be centered in this island, especially in […]
Human Rights Act 1998 in British Legal System The safeguard of British liberty is in the good sense of the people and in the system of representative and responsible government which has been evolved”.[The Business of Judging] Such an approach isolated British constitutional […]
Human Rights in Russia: A 2020 Report Concentrating on the Last Changes Overall, expert opinion on the outcomes of human rights in Russia in the future shows a lack of certainty the country’s record of infringements is going to improve. It is imperative to support the promotion […]
Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Daily Briefs UN experts and ambassadors of foreign countries, including the US and the EU, responded to this violation, calling not to use weapons and allow the people to express their will.
Will the Development of Artificial Intelligence Endanger Global Human Rights? The contradiction between the advantages of AI and the limitation of human rights manifests in the field of personal privacy to a larger extent.
St. Johns Agency and Human Rights: Universal Policies to Support Human Rights The right to health as an inclusive right is one of the elements which states that the right is not only associated with access to health care facilities and services. The company incorporates various aspects […]
History II, Early Human Rights Debates: The Truth About Pirates and the Social Justification The reading by Mark Roth describes the hidden historical truth behind pirates and their deceptive view by the modern society. This historical document depicts one of the earliest accounts of the mistreatment of Native Americans […]
Universal Human Rights on The Case of MV Tampa On the other hand, the country was enforcing its own right to protect the citizens from the perceived danger a justified precaution in light of numerous cases of illegal immigration and terrorist attacks.
Human Rights Violations by Police: Accountable in Discharging Their Duties Corey in his study and reflection on two mass exonerations, that is, the Rampart and Tulia exonerations, identified police misconduct, and in particular perjury as the primary cause for wrongful convictions.
Human Rights Obligations of Multinational Corporations The argument of whether it is valid to impose obligations on violation of human rights on MNCs calls to reason the minimum caliber MNCs should maintain in their obligations towards human rights.
Human Rights Issues in Australia: Bullying Among School-Going Age and Young People The focus of the topic of the day is on bullying. It is used to prevent or avoid the occurrence of a bullying experience.
Tortures as the Form of Human Rights Abuse The law of the country must allow persons tortured in any form to be permitted to make an official complaint and investigation to be started on the credibility of the person.
Is FGM a Human Rights Issue in the Development of Humanism and Equality? Among the problems faced by developed states that receive migrants from third-world countries, the protection of women’s and girls’ rights in the field of reproductive health stands out.
Shirin Ebadi’s Perspective on Women’s Human Rights Activism and Islam It is worth noting that Shirin Ebadi’s self-identity as an Iranian woman and a Muslim empowers her experience and perspective in women’s rights activism.
United States Role in Support of Universal Human Rights The first thing is to put an end to extrajudicial killings and detentions which will be in a bid to end intrusion to the freedom and the right to truth and justice.
Universal Jurisdiction for Human Rights One of the most prominent roles in this process was played by the implementation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the UN, by the development of the national and intercultural awareness of various […]
Human Rights: Humanitarian Intervention Some of these are the right to liberty, the right to life, the right of the freedom to think and express oneself, and finally the right to receive equal handling as regards issues relating to […]
Social Factors in the US History: Respect for Human Rights, Racial Equality, and Religious Freedom The very first years of the existence of the country were marked by the initiatives of people to provide as much freedom in all aspects of social life as possible.
South Africa: Human Rights in the Constitution The Bill of Rights serves as the foundation upon which the democratic character of the Republic of South Africa is built.
Human Rights: Development, Commission, Listening, Monitoring The final draft of the Declaration was handed to the Commission being held in Geneva, therefore, the draft declaration that was sent to all UN member states for commentary is known as the Geneva draft.
Human Rights in China, Tibet and Dafur In spite of the progress, achieved in the process of regulating the situation, and the ongoing process of peaceful settlement, the atmosphere of intensity is preserved in the country, and scale military attacks on innocent […]
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights The Universal Declaration of Human Rights should be analyzed within the context of the political, cultural, and religious situation, emerging in the middle of the twentieth century.
Vehicle Impoundment “HOON” Laws Are an Infringement of People’s Human Rights The other dimension presents the argument that the laws are meant for the well being of the pepole articulating that the legislation is in fact designed for the protection of the civil rights of the […]
Human Rights and International Business The article deals with the crisis in Burma and the role of India and China in this crisis. Even though it might appear that the major theme of discussion is international politics, from the first […]
Human Rights Violation in Kosovo The paper has discussed the massive violation of Human Rights in Kosovo, The International Community’s reaction and actions to the Kosovo crisis, and i have given my suggestions to the community on regard to Kosovo […]
How Has Globalization Impacted on Issues of Human Rights? William Adler closely examines the disrupted lives of the three women who occupy an assembly-line job as the job and its company moves from New Jersey to rural Mississippi and to Matamoros, Mexico, across the […]
Protecting America: Security and Human Rights 2007) After the 9/11 bombings of the World Trade Center, the US government under President Bush executed and implemented a series of actions that catapulted the country to a period of war.
Refugee Women and Their Human Rights According to the researches have been made by UNHCR, 1998, found that 80% of the refugees immigrating to the United States and other countries of second asylum are women or children.
Human Systems. Technology as a Human Right Since most of the world bodies continue to use the basic technology to communicate with the world e.g.about health and safety, access to these amodern’ basic technology should be regarded as a human right and […]
Prisoners’ Human Rights Denial Human rights watch is required to create a standardized list of rights and guarantees that should affect both domestic and international institutions in order to ensure the application of basic human rights, such as the […]
Global and Regional Human Rights Institutions Overall, the topic of human rights and their protection through economic sanctions and other strategies requires additional attention from the states and international institutions.
Prisoners’ Basic Human Rights and Their Violation In the report, McKelvie et al.highlight the important contradictions behind the blanket ban, namely the lack of understanding behind the purpose of the prison, the influence of the media and the public press, as well […]
Human Rights of Migrants by Francois Crepeau The report by Francois Crepeau addresses the deaths of migrants in the central Mediterranean Sea and evaluates the European Union border control analysis, migration policy, and the application of values and human rights in the […]
Monsanto: Profits, Laws, and Human Rights Although the majority of multinational giants have affirmed their conviction in upholding the letter of the law and professional ethics, in practice, a good portion of them has issues with either the ethical or the […]
Human Rights and Dignity: Non-Western Conceptions It has been accepted that human rights are the notion which was developed in the West, however, some scientists tried to contradict this idea presenting the arguments that many nations battled for human rights many […]
Human Rights Issues During the Holiday Season Should we stick to the habitual “Merry Christmas” and stay loyal to the traditions of the majority or embrace a more neutral “Happy Holidays” and show respect to the cultural diversity?
Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice It is essential to highlight the contributions of Ghonim because he was one of the first to leverage the use of social media.
Human Rights of Poor in Developing Countries Their interactions with those in authority and the decision makers in the society have been marred with many obstacles and denied the rights to freedom of speech and expression that is being enjoyed by the […]
Communication as a Human Right and Its Violations According to the international laws, every person has a range of rights which should be met in the society completely, and the right to communicate is one of the most significant ways for a person […]
Human Rights and Relations in Education and Career The information is located on the left and above and is easy to navigate. This is useful to the employees as it makes them aware of the key needs to the job and the benefits.
China’s Land Grabs and Human Rights Violation What interested you about the article and how is the content of the article related to aspects of global citizenship? Upon reading the news article from Amnesty International’s website about Chinese officials’ land grabbing […]
The Human Rights and Its Basic Principles There is a perspective that the initiation of the given process can be justified by the need to protect citizens and the state.
Human Rights in Naturalistic and Political Conceptions Conferring to one venerable explanation, the Naturalistic Conception of Human rights, human rights are the privileges and rights that we enjoy by the mere fact that we are humans.
Islamic Culture, Its History and Human Rights The Christian and Jewish cultures gradually reshaped the Arabian Peninsula; people of Arabia became more accustomed to the concept of Abrahamic religion, while paganism was on the decline. Various forms of arts flourished in the […]
Theocratic Government’s Census and Human Rights The primary idea of the paper is to disclose moral opacities of the issue, conduct stakeholder impact analysis, and speculate on the collision of values of the theocratic governments and people.
History of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Things did not look too bright at the time: the condition of Japan after Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings; the divided Koreas; the beginning of the cold war between the Soviet Union and the U.
Equality, Diversity and Human Rights in Healthcare Equity can be achieved in a health system that acknowledges the diversity of the population respecting the expectations and needs of the patients, the staff and the services as a whole.
Syrian Crisis and Human Rights Instruments However, the increase in the number of migrants triggers a range of concerns for the states that they choose as the target location.
Culture and Religion in Human Rights Universality Fagan asserts that a commitment to the universal legitimacy of human rights is not consistent with the dedication to the principle of respecting cultural diversity.
Consequentialism and Human Rights Ethics is a moral code that governs the behavior or conduct of an activity.”Ethics is thus said to be the science of conduct”.
The Evolution of Human Rights: France vs. America The Age of Enlightenment made human rights one of the major concerns of the world community, which led to the American and French Revolutions the turning points in the struggle for justice.
Ethical Reasoning Theories and Human Rights Utilitarianism involves the assessment of the consequences of any action taken by the business since it involves a common good for the majority.
Human Rights and Resistance of South Asia To get an in-depth understanding of the question and discuss it appropriately, we will refer to the status of women in South Asia where women’s rights are still discriminated in the light of social and […]
The Issues of Human Rights The scope of this review starts from the history of Labour Human Rights and examines how various authors have presented their case studies regarding the effectiveness or lack of it of the policies that govern […]
International Justice for Human Rights Violation In order to understand the status of these amendments, it is important to appreciate the relevance of the definition given in reference to acts and the crime of aggression.
Human Rights and Climate Change Policy-Making Advocates of the inclusion of human rights feel that there is an important link between climate impacts and human rights and as such, integrating the two would promote the formulation of the best policies. Specifically, […]
Just War in Human Rights Perspective When a war is about to begin, people, who start the war, have to understand the role of human rights in the process of making decisions and clearly identify the peculiarities of the just war.
The Human Right to Privacy: Microsoft and the NSA Microsoft had started to collaborate with the NSA to help it to offer services to its customers, but as they progressed, the NSA began to access all the programs of the Microsoft that made private […]
Economics and Human Rights: Intersecting Theories Theories allied to the two disciplines play a critical role in explaining development because human rights theories give economists an opportunity to employ legal and political concepts in the process of drafting policies aimed at […]
Human Rights and Legal Framework in Poor Countries In this article, Benton traces the origin of international order to the 17th century. Moreover, Benton claims that the two approaches have been utilized to explain effect of imperial administration on trends in international law.
Women’s Fight for Equal Human Rights According to the readings assigned, the term feminist could be used to refer to people who fought for the rights of women.
Immigrants’ Human Rights in America: The Issue of Immigration as Old as the Country In order to make the constitution a living document, America should introduce effective measures in ensuring that the rights of all immigrants are fully recognized, secured and protected.
The Human Right to Water: History, Meaning and Controversy The utilitarianism theory of ethics relates to the welfare rights and the libertarianism theory of ethics relates to the liberty rights.
The Evolution of Human Rights in Canada In addition, the movements aided the treaties to champion for the acquisition of rights of associations and political developments among the indigenous communities living in Canada.
Human Rights and Their Role in Public Opinion Making The quest for human rights create a mental picture that draws the audience’s assumed knowledge of the need to end the restrictions of human beings in their endeavor to reach out to greatness in life.
Human Rights and Intervention in Public Opinion Making According to Bloomer, human rights demonstrate the public ideas that are used in the media and politics to ensure that they reflect the true meaning of the intended actions.
Gender Studies: Queer Politics and Human Rights As earlier stated, the idea of queer politics came about to confront injustice and to ensure that the rights of the minority groups in the society are respected.
Human Rights Issues in the Bahrain Members of the Sunni minority are the rulers of the monarchy; the present king is Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, and he has held the office since 1999.
Conflict Over Human Rights The following discussion is a description concerning the conflicts between Iran and the United States in the promotion of human rights some violations of human rights by Iran, such as abuse of the captives.
Human Rights in Relation to Catholic Theology The church declared the acts of slavery as infamy and conjured to discourage slavery since it was dishonored God and destroyed the lived of many people.
The Ontario Human Rights Commission Application forms for job seekers and the process of interviewing applicants are usually subjected to all the mentioned elements of prejudice and discrimination.
Torture and Human Rights However, the full state of affairs in Abu Ghraib prison came to the knowledge of the public when a report by the military into the first pictures leaked to an online magazine.
Why Migration Cannot Be a Basic Human Right but Always Been a Part of Human Culture The United Nations has acknowledged the individual right of movement with Article 13-2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights stating, “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return […]
Human Rights Violations in Chile In order to confront past abuses and human rights violations, both civilian collaborators and the past military officers who took part in the violations have been taken through the prosecution process owing to the torture […]
Human Rights in 21st Century: China Although there have been cases of human rights violations in China, recent events and efforts depict the country as working towards promoting individual rights.
Faith, Justice, War – and Human Rights in the Realm of the Present-Day World Quran: The Most Ancient and Sacred Islamic Book as the Basis for the Laws on Human Rights Considering the Issue from a Different Perspective: The Fifteen Postulates Security of life and property: bi-al haqq and […]
Ethical Relativism in Human Rights To support this point of view, the nature of human society, the standardization of human rights and the progress of human rights will be analyzed.
Human Rights and NGOs In the world today, there are numerous international human rights treaties which stipulate the obligations of states, and the rights of the citizens in these states and beyond2.
Human Rights Issues in Guantanamo Bay It is expressed in the article that although the detainees are international criminals, the move by the US to detain them at the Guantanamo Bay is an abuse of international laws on the human rights.
The Human Rights Violation in the Republic of Korea The human rights situation under President Kim Jong-Un in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has remained dire due to the government’s unwillingness to yield to the recommendations by the United Nations Human Rights Council’s […]
International Human Rights Law The civil and political rights preceded the origins of the economic, social, and cultural rights, and thus they are deemed as second-generation rights.
Gender and Human Rights The concept of a Human of Rights introduced by Foucault in 1950s, and also referred to as humanity is traditionally defined as a “floating signifier” and is related directly to the idea of human rights.
The Politics of International Human Rights Law To uphold the reliability of the country’s immigration programs, the policy requires three categories of immigrants to be subjected to compulsory incarceration.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights UDHR is quite relevant to human service professionals in the field of domestic disputes. The assertions of UDHR’s article 25 are important to domestic dispute professionals.
Turkey, Media and Human Rights According the report, “press freedom, freedom of opinion and expression and presumption of innocence should be exercised within the articles of the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey, Turkish Supreme Court decisions and judgments of […]
Paul Farmer about the Human Rights As a result, Farmer argued that the current struggle for the essential and most vital human rights was to promote the social, as well as the economic rights of the poor individuals around the globe.
“Feminism, Peace, Human Rights and Human Security” by Charlotte Bunch To help understand the concept of globalization, the author uses the scale, contradictions and the uncertainty associated with globalization. What are the alternative methods that can be applied to demonstrate globalization?
The Objectives of Women in the International Community The need to increase the participation of women and the girl child in the civil society organisations must aim to strengthen women human rights.
Human Rights Violations in Turkey It is due to this that the current strategy of the EU is to seek to advance human rights in Turkey in such a way that the most detrimental aspects of preventing the country from […]
Human Rights of People With Intellectual Disabilities Since disability is not inability, human rights’ advocates argue that perception of people with disabilities as disabled is discriminative and therefore call for their recognition as a minority people with unique abilities that do not […]
The Effect of Terrorism on Human Rights: The Clash Between the Human Rights Advocates and Victims of Terrorism Human Rights organizations have the responsibility to ensure that the governments and other counter terrorism officials respect the human rights and the law in their fight against terrorism.
The European Human Rights System Despite the efforts of the European human rights system to establish a common system of legislation to guide the implementation of the human rights in all the member states, the specific laws of the states […]
Human Rights Interventions Mindful declarations therefore strive to educate and promote the respect for rights and freedoms and implementation of progressive measures that secure the recognition of the importance and observance of the freedoms and rights3.
Fighting for Human Rights: Somalia Humanitarian Crisis As a result, it was only the rich, the powerful and the elite who enjoyed the powers and privileges of the community at the expense of the less fortunate individuals in the society.
The Role of Non-state Actors in the Implementation and Monitoring of Human Rights Various human rights international and local organizations have come up with strategies that aid in the implementation of human rights laws and monitoring and evaluation of the standards.
The concept of Human Rights Many of the fundamental initiatives, which animated the human rights movement, emerged in the after effects of the World War II and the mayhem of the Holocaust, leading to the legitimation of the Universal Declaration […]
The UN Human Rights System The rights speak of a general importance of the people having the equal rights to others and living together in the spirit of brotherhood.
The European System of Human Rights
Human Rights: Universalism, Marxism, Communitarianism
Environmental Groups’ and Human Rights Organization Strategies
Immigrants and Human Rights
Human Rights in History Teaching
Is Universal Healthcare a Human Right?
Confucianism and its Effects on Human Rights Development
Debate Between John Stuart Mill and Immanuel Kant Theories on the Sources of Human Rights
United Nations Human Rights Council
Critique of the U.S & the U.N Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Definition of Human Rights and Trafficking
Challenges for Universal Human Rights
Human Rights in Asia
Human rights and freedoms
The human rights in the USA and around the world
On What Grounds is the Idea of Universal Human Rights Challenged?
Advancement of Human Rights from 1865 to Present
Disabled Babies Have Human Rights Which We Must Let Them Enjoy
The Impact of Human Right on Globalization
Concerning the Human Rights of Immigrants: Policies, Approaches and Stereotypes
Protection of Human Rights of Immigrants
What is the UN Human Rights Council?
New “Act on Democracy and Human Rights in Belarus” Passed by the US Congress
Human Rights in Serial ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’
Through the Prism of Culture: Human Rights as They Are
Compare Two Movies Related With Human Rights
Human Rights: Analysis of Ludlow Massacre and the “Valour and the Horror”
Ang Lee’s Attempts to Develop an Idea of Human Rights in Hulk, Brokeback Mountain, and Sense and Sensibility
Saddam Hussein Human Rights Abuse
The Cold War: Global Prosperity and Human Rights
Human Rights in Catholic Teachings
Abusing Human Rights: Violence Against Women
What if Environmental Rights Are More Important Than Human Rights?
How Did the Development of Human Rights Affect the Caste System in India?
Should Men and Women Have Equal Human Rights?
How Are Human Rights Observed During Early Childhood?
What Are the Barriers to Human Rights Being Recognized as Truly Universal in Application?
How Does Criminal Justice in the United Kingdom Respect Human Rights?
What Is the Role of the National Human Rights Commission?
How Are Human Rights Abused in India?
What Is the Relationship Between Human Rights and State Sovereignty?
How Are Human Rights Observed in Islamic Countries?
What Are Human Rights and From Where Do They Originate?
How Were Human Rights Violated During the French Revolution?
How Human Rights Affect Administrative Law?
What Human Rights Dilemmas Do Social Workers Face?
How Does Political Corruption Violate Human Rights?
Who Practices Rights-based Development?
When Religious Beliefs Overpower Human Rights?
Why Does China Have Such a Poor Record of Human Rights?
How Does Human Rights Affect Multi-national Companies on Their Marketing Strategies?
What Is the History of the Spread of Human Rights in the World and the Obstacles in Its Way?
What Are the Human Rights for Persons With Mental Disorders?
How Are Human Rights Abused in the Absence of Oversight?
What Is the Economic Impact on Human Rights in China?
Why Have Many Human Rights Issues Remained Unaddressed?
What Are the Concepts and Meaning of Human Rights in Society?
What Effect Has the Human Rights Act 1998 Had on UK Law?
How Do Self-determination Issues Affect Human Rights?
Impact of Economic Liberalization on Human Rights?
How Does Global Politics Affect Human Rights?
Should Nature Have Constitutionally Protected Rights Equal to Human Rights?
Activist Essay Titles
Constitution Research Ideas
Discrimination Essay Titles
Equality Topics
Criminal Justice Essay Topics
Police Brutality Questions
Corruption Ideas
Libertarianism Research Topics
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Human Rights Law Research Paper Topics

This page presents a comprehensive guide on human rights law research paper topics tailored for law students assigned with research paper tasks. The page aims to provide comprehensive guidance and resources to students studying law and assigned with research paper tasks in the field of human rights law. It presents a diverse range of research paper topics related to human rights law, covering ten distinct categories, each containing ten topics for exploration. Furthermore, the page includes an in-depth article on human rights law, tips on selecting compelling human rights law research paper topics, and guidelines for writing a successful research paper. The page also highlights the custom writing services offered by iResearchNet, tailored to meet students’ academic needs and requirements in the domain of human rights law.

100 Human Rights Law Research Paper Topics

In the realm of human rights law, the depth and breadth of research topics are vast, reflecting the complexities of the field and its dynamic nature. This comprehensive list of human rights law research paper topics spans ten categories, each presenting ten engaging and thought-provoking subjects for exploration. From international perspectives to domestic applications, these topics cover various dimensions of human rights law, shedding light on critical issues, ongoing challenges, and evolving debates. Whether students are interested in human rights advocacy, humanitarian law, discrimination, or constitutional protections, this list aims to inspire and equip them with the right tools to embark on their research journey.

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Freedom of Expression and Hate Speech Laws: Striking a Balance
The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age: Challenges and Protections
Religious Freedom and the Clash of Beliefs in Pluralistic Societies
LGBTQ+ Rights and the Pursuit of Equality: Legal Progress and Challenges
Racial Profiling and Discrimination: Addressing Systemic Biases
Women’s Rights and Gender Equality: Empowerment and Legal Reforms
The Rights of Persons with Disabilities: Inclusion and Accessibility
Juvenile Justice and Youth Rights: Restorative Approaches
The Right to Education: Ensuring Access and Quality
Combating Human Trafficking: Legal Frameworks and Anti-Trafficking Efforts
Universal Human Rights Declarations and International Enforcement
The Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in Promoting Human Rights
The United Nations Human Rights Council: Achievements and Limitations
International Criminal Court and the Pursuit of Accountability for Atrocities
The Impact of Customary International Law on Human Rights Norms
Regional Human Rights Systems: Advancing Rights Protection in Specific Areas
The Intersection of Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law
Diplomacy and Human Rights: Balancing National Interests and Global Responsibilities
Economic Sanctions and Human Rights: Assessing Their Effectiveness and Consequences
The Responsibility to Protect: Sovereignty and Humanitarian Interventions
Income Inequality and Human Rights: Addressing Economic Disparities
Access to Healthcare as a Human Right: Equity and Universal Coverage
Housing Rights and Homelessness: Legal Strategies for Housing Security
Environmental Justice and Human Rights: Protecting Vulnerable Communities
Indigenous Rights and Land Restitution: Recognizing Past Injustices
The Impact of Armed Conflicts on Human Rights and Refugee Crisis
Discrimination and Marginalization of Minority Groups: Legal Responses
Labor Rights and Worker Protections: Fair Employment Practices
Human Rights and Access to Justice: Overcoming Barriers to Legal Remedies
Rights of Migrants and Refugees: Challenges in Migration Policies
Capital Punishment and Human Rights: Abolition and Alternatives
The Right to a Fair Trial: Legal Safeguards and Due Process
Prison Conditions and Human Rights: Rehabilitation vs. Punishment
Police Accountability and Use of Force: Balancing Public Safety and Rights
Juvenile Justice Reform: Rethinking Punishment for Young Offenders
Human Rights Implications of Cybercrime and Cybersecurity Measures
Counterterrorism Laws and Civil Liberties: Balancing Security and Rights
The Rights of Victims and Witness Protection in Criminal Proceedings
Criminalization of Drug Use and Human Rights: Health Approaches vs. Punitive Measures
Human Rights and the Right to Legal Representation: Ensuring Access to Counsel
Reproductive Rights and Women’s Health: Legal Battles and Access to Care
Mental Health Law and Human Rights: Balancing Autonomy and Protection
Access to Medicines and Patent Rights: Global Health Equity
Medical Ethics and Human Rights: Informed Consent and Research Ethics
LGBTQ+ Health Rights and Healthcare Disparities: Advocacy and Legal Reforms
Disability Rights and Healthcare Accessibility: Accommodations and Inclusion
The Right to Die with Dignity: Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia Laws
Human Rights Implications of COVID-19 Pandemic Response: Balancing Public Health and Liberties
Substance Use and Harm Reduction: Public Health Approaches and Legal Barriers
Health Rights of Refugees and Displaced Persons: Challenges in Providing Care
Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflicts: Legal Frameworks and Challenges
The Right to Seek Asylum: International Refugee Law and Responsibilities
War Crimes and International Justice: The Role of International Criminal Tribunals
Human Rights Implications of Autonomous Weapons and Military Technologies
The Role of Humanitarian Organizations in Conflict Zones: Safety and Access
The Responsibility to Protect: Preventing Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity
Human Rights and Internally Displaced Persons: Legal Recognition and Protections
The Impact of Armed Conflicts on Children’s Rights: Child Soldiers and Protection Measures
Gender-Based Violence in Armed Conflicts: Legal Responses and Accountability
Humanitarian Interventions and the Sovereignty Debate: Balancing Global Responsibility and Non-Interference
The Right to a Healthy Environment: Environmental Protections and Human Rights
Climate Change and Human Rights: Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies
Indigenous Rights and Environmental Conservation: Balancing Preservation and Development
Environmental Justice and Communities of Color: Overcoming Environmental Racism
The Impact of Extractive Industries on Human Rights and Environmental Preservation
Biodiversity Conservation and Indigenous Peoples’ Rights: Conflict and Collaboration
The Right to Water and Sanitation: Access and Equity in Water Management
Land Rights and Environmental Protection: Balancing Development and Conservation
Environmental Impact Assessments and Human Rights: Ensuring Accountability and Participation
The Role of the International Court of Justice in Protecting Human Rights
The United Nations Human Rights Council and its Effectiveness in Promoting Rights
Human Rights in Regional Organizations: The European Court of Human Rights
The Role of International NGOs in Monitoring and Advocating for Human Rights
International Human Rights Mechanisms and State Compliance: Challenges and Achievements
The Role of Human Rights in International Trade Agreements and Economic Cooperation
Human Rights in Armed Conflict: The Geneva Conventions and Customary International Law
International Criminal Law and Prosecution of Human Rights Violations
The Role of the United Nations in Protecting Children’s Rights
Human Rights and Peacekeeping Operations: Balancing Security and Rights
Digital Privacy and Human Rights: Challenges in the Age of Big Data
The Right to Freedom of Expression in the Digital Era: Censorship and Online Speech
Human Rights Implications of Artificial Intelligence and Automation
Surveillance and Human Rights: Balancing Security and Privacy
The Right to Internet Access as a Human Right: Universal Connectivity and Digital Equity
Online Harassment and Cyberbullying: Legal Protections and Remedies
Data Protection and Human Rights: Ensuring Personal Information Security
Intellectual Property Rights and Access to Knowledge: Copyright and Cultural Rights
The Right to Information and Government Transparency: Open Data and Accountability
The Use of Drones in Armed Conflicts: Ethical and Legal Implications
The Role of Human Rights Activism in Advancing Social Change
The Intersectionality of Human Rights: Addressing Multiple Forms of Discrimination
Indigenous Rights Movements and Land Justice: Advocacy and Legal Strategies
The LGBTQ+ Rights Movement: Progress and Challenges in the Fight for Equality
Women’s Rights Movements and Legal Reforms: Empowerment and Gender Equality
Disability Rights Advocacy and the Fight for Inclusion and Accessibility
Youth-Led Movements for Climate Justice and Environmental Rights
The Black Lives Matter Movement and Police Accountability: Demanding Justice and Reform
Human Rights and Migrant Rights Movements: Standing for Justice and Dignity
Human Rights and Corporate Accountability: Advocating for Corporate Social Responsibility

The field of human rights law presents a dynamic landscape with a plethora of research paper topics that delve into critical social, political, and ethical issues. The ten categories presented here offer students a panoramic view of the diverse and interrelated areas within human rights law. As they embark on their research endeavors, students have the opportunity to explore the complexities and implications of human rights from various perspectives, both nationally and globally. The ever-evolving nature of human rights law ensures that this field will continue to inspire and challenge scholars, advocates, and policymakers in their pursuit of justice, equality, and human dignity. Whether it is advocating for marginalized communities, addressing humanitarian crises, or examining the intersection of technology and human rights, these topics will empower students to contribute meaningfully to the discourse and advancement of human rights principles worldwide. The journey of human rights research is both transformative and empowering, offering the potential to effect positive change in the lives of millions.

Human Rights Law: Exploring the Range of Topics

Human rights law is a dynamic and critical field that addresses the fundamental rights and freedoms inherent to all human beings. Rooted in the belief in the inherent dignity and worth of every individual, human rights law seeks to protect and promote these rights, ensuring that all people can live in equality, freedom, and peace. As a multidimensional area of study, human rights law offers a wide range of research paper topics that delve into the complexities of international and domestic legal frameworks, the intersections between human rights and other fields of law, and the evolving challenges in safeguarding human rights in an ever-changing world.

The Universality and Cultural Relativism of Human Rights : The concept of human rights raises intriguing questions about the universality of rights versus the cultural relativism of values. Research papers in this category may explore the tensions between universal human rights norms and cultural practices, analyzing how cultural contexts can impact the interpretation and implementation of human rights.
Human Rights and Armed Conflicts : Armed conflicts present severe challenges to human rights, with civilian populations often suffering the most. Human rights law research paper topics in this area may focus on the protection of human rights during armed conflicts, including issues of war crimes, humanitarian law, and the role of international institutions in ensuring accountability for human rights violations.
Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights : Economic, social, and cultural rights are essential components of human rights law, emphasizing access to education, healthcare, housing, and social security. Research papers may analyze the legal frameworks and challenges in implementing these rights, especially in the context of poverty, inequality, and socio-economic development.
Human Rights and Refugees : The plight of refugees and asylum seekers is a pressing human rights issue worldwide. Research topics in this area may examine the legal protections and challenges faced by refugees, the role of international organizations in supporting displaced populations, and the impacts of immigration policies on human rights.
Human Rights and Discrimination : Discrimination on various grounds, such as race, gender, religion, and disability, continues to be a significant human rights concern. Research papers may explore legal frameworks and strategies to combat discrimination, including the role of affirmative action, equality laws, and anti-discrimination policies.
Freedom of Expression and Media Rights : Freedom of expression is a cornerstone of human rights law, and the media plays a crucial role in fostering democracy and accountability. Research topics in this category may delve into issues of media freedom, censorship, and the balance between free speech and hate speech.
Human Rights and Technology : Advancements in technology bring both opportunities and challenges to human rights protection. Research papers in this area may examine issues such as digital privacy, surveillance, artificial intelligence, and the right to access information in the digital age.
Human Rights and Health : Health is intricately linked to human rights, as access to healthcare is a fundamental right. Research topics may explore the right to health and the challenges in ensuring equitable access to healthcare services, especially in vulnerable populations.
Gender and Human Rights : Gender equality is a central theme in human rights law, and research papers in this category may focus on women’s rights, LGBTQ+ rights, and the intersections between gender and other human rights issues.
Human Rights and Business : The impact of business practices on human rights has become a significant area of concern. Research topics may explore corporate social responsibility, business and human rights initiatives, and the role of businesses in upholding human rights standards.

The realm of human rights law is vast and multifaceted, covering a wide array of topics and issues that demand critical examination and research. From armed conflicts to economic disparities, from refugees’ rights to media freedom, and from technology to health, the field of human rights law offers a rich landscape for exploration and advocacy. As students and scholars delve into these research paper topics, they engage in crucial discussions on human rights protection, social justice, and the promotion of dignity and equality for all. By striving for a deeper understanding of human rights and their complexities, we contribute to creating a more just, compassionate, and rights-respecting world. At iResearchNet, we are committed to supporting students in their academic pursuits by providing expert assistance and custom research paper writing services that adhere to the highest standards of quality and excellence. Together, let us explore the frontiers of human rights law and work towards a future where human rights are upheld and protected for every individual, without exception.

How to Choose a Human Rights Law Topic

Choosing a compelling and relevant research paper topic is a crucial step in the academic journey of students studying human rights law. As a multifaceted and evolving field, human rights law offers a vast array of topics to explore, each with its unique challenges and opportunities. However, the abundance of choices can also be overwhelming, leaving students unsure of where to begin. In this section, we will provide valuable insights and practical tips on how to select the most suitable and engaging human rights law research paper topics.

Identify Your Interests and Passions : The first step in choosing a research paper topic is to reflect on your personal interests and passions within the field of human rights law. What particular human rights issues resonate with you the most? Are you drawn to topics related to gender equality, access to healthcare, refugees’ rights, or freedom of expression? Identifying your interests will not only make the research process more enjoyable but also enable you to invest the necessary time and effort into producing a compelling and meaningful paper.
Conduct Preliminary Research : Before finalizing a research paper topic, it is essential to conduct preliminary research to gain a broader understanding of the current state of knowledge in the chosen area. Review academic journals, books, policy papers, and reports related to your potential topics. This preliminary research will not only help you refine your topic but also identify any gaps in the existing literature that you could address in your research.
Consider the Scope and Feasibility : While it may be tempting to choose a broad and ambitious topic, it is essential to consider the scope and feasibility of your research. A topic that is too broad may lack focus, while a topic that is too narrow may limit your ability to find sufficient research material. Strike a balance between a topic that is comprehensive enough to explore in-depth and one that is manageable within the scope of your research project.
Examine Current Debates and Controversies : Human rights law is often marked by ongoing debates and controversies surrounding certain issues. Exploring topics that are currently subject to heated discussions allows you to contribute to these debates and engage with cutting-edge research. Consider topics related to emerging challenges in human rights protection, the implications of new technologies on human rights, or the impact of global events on human rights law.
Consult with Professors and Peers : Seek guidance and feedback from your professors, advisors, and peers during the topic selection process. Discussing your ideas with knowledgeable individuals can provide valuable insights and help you refine your research focus. They can also suggest additional resources and research directions that you may not have considered.
Choose a Researchable and Original Topic : Select a research paper topic that is not only interesting but also researchable and original. Ensure that there is a sufficient amount of credible sources and data available for your chosen topic. Additionally, strive to bring a unique perspective or approach to your research to contribute new insights to the field of human rights law.
Stay Updated on Current Events : Human rights issues are dynamic and influenced by current events and global developments. Keep yourself updated on recent news, legal developments, and policy changes related to human rights. Monitoring current events will help you identify timely and relevant research paper topics that address real-world challenges.
Consider the Impact and Real-World Relevance : Choose a research paper topic that has practical significance and real-world relevance. Human rights law is not merely an academic exercise; it has a direct impact on the lives of individuals and communities worldwide. Consider topics that have the potential to contribute to positive change, promote human rights awareness, or address pressing human rights challenges.
Be Open to Flexibility and Adaptation : As you delve deeper into your research, be open to adapting and refining your research paper topic based on new insights and findings. Sometimes, the direction of your research may evolve, and being flexible in your approach allows you to produce a more nuanced and comprehensive paper.
Seek Inspiration from iResearchNet : At iResearchNet, we understand the significance of choosing the right research paper topic. Our team of expert writers and researchers is well-versed in various areas of human rights law and can provide valuable insights and inspiration to help you select the perfect topic for your research paper. With our assistance, you can embark on a journey of exploration and discovery, delving into the complexities and nuances of human rights law while making a meaningful contribution to the field.

Selecting a research paper topic in human rights law requires careful consideration and thoughtful reflection. By identifying your interests, conducting preliminary research, and staying updated on current events, you can choose a topic that is not only academically stimulating but also relevant and impactful. At iResearchNet, we are committed to supporting students in their academic pursuits by offering expert guidance and custom research paper writing services. Together, let us embark on a journey of academic excellence and advocacy, working towards a world where human rights are upheld and protected for all.

How to Write a Human Rights Law Research Paper

Writing a research paper in the field of human rights law requires careful planning, thorough research, and a clear understanding of the subject matter. As you embark on this academic endeavor, you will encounter various challenges and opportunities to delve deep into the complexities of human rights issues. In this section, we will provide you with a comprehensive guide on how to write a compelling and impactful human rights law research paper.

Understand the Research Question : The first step in writing a research paper is to understand and define your research question. Your research question should be clear, focused, and specific, addressing a particular aspect of human rights law. It should guide your research and provide a framework for your paper.
Conduct In-Depth Research : Human rights law is a multidisciplinary field that draws on legal principles, international treaties, ethical considerations, and socio-political aspects. To write an authoritative research paper, conduct in-depth research from a variety of credible sources, including academic journals, legal databases, government publications, and reputable websites. Take notes and organize your findings to support your arguments effectively.
Create an Outline : Organize your research and ideas by creating a well-structured outline for your research paper. An outline helps you maintain a logical flow of information, ensuring that your paper is cohesive and coherent. Divide your paper into sections and subsections, each addressing a specific aspect of your research question.
Develop a Strong Thesis Statement : Craft a clear and concise thesis statement that summarizes the main argument of your research paper. Your thesis statement should convey the purpose of your paper and guide readers on what to expect throughout the document.
Introduction : Begin your research paper with an engaging introduction that provides background information on the human rights issue you are addressing. Introduce the significance of the topic, explain its relevance in the context of human rights law, and present your thesis statement.
Literature Review : Incorporate a literature review section in your research paper to discuss the existing body of knowledge on the topic. Analyze and critically evaluate relevant studies, theories, and legal cases related to your research question. Identify any gaps or inconsistencies in the literature that your research aims to address.
Methodology : If your research paper involves empirical research or data analysis, outline your methodology in this section. Describe the research design, data collection methods, and data analysis techniques you used to obtain results. Explain how your chosen methodology aligns with your research question and contributes to the overall understanding of the human rights issue.
Analysis and Findings : Present your research findings and analyze the data in the context of your research question. Use evidence and examples from your research to support your arguments. Analyze the implications of your findings on the human rights issue and its potential impact on policies, laws, or practices.
Discussion : In the discussion section, interpret your research findings and relate them to the existing body of knowledge. Address any limitations or challenges encountered during your research and suggest avenues for further exploration.
Conclusion : Summarize the key points of your research paper in the conclusion section. Restate your thesis statement and highlight the main findings of your study. Discuss the implications of your research on human rights law and suggest potential areas for future research.
Citations and Referencing : Properly cite all the sources used in your research paper following the required citation style (e.g., APA, MLA, Chicago). Accurate referencing is essential to give credit to the original authors and avoid plagiarism.
Proofreading and Editing : Before submitting your research paper, thoroughly proofread and edit it to eliminate any grammatical errors, typos, or inconsistencies. Ensure that your paper adheres to the formatting and style guidelines provided by your instructor or academic institution.

Writing a human rights law research paper is a rewarding and intellectually stimulating experience. By understanding your research question, conducting in-depth research, and organizing your paper effectively, you can produce a compelling and impactful piece of academic work. Remember to stay focused on your thesis statement and support your arguments with credible evidence. At iResearchNet, we understand the challenges of writing a research paper and are here to support you with expert guidance and custom research paper writing services. Together, let us contribute to the advancement of human rights knowledge and advocate for a more just and equitable world.

iResearchNet’s Custom Research Paper Writing Services

At iResearchNet, we understand the significance of human rights law and its impact on shaping a just and equitable society. We recognize that students pursuing law studies often face various academic challenges, including the task of writing comprehensive and well-researched research papers on complex human rights issues. To support students in their academic journey and contribute to the advancement of human rights knowledge, we offer custom human rights law research paper writing services. Our team of expert degree-holding writers is dedicated to providing top-quality, customized solutions tailored to meet your specific research needs. With our comprehensive services, you can embark on a seamless and rewarding research paper writing experience.

Expert Degree-Holding Writers : At iResearchNet, we have a team of expert writers with advanced degrees in law and human rights-related fields. Our writers possess extensive knowledge of human rights principles, international treaties, and legal frameworks, enabling them to craft well-informed and insightful research papers.
Custom Written Works : We understand that each research paper is unique, and therefore, we offer fully custom-written papers designed to meet your specific requirements. Our writers conduct in-depth research on your chosen topic and tailor the paper to align with your research question and academic guidelines.
In-Depth Research : Our writers are adept at conducting comprehensive and in-depth research from a variety of credible sources, ensuring that your research paper is well-supported with evidence and examples.
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With iResearchNet’s custom human rights law research paper writing services, you can unlock the full potential of your academic journey. Our team of expert writers is here to support you in exploring the complexities of human rights law and contributing to the advancement of this critical field. Whether you need assistance in choosing a research topic, conducting in-depth research, or crafting a well-structured paper, we are here to assist you every step of the way. Empower your human rights law research with iResearchNet and make a meaningful impact on the world.

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LL.M thesis topics

On this page you can find an overview of all our LL.M thesis topics or Master theses in English.

Do you want to write your LL.M thesis on a human rights topic? Choose one of these topics and contact the relevant supervisor. Do you want to write a Master thesis in English? First consult the Plato list.

All subjects in the domain of human rights or transitional justice in which the student applies a socio-legal perspective ann integrates a substantial empirical component (qualitative and/or quantitative) to examine the law “in practice”.

Across Europe and around the world, issues of memory and old monuments are being revisited. The shift of historical narratives resulted in the loss of social consensus about the past and interpretation of history. Since monuments are among the most visible expressions of history they have appeared in the middle of contestation and heated debates. […]

This research deals with the impact of prosecution of “minor offences” on people living in poverty in Europe. Through case studies (criminalization of beggars, SyRI case in the Netherlands etc. ), it explores whether minor offences – which are usually punished by outstanding fines with minimum procedural rights – are compatible with the ECHR (more […]

The sovereign debt crisis could have a direct impact on human rights, especially when they are framed within a programme of austerity, and tension between the ‘market justice’ and ‘social justice’ occurs. The aim of the thesis is to study the different human rights legal discourses surrounding the latest cases of sovereign debt restructurings.

Lately, the ‘Facebook Oversight Board’ and other private mechanisms of human rights accountability have been established. The Oversight Board of Facebook was created to review the lawfulness of certain ‘emblematic’ content moderation decisions taken by the social media platform. The Board comprises 20 representatives of civil society, including academics, human rights experts, and journalists. It […]

Regional human rights courts can organize so-called fact-finding missions when confronted with human rights violations. Both the Inter-American and African Court of Human Rights may, if necessary, organize such missions when confronted with cases involving gross and/or large-scale violations of human rights, while the European Court of Human Rights seems to have become rather reticent […]

Human rights defenders around the world are being killed, especially in Latin-American countries. How is the Inter-American human rights system responding to this cruel reality?

During the past years worldwide human rights defenders are being targeted for doing their job. Such attacks may be of a physical, but also of a psychological nature, and they may target the human rights defenders themselves and/or their families. This study aims to evaluatie what kinds of legal mechanisms exist under international law, i.e. […]

Particular focus on Myanmar/Sri Lanka or Cambodia. Language requirement ENG.

Focus on the Mediterranean or boat pushbacks in Southeast Asia. Language requirement Eng.

Study of the marginalisation of certain regions in the TJ process, looking into the importance of socio-economic rights in ICL. Language requirement ENG.

In 2010 Marie-Benedicte Dembour published an article entitled ‘What are Human Rights? Four Schools of Thought’ in Human Rights Quarterly. Her model posits that we do not all conceive of human rights in the same way, but that there are four main conceptions of human rights. She proposes that those who hold a ‘natural’ view […]

The summer of 2015 saw Europe hit by a refugee crisis – or some commentators say – more accurately a crisis in refugee protection. Marie-Benedicte Dembour asserts in an article forthcoming in Questions of International Law that, due to the relative weakness of its past jurisprudence concerning migrants’ rights, the European Court of Human Rights […]

Judges have to act in an impartial manner while deciding cases. The research will examine the breadth of the right to freedom of expression of judges from a cross-cutting international and regional human rights perspective, with possibly a case study.

Suggested by and with cosupervision from PICUM, the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants. How does the package, comprised of the Council’s Facilitation Directive and the Framework Decision, impact undocumented children and families’ ability to secure adequate housing? This research would (i) look at the EU and national legal framework criminalising landlords renting to […]

For many centuries, citizenship has been regarded as the highest degree of affiliation between an individual and a ‘self-governing’ political community’. However, in the last years, the development of programs around the globe are seeking to attract flows of foreign capital by different incentives, including granting legal membership with society in exchange for diverse types […]

During the past decades social rights have become more prominently part of legal studies. However, most studies deal with substantial violations of social rights. This study takes a procedural turn by looking at the instrument of interim measures awarded by international monitoring bodies, thereby focussing on the different UN Treaty Bodies and regional human rights […]

In present-day society indigenous peoples are one of the most vulnerable groups. This study assesses to what extent such groups can rely on interim measures before international human rights monitoring bodies, both at the UN and regional level and to what extent such measures effectively protect their rights.

Worldwide, but especially in the America’s, women human rights defenders are being targeted. Such attacks may be of a physical, but also of a psychological nature, and they may target the human rights defenders themselves and/or their families. This study aims to evaluatie what legal mechanisms are available in the ambit of the Inter-American Human […]

Could be further narrowed down to a particular focus on the UN, European or Inter-American standards of protection. Language requirement ENG & Spanish.

‘Universal jurisdiction’ is a principle of international law based on the recognition that certain crimes are so horrific that they affect the international community as a whole. Universal jurisdiction is therefore a key component in the ﬁght against impunity. This thesis will analyze specific recent cases (for example, concerning Syria) where the principle of universal […]

Study of development of strategic litigation, the possibilities and limitations of using this approach. Language requirement ENG & Spanish.

Case study of the Tunisian court establised to adjudicate cases related to gross violations of human rights. Language requirement ENG.

This thesis will explore the interaction of the United States with the Inter-American System. In particular, it will analyse the Inter-American approach regarding migrants who are minors.

The research should focus on a legal analysis of Strasburg case law on history, when the Court was asked to rule on the so-called ‘historical situations’ (to bring justice to those accused of war crimes, to protect the rights of mass atrocities victims and their relatives, to deal with Holocaust and genocide deniers, to punish […]

Needless to say, having evidence being declared inadmissible can be devastating to a case. Two cases which ended up before the European Court of Human Rights due to the inadmissibility being contested are Cwik v Poland and R.B. v Estoni. In Cwik, the ECtHR agreed that the tape of the interrogation by a gang of […]

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5 Tips for Writing Your Human Rights Research Paper

If you are a human rights student, you will often be asked by your professors to do research on a certain human rights issue and write a research paper. Research papers are considered to be academic writings based on your original research, interpretation and commentary of other research findings. They are done in order to demonstrate your academic knowledge of a certain human rights issue and your acquisition of different research methodologies.

Also read: 10 Tips for conducting human rights research

Do you want to pursue a career in human rights?

Our eBook “ Launching Your Career in Human Rights ” is an in-depth resource designed for those committed to pursuing a career in the human rights field. It covers a wide range of topics, including the types of careers available, the necessary skills and competencies, and the educational pathways that can lead to success in this sector. Whether you’re considering a master’s degree, looking for your first job, or exploring specific human rights issues, this guide offers valuable insights and practical advice. It’s a helpful tool for anyone looking to understand the complexities of working in human rights and how to effectively navigate the challenges and opportunities that come with this important work. Learn more .

Research papers on human rights can focus on any type of human right or a broad overview of human rights. For example, you can focus your research paper on the right to labor or do a research on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which includes 30 human rights. This article offers five tips for writing your human rights research paper with an aim to assist you to keep good organization and focus.

Step 1: Choose a Human Rights Topic

When writing a research paper the first thing you have to do is to choose a topic . So where can you get inspiration? A common tactic is to skim through thesis directories to discover topics or issues that spark your interest. Another option you can try, is to visit your favorite online magazine and look at the articles through a human rights lens. The fashion brand, where you buy your clothes, do they care about human rights? What are the human rights implications of the latest developments in artificial intelligence? What happens when you apply a human rights perspective to the netflix series you saw last week? Human rights are everywhere, and so are the topics for your research paper.

Step 2: Conduct Research

Once you have selected your topic, the next step is to conduct research. This can take various forms. Most students start with skim reading through the available literature. When you are searching an online library, make sure you also use synonyms and similar keywords in your search. It might be possible that your topic is well researched already but that most researchers choose a different term than the one you had in mind to describe the issue.

Look for articles and books that were written by human rights experts that deal with your chosen topic. Articles and books usually contain an empirical research that was already conducted within the field you are writing about. Once you find articles and books about your topic, check out the reference list or bibliography. The sources listed there can be a great tool for you to identify more suitable literature.

A great source for conducting research is the Internet, where you can find scholarly articles , books , journals, blog posts, encyclopedias and case directories . However, make sure you distinguish between invalid sources (i.e. Wikipedia, forums, etc.) and valid sources (i.e. scholarly article published by a university research center). Usually, your professor will outline and define what type of sources are acceptable to use in a research paper (i.e. scholarly articles, books, online journals, media articles etc.).

However, the most important is that information you find is trustworthy and based on facts. Academic publications often go through a rigorous quality assurance process and are thus considered more trustworthy than a message anyone can post on social media without much accountability. Your research paper should be based on at least five reliable sources.

Research traditions also vary in different universities and locations. At universities in Germany and Austria it is more common to reference twenty to fifty sources, even for a short research paper while in the UK less sources and more original writing is often state of the art. Make sure you discuss expectations with your professors especially if you are studying abroad and may be used to a different university system.

Citing well known authors and academics will make your research more reliable and your arguments well supported. It is a common best practice to summarize the key arguments of two or more authors and then, based on the research that has already been done, develop your own thoughts and conclusions around the topic. Once you have collected enough information on your topic, you can begin creating the outline of your research paper and developing your main argument.

Step 3 : Create an Outline

One of the most important steps in writing a research paper is creating a proper outline which will, later on, serve you as a guide and keep you on track. However, prior to creating an outline you should develop your research question and thesis statement which serve as a main idea and central point of your research paper. The arguments in your research paper should revolve around answering your research question ( Is murder a violation of the right to life? ) and testing your thesis statement ( Murder is not considered a violation of the right to life, but killings are considered a violation of the right to life ). The majority of your research paper will be based on arguments to verify or falsify your thesis statement based on facts and reliable sources.

Once you defined your research question and thesis statement, you should be able to create an outline of your research paper which will help you organize your arguments. Creating an outline usually means organizing your thoughts into a linear structure with headings and subheadings presenting the main points of your argument.

Usually, a research paper, no matter what topic concerns, has the following structure:

Title page (This includes the title, the author’s name, date, the university name and name of your professor)
Abstract (This is a brief summary of your research paper with only main points outlined)
Introduction (Introduction should contain your research question, thesis statement and brief background information on the topic with the main arguments presented)
The main body (This part contains several sections in which you are going to summarize, analyze and present your literature findings and your arguments answering your research question and testing your thesis statement. In this part you are also going to explain how you have conducted your research and what research methodologies you used)
Conclusion (In conclusion you should shortly summarize your main arguments and explain the significance of your research. In this part, you should outline whether or not your research question has been answered and if your thesis statement has been confirmed)
Reference and Literature (In this section you will list all references and literature that you have used in your research paper)
Appendix (This section is necessary only if you have any additional information to support your argument such as charts, tables or figures)

Step 4: Write the paper

Once you finished outlining your paper it is time to begin writing. When starting this process it can be helpful to skip the introduction and start with the main body text. Usually, introduction and conclusion are written last because only then you will have a clear picture of your research paper and will be able to summarize it more concretely without skipping the important points. During the writing process you will develop new ideas and thoughts and the paper might move in a different direction that you originally planned. That’s normal but you need to update all aspects of the paper accordingly to ensure everything is consistent.

While writing, organize your arguments into paragraphs in order to get a clear and concise line of arguments. During the writing stage you will consult the literature and information you collected during the phase of conducting a research. However, it is really important to pay attention to how you summarize your literature in order to avoid plagiarism. This means using someone else’s exact words and copying them into your own research paper. Plagiarism is absolutely unacceptable in any academic discipline and considered as a form of theft.

A common way to avoid plagiarism is to paraphrase a certain argument or a fact in your own words and add a footnote to the original source. If you want to use word to word quotes you must mark them with quotation marks. In addition, always make sure to cite at the end from which source the fact or information derived or came from.

When writing, you should always keep in mind that the main purpose behind writing a research paper is to present arguments supported by the evidence from research.

Step 5: Edit, Revise and Celebrate

After you finished writing your research paper it is important to edit and revise it. At this stage, put your paper away for some time to gain distance to your own writing before you come back and revise it. After a few days, you will be able to notice mistakes more clearly and see whether or not you have presented clear and concise arguments. During the edit phase you should check for typos and spelling mistakes and if language you have used is clear and concise. Also, you will be able to notice if there was repetition in some parts of the paper and repetitive words or phrases that could be replaced with synonyms to improve the style of your paper. Once you have handed in your paper, don’t forget to celebrate! One step closer to your human rights masters .

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About the author, ada hasanagic.

Ada Hasanagić is a human rights professional currently working as a researcher at the Delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Previously, Ada graduated with honors from the Sarajevo School of Science and Technology and the University of Buckingham in the fields of Political Science and International Relations. Also, she earned a master’s degree in Democracy and Human Rights from the University of Sarajevo and University of Bologna.

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Human Rights Thesis by Abdeta Emana

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Abdeta Emana

Shahnawaz Laghari

Faghfirly Dufana

HUMAN RIGHTS: BETWEEN UNIVERSALISM AND CULTURAL RELATIVISM

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The concept of human rights over time has gained popularity and recognition. It has been observed that the evolution of human rights in the present era has aroused a lot of debate and controversy as regard its justification and applicability to a human being, by virtue of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Conference in Vienna 1993. These international treaties reconfirmed the validity of the universality of human rights, which has attracted criticizing from cultural relativist scholars like Renteln that it is based on western origin. This paper adopted the doctrinal and analytical research method in examining cultural relativist views such as Renteln's argument on the Universality of Human Rights and Cultural Relativism if Universalism of Human Rights is Western Imperialism? Weakness and Challenges of cultural relativist View on human rights. It was therefore recommended that, in order to end the endless arguments on whether or not human rights are universal, there is a need to convene an international forum where at least a more significant number percentage of nations can form a quorum in resolving the issue.

Pranjal Choudhury

THE AGE OF HUMAN RIGHTS

Edna Raquel Hogemann

The consolidation of relations of global society requires the progressive establishment of a global legal system, consisting of a system of rules-precisely, human rights-as the source and evaluation criteria of positive national rights. This essay aims to contribute to some extent using reflective dialectical methodology, establishing logical-argumentative criteria, based on the dialogue between authors to exercise a critical reflection of the official narrative on the universality of human rights, in addition overcoming the universalism/relativism dichotomy eurocentricaly established by a theory of human rights between universalism and cultural relativism. Introdution There are strong criticisms of the attempts to create a world political order based on the defense of human rights, allowing international organizations and major powers to implement a centralized policy of "humanitarian" intervention, situated above the sovereignty of States, using even of war resources if necessary. In this line of argument, there are those who accuse the West of using "human rights rhetoric" to cover up their true political and economic interests and, through that discourse, impose its policies on the rest of the world. The process leading to the creation and consolidation of human rights is contemporary to the expansion of Europe and the West over the whole world and inextricably linked to this process and its contradictions. If, in the so-called West, the consolidation of some fundamental rights was the result of many struggles and conflicts and wars, non-European countries excluded from this process since the beginning and not infrequently participated as victims. The approach to the issue of human rights comes as a more tortuous issue to jurists faced with dilemmas that have assumed an enormous degree of importance with the intra-frontier and international community and which, at the same time, have not yet achieved unity of thought that allows its organization to ensure universal protection. It is, therefore, relevant to the establishment of a set of universal human rights to try to find, at least, a minimum set of guarantees capable of assuring the dignity of the human person. The very notion of dignity is problematic for the solution of this impasse, as each country, and within each of these countries, each culture sheltered by them, tends to establish its own conception of human dignity. To discuss a theory of human rights necessarily leads to a reference to the juridical theory of this class of rights, enshrined by a range of treaties, conventions and

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Essay on Human Rights: Samples in 500 and 1500

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Jun 20, 2024

Essay writing is an integral part of the school curriculum and various academic and competitive exams like IELTS , TOEFL , SAT , UPSC , etc. It is designed to test your command of the English language and how well you can gather your thoughts and present them in a structure with a flow. To master your ability to write an essay, you must read as much as possible and practise on any given topic. This blog brings you a detailed guide on how to write an essay on Human Rights , with useful essay samples on Human rights.

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The basic human rights, 200 words essay on human rights, 500 words essay on human rights, 500+ words essay on human rights in india, 1500 words essay on human rights, importance of human rights, essay on human rights pdf, what are human rights.

Human rights mark everyone as free and equal, irrespective of age, gender, caste, creed, religion and nationality. The United Nations adopted human rights in light of the atrocities people faced during the Second World War. On the 10th of December 1948, the UN General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Its adoption led to the recognition of human rights as the foundation for freedom, justice and peace for every individual. Although it’s not legally binding, most nations have incorporated these human rights into their constitutions and domestic legal frameworks. Human rights safeguard us from discrimination and guarantee that our most basic needs are protected.

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Human Rights and Common Good: Collected Essays Volume III

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This volume collects twenty-two published and unpublished chapters on a variety of topics related directly to human rights, justice, and the common good. The first nine date from 1970 through to 2007. They begin with a study — in dialectic with Dworkin's earlier lecture on the same themes — of the bearing of contemporary legal and political theory on the incorporation of a declaration of rights and freedoms in British law. There follow chapters on place of rights, and of duties to oneself, in Kant's moral and legal theory and some contemporary interpreters of Kant; on the application classical conceptions of distributive justice to modern problems; on the emergence of the ideal of government limited by, inter alia, respect for human rights, and contemporary distortions of the ideal that are proposed by Rawls, Dworkin, and followers of theirs (not least in relation to marriage); on the place of civic virtues and respect for diverse persons in constitutional order; and two chapters on the great question of migration rights and the legitimacy of national boundaries preventing free and equal migration. Part Two groups three chapters on the justice of punishment, concluding with the mature statement of retribution's place as punishment's formative justifying aim, in engagement especially with Nietzsche's ‘genealogy of morals’. Part Three surveys just way theory in its historic development and current shape. Parts Four, Five, and Six each group three chapters: on autonomy, justice, and euthanasia; on autonomy, justice, and human reproduction; and on marriage in its relation to justice and the common good.

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December 2023	4
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Human Rights

Human rights are norms that aspire to protect all people everywhere from severe political, legal, and social abuses. Examples of human rights are the right to freedom of religion, the right to a fair trial when charged with a crime, the right not to be tortured, and the right to education. The philosophy of human rights addresses questions about the existence, content, nature, universality, justification, and legal status of human rights. The strong claims often made on behalf of human rights (for example, that they are universal, inalienable, or exist independently of legal enactment as justified moral norms) have frequently provoked skeptical doubts and countering philosophical defenses (on these doubts see Lacroix & Pranchère 2016; Mutua 2002; and Waldron 1987). Reflection on these doubts and the responses that can be made to them has become a sub-field of political and legal philosophy with a very substantial literature (see the extensive Bibliography below). This entry addresses the concept of human rights, the existence and grounds of human rights, the question of which rights are human rights, and relativism about human rights.

1. The General Idea of Human Rights

2.1 how can human rights exist, 2.2 justifications for human rights, 3.1 civil and political rights, 3.2 economic and social rights, 3.3 human rights of women, minorities, and groups, 3.4 new human rights, 4. universal human rights in a world of diverse beliefs and practices, a. books and articles in the philosophy of human rights, b. legal declarations, other internet resources, related entries.

This section attempts to explain the general idea of human rights by identifying four defining features. The goal is to answer the question of what human rights are with a description of the concept rather than with a list of specific rights. Two people can have the same general idea of human rights even though they disagree about which rights are really human rights and even about whether universal human rights are a good idea. The four-part explanation just below attempts to cover all kinds of human rights including both moral and legal human rights as well as old and new human rights (e.g., both Lockean natural rights and contemporary human rights). The explanation anticipates, however, that particular kinds of human rights will have additional features. Starting with this general concept does not commit us to treating all kinds of human rights in a single unified theory (see Buchanan 2013 for an argument that we should not attempt to theorize together universal moral rights and international legal human rights).

Human rights are rights . Lest we miss the obvious, human rights are rights (see Cruft 2012 and the entry on rights ). Rights focus on a freedom, protection, status, immunity, or benefit for the rightholders. Most human rights are claim rights that impose duties or responsibilities on their addressees or dutybearers. The duties associated with human rights often require actions involving respect, protection, facilitation, and provision. Although human rights are usually mandatory in the sense of imposing duties on specified parties, some legal human rights seem to do little more than declare high-priority goals and assign responsibility for their progressive realization. One can argue, of course, that goalish rights are not real rights, but it may be better to recognize that they comprise a weak but useful notion of a right. (See Beitz 2009 for a defense of the view that not all human rights are rights in a strong sense. Also, see Feinberg 1973 for the idea of “manifesto rights” and Nickel 2013 for a discussion of “rightslike goals”.)

Human rights are plural and come in lists . If someone accepted that there are human rights but held that there is only one of them, this might make sense if she meant that there is one abstract underlying right that generates a list of specific rights (see Dworkin 2011 for a view of this sort). But if this person meant that there is just one specific right such as the right to peaceful assembly this would be a highly revisionary view. Some philosophers advocate very short lists of human rights but nevertheless accept plurality (see Ignatieff 2004).

Human rights are universal . All living humans—or perhaps we should say all living persons —have human rights. One does not have to be a particular kind of person or a member of some specific nation or religion to have human rights. Included in the idea of universality is some conception of independent existence. People have human rights independently of whether such rights are present in the practices, morality, or law of their country or culture. This idea of universality needs several qualifications, however. First, some rights, such as the right to vote, are held only by adult citizens or residents and apply only to voting in one’s own country. Second, some rights can be suspended. For example, the human right to freedom of movement may be suspended temporarily during a riot or a wildfire. And third, some human rights treaties focus not on the rights of everyone but rather on the rights of specific groups such as minorities, women, indigenous peoples, and children.

Human rights have high-priority . Maurice Cranston held that human rights are matters of “paramount importance” and their violation “a grave affront to justice” (Cranston 1967: 51, 52). If human rights were not very important norms they would not have the ability to compete with other powerful considerations such as national stability and security, individual and national self-determination, and national and global prosperity. High priority does not mean, however, that human rights are absolute. As James Griffin says, human rights should be understood as “resistant to trade-offs, but not too resistant” (Griffin 2008: 77). Further, there seems to be priority variation among human rights. For example, the right to life is generally thought to have greater importance than the right to privacy; when the two conflict the right to privacy will generally be outweighed.

Let’s now consider four other features or functions that might be added to these four.

Should human rights be defined as inalienable? Inalienability does not mean that rights are absolute or can never be overridden by other considerations. Rather it means that its holder cannot lose it temporarily or permanently by bad conduct or by voluntarily giving it up. It is doubtful that all human rights are inalienable in this sense. One who endorses both human rights and imprisonment as punishment for serious crimes must hold that people’s rights to freedom of movement can be forfeited temporarily or permanently by just convictions of serious crimes. Perhaps it is sufficient to say that human rights are very hard to lose. (For a stronger view of inalienability, see Donnelly 1989 [2020] and Meyers 1985.)

Should human rights be defined as minimal rights? A number of philosophers have proposed the view that human rights are minimal in the sense of not being too numerous (a few dozen rights rather than hundreds or thousands), and not too demanding (see Joshua Cohen 2004 and Ignatieff 2004). Their views suggest that human rights are—or should be—more concerned with avoiding the worst than with achieving the best. Henry Shue suggests that human rights concern the “lower limits on tolerable human conduct” rather than “great aspirations and exalted ideals” (Shue 1996: ix). When human rights are modest standards they leave most legal and policy matters open to democratic decision-making at the national and local levels. This allows human rights to have high priority, to accommodate a great deal of cultural and institutional variation among countries, and to leave open a large space for democratic decision-making at the national level. Still, there is no contradiction in the idea of an extremely expansive list of human rights and hence minimalism is not a defining feature of human rights (for criticism of the view that human rights are minimal standards see Brems 2009; Etinson forthcoming; and Raz 2010). Minimalism is best seen as a normative prescription for what international human rights should be. Moderate forms of minimalism have considerable appeal as recommendations, but not as part of the definition of human rights.

Should human rights be defined as always being or “mirroring” moral rights? Philosophers coming to human rights theory from moral philosophy sometimes assume that human rights must be, at bottom, moral rather than legal rights. There is no contradiction, however, in people saying that they believe in human rights, but only when they are legal rights at the national or international levels. As Louis Henkin observed,

Political forces have mooted the principal philosophical objections, bridging the chasm between natural and positive law by converting natural human rights into positive legal rights. (Henkin 1978: 19)

It has also been suggested that legal human rights can be justified without directly appealing to any corresponding moral human right (see Buchanan 2013).

Should human rights be defined in terms of serving some sort of political function? Instead of seeing human rights as grounded in some sort of independently existing moral reality, a theorist might see them as the norms of a highly useful political practice that humans have constructed. Such a view would see the idea of human rights as playing various political roles at the national and international levels and as serving thereby to protect urgent human and national interests. These political roles might include providing standards for international evaluations of how governments treat their people and specifying when use of economic sanctions or military intervention is permissible. This kind of view may be plausible for the very salient international human rights that have emerged in international law and politics in the last fifty years. But human rights can exist and function in contexts not involving international scrutiny and intervention such as a world with only one state. Imagine, for example, that a massive asteroid strike makes New Zealand the only remaining state in existence. Surely the idea of human rights along with many dimensions of human rights practice could continue in New Zealand, even though there would be no international relations, law, or politics (for an argument of this sort see Tasioulas 2012a). And if in the same scenario a few people were discovered to have survived in Iceland and were living without a government or state, New Zealanders would know that human rights governed how these people should be treated even though they were stateless. How deeply the idea of human rights must be rooted in international law and practice should not be settled by definitional fiat. We can allow, however, that the sorts of political functions that Rawls and Beitz describe are typically served by international human rights today.

2 The Existence and Grounds of Human Rights

The most obvious way in which human rights exist is as norms of national and international law. At the international level, human rights norms exist because of treaties that have turned them into international law. For example, the human right not to be held in slavery or servitude in Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights and in Article 8 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights exists because these treaties establish it. At the national level, human rights norms exist because they have—through legislative enactment, judicial decision, or custom—become part of a country’s law. For example, the right against slavery exists in the United States because the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits slavery and servitude. When rights are embedded in international law, we are apt to speak of them as human rights; but when they are enacted in national law we more frequently describe them as civil or constitutional rights.

Although enactment in national and international law is one of the ways in which human rights exist, many have suggested that this is not the only way. If human rights exist only because of enactment, their availability is contingent on domestic and international political developments. Many people have looked for a way to support the idea that human rights have roots that are deeper and less subject to human decisions than legal enactment. One version of this idea is that people are born with rights, that human rights are somehow innate or inherent in human beings (see Morsink 2009). One way that a normative status could be inherent in humans is by being god-given. The American Declaration of Independence claims that people are “endowed by their Creator” with natural rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. On this view, god, the supreme lawmaker, enacted some basic human rights.

Rights plausibly attributed to divine decree must be very general and abstract (life, liberty, etc.) so that they can apply across thousands of years of human history, not just to recent centuries. But contemporary human rights are specific and many of them presuppose contemporary institutions (e.g., the right to a fair trial, the right to social security, and the right to education). Even if people are born with god-given natural rights, we need to explain how to get from those general and abstract rights to the specific rights found in contemporary declarations and treaties.

Attributing human rights to god’s commands may give them a secure status at the metaphysical level, but in a very diverse world it does not make them practically secure. Billions of people today do not believe in the god of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. If people do not believe in god, or in the sort of god that prescribes rights, then if you want to base human rights on theological beliefs you must persuade these people to accept a rights-supporting theological view. This is likely to be even harder than persuading them of human rights. Legal enactment at the national and international levels provides a far more secure status for practical purposes.

Human rights could also exist independently of legal enactment by being part of actual human moralities. All human groups seem to have moralities, that is, imperative norms of behavior backed by reasons and values. These moralities contain specific norms (for example, a prohibition on the intentional murder of innocent persons) and specific values (for example, valuing human life). One way in which human rights could exist apart from divine or human enactment is as norms accepted in almost all actual human moralities. If almost all human groups have moralities containing norms that prohibit murder, for example, these norms could constitute the human right to life.

This view is attractive but has serious difficulties. Although worldwide acceptance of human rights has increased in recent decades (see below section 4. Universal Human Rights in a World of Diverse Beliefs and Practices ), worldwide moral unanimity about human rights does not exist. Human rights declarations and treaties are intended to change existing norms, not just describe an existing moral consensus.

Yet another way of explaining the existence of human rights is to say that they exist most basically in true or justified ethical outlooks. On this account, to say that there is a human right against torture is mainly to assert that there are strong reasons for believing that it is always morally wrong to engage in torture and that protections should be provided against its practice. This approach would view the Universal Declaration as attempting to formulate a justified political morality: that is, as not merely trying to identify a preexisting moral consensus, but trying to create a consensus that could be supported by very plausible moral and practical reasons. This approach requires commitment to the objectivity of such reasons. It holds that just as there are reliable ways of finding out how the physical world works, or what makes buildings sturdy and durable, there are reliable ways of finding out what individuals may justifiably demand of each other and of governments. Even if unanimity about human rights is currently lacking, rational agreement is available to humans if they will commit themselves to open-minded and serious moral and political inquiry. If moral reasons exist independently of human construction, they can—when combined with premises about current institutions, problems, and resources—generate moral norms different from those currently accepted or enacted. The Universal Declaration seems to proceed on exactly this assumption (see Morsink 2009).

One problem with this view is that an existence based on good reasons seems a rather thin form of existence for human rights. But perhaps we can view this thinness as a practical rather than a theoretical problem—that is, as something to be remedied by the formulation and enactment of legal norms. The best form of existence for human rights would combine robust legal existence with the sort of moral existence that comes from being supported by strong moral and practical reasons.

Justifications for human rights should identify plausible starting points for defending the key features of human rights and offer an account of the transition from those starting points to a list of specific rights (see Nickel 2007). Further, justifying international human rights is likely to require additional steps (see Buchanan 2013). These requirements make the construction of a good justification a daunting task.

Recent attempts to justify human rights offer a dizzying variety of grounds. These include prudential reasons; linkage arguments (Shue 1996); agency and autonomy (Gewirth 1996; Griffin 2008); basic needs (D. Miller 2012); capabilities and positive freedom (Gould 2004; Nussbaum 2000; and Sen 2004) dignity (Gilabert 2018b; Kateb 2011, Tasioulas 2015); and fairness, status equality, and equal respect (Dworkin 2011; Buchanan 2013).

There is a lot of overlap between these approaches, but also important differences that are likely to make them yield different results. For example, an approach framed in terms of agency and autonomy will be more strongly and directly supportive of fundamental freedoms than one framed in terms of basic human needs. Justifications can be based on just one of these types of reasons or be pluralistic and appeal to several. Seeing so much diversity in philosophical approaches to justification may be discouraging (although great disagreement in approaches is common in philosophy) but its good side is that it suggests that there are at least several plausible ways of justifying human rights.

Philosophical justifications for human rights differ in how much credibility they attribute to contemporary lists of human rights, such as the one found in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948). Some take fidelity to contemporary human rights practice as nearly imperative while others prioritize particular normative frameworks even if they can only justify some of the rights in contemporary lists.

Attempting to discuss all of these approaches would be a task for a large book, not an encyclopedic entry. The discussion here is limited to two approaches: agency/autonomy and dignity.

2.2.1 Agency and Autonomy

Grounding human rights in human agency and autonomy has had strong advocates in recent decades (Griffin 2008; Gould 2004). An important forerunner in this area was Alan Gewirth. In Human Rights: Essays on Justification and Application (1982), Gewirth argued that human rights are indispensable conditions of a life as an agent who survives and acts. Abstractly described, the conditions of such a life are basic freedom and well-being. A prudent rational agent who must have freedom and well-being will assert a “prudential right claim” (1982: 31)to them. But, having demanded that others must respect her freedom and well-being, consistency requires her to recognize and respect the freedom and well-being of all other persons, too. She “logically must accept” (1982: 20) that other people as agents have equal rights to freedom and well-being. These two abstract rights work alone and together to generate a list of more determinate human rights of familiar sorts (Gewirth 1978, 1982, 1996). Gewirth’s argument generated a large critical literature (see Beyleveld 1991 and Boylan 1999).

A more recent attempt to base human rights on agency and autonomy is found in James Griffin’s book, On Human Rights (2008). Griffin does not share Gewirth’s goal of providing a logically inescapable argument for human rights, but his overall view shares key structural features with Gewirth’s. These include basing the justification on the unique value of agency and autonomy, postulating some abstract rights, and making place for a right to well-being within an agency-based approach.

In the current dispute between “moral” (or “orthodox”) and “political” conceptions of human rights, Griffin strongly sides with those who see human rights as fundamentally moral rights (on this debate see Liao & Etinson 2012). Their defining role, in Griffin’s view, is protecting people’s ability to form and pursue conceptions of a worthwhile life—a capacity that Griffin variously refers to as “autonomy”, “normative agency”, and “personhood”. This ability to form, revise, and pursue conceptions of a worthwhile life is taken to be of paramount value, the exclusive source of human dignity, and thereby the basis of human rights. Griffin holds that people value this capacity “especially highly, often more highly than even our happiness” (2008: 32 [§2.3])

“Practicalities” also shape human rights in Griffin’s view. He describes practicalities as “a second ground” (2008: 37–39 [§2.5]) of human rights. They prescribe making the boundaries of rights clear by avoiding “too many complicated bends” (2008: 37 [§2.5]), enlarging rights a little to give them safety margins, and consulting facts about human nature and the nature of society. Accordingly, the justifying generic function that Griffin assigns to human rights is protecting normative agency while taking account of practicalities.

Griffin thinks that he can explain the universality of human rights by recognizing that normative agency is a threshold concept—once one is above the threshold one has the same rights as everyone else. One’s degree of agency above the threshold does not matter. There are no “degrees of being a person” (2008: 67 [§3.5]) among competent adults. Treating agency in this way, however, is a normative policy, not just a fact about concepts. An alternative policy is possible, namely proportioning people’s rights to their level of normative agency. This is what we do with children; their rights grow as they develop greater agency and responsibility. To exclude proportional rights, and to explain the egalitarian dimensions of human rights, including their character as universal and equal rights to be enjoyed without discrimination, some additional ground pertaining to fairness and equality seems to be needed.

This last point raises the question of whether agency-based approaches in general can adequately account for the universality, equality, and anti-discriminatory character of human rights. The idea that human rights are to be respected and protected without discrimination seems to be most centrally a matter of fairness rather than one of agency, freedom, or welfare. Discrimination often harms and hinders its victims, but even when it doesn’t it is still deeply unfair. For example, human rights that explicitly refer to fair wages and equal pay for equal work (ICESCR Articles 3 and 7.i) seem to be much more about fairness than about agency, freedom, or welfare—particularly since human rights to a wage that ensures a decent standard of living are often mentioned separately (ICESCR Article 7.ii).

2.2.2 Dignity

Many human rights declarations and treaties invoke human dignity as the ground of human rights. In recent decades numerous books and articles have been published that advocate dignitarian approaches to justifying human rights (for example, Gilabert 2018b; Kateb 2014; McCrudden 2013 and the many essays therein; Tasioulas 2015; Waldron 2012 and 2015). There have also been many critics, including Den Hartogh 2014; Etinson 2020; Green 2010; Macklin 2003; Rosen 2012; and Sangiovanni 2017.

A well-worked out conception of human dignity is likely to have at least three parts. The first describes the nature of human dignity, specifying for example whether it is a kind of value, status, or virtue (see Rosen 2012). The second explains the grounds of human dignity—that is, why, or in virtue of which shared capacities or features we all have the sort of dignity described in the first step. Finally, and third, there is the question of human dignity’s practical requirements, or what is concretely involved in “respecting” it. (See the entry on dignity for a broader discussion.)

Human dignity is often understood as a special worth or status which all human beings share in contrast to other animals (e.g., Kateb 2011). We can call this the “Special Worth Thesis”. Attempts to provide good explanatory grounds for the Special Worth Thesis identify one or more valuable features that all human persons share and that non-human animals mostly do not possess or have at much lower levels. The valuable features identified will presumably once again need to be “threshold concepts”, so that people can vary in how much of the feature or capacity they have without thereby losing, lessening, or increasing their human dignity in comparison to other persons. Human dignity is, after all, supposed to be a strongly egalitarian idea. Plausible candidates for such grounds might include moral abilities (to understand and follow moral values and norms and to reason and act in terms of them); thought, imagination, and rationality; self-consciousness and reflective capacities; and the use of complicated language and technologies, among others.

One worry about the Special Worth Thesis is its self-glorifying character. In claiming special worth we humans seem to excuse our many faults—including a terrible capacity for evil, routinely evidenced in our behavior towards other humans and towards non-human animals (Rosen 2013). Another closely associated and increasingly prominent worry is that the Special Worth Thesis is speciesist, arbitrarily ranking the interests, status, and/or value of human beings above that/those of non-human animals (Kymlicka 2018; Meyer 2001). In the context of these reasonable concerns, it is worth noting that support for, or a belief in, human dignity need not be prejudicial towards non-human animals; one can affirm the dignity of homo sapiens while also affirming the equal dignity of other species and forms of life (Etinson 2020; Gilabert 2018b). The Special Worth Thesis is optional and only defended by some theorists.

What attitudes, actions, policies, and rights follow from the duty or reason to respect human dignity? And are human rights among them? The answer will at least in part depend on what we think human dignity is. If it is a kind of virtue shared or shareable by all persons then its practical requirements will include things like praising and/or admiring those who possess it, and perhaps developing or cultivating “dignitarian” dispositions in one’s own character. If human dignity is, by contrast, a kind of value or worth (as in Immanuel Kant’s famous understanding of dignity as a worth “beyond all price” Kant 1785/1996: 43), then it is something we have reason to protect, promote, preserve, cherish, restore and perhaps even maximize, if possible. The human right to life, and its material conditions, is an intuitive product of human dignity understood in this way. If, on the other hand, we think of human dignity as a kind of legal (Waldron 2012 and 2015), moral (Gilabert 2018b; Lee & George 2008), or social status (Etinson 2020; Killmister 2020), then duties of “respect” more naturally follow.

These options are not mutually exclusive. In principle, human dignity can refer to all of these things: value, status, and virtue. If human dignity yields human rights, however, this is going to depend on exactly how we understand its practical requirements in light of its nature and grounds. This practical elaboration is the workhorse of a conception of human dignity. It normally results in one or more general maxims or guidelines: e.g., not to humiliate or degrade, never to treat persons merely as a means, to treat others in justifiable ways, to avoid severe cruelty, to respect autonomy, etc. The prospect of grounding human rights in human dignity faces critical challenges at this juncture. As we saw in the preceding discussion of agency-based approaches, the more specific and singular one’s dignitarian maxim is, the less plausible it will be as an exhaustive ground for standard lists of human rights in all their variety. On the other hand, a pluralistic set of grounding maxims will make human dignity a better source of human rights, but it is unclear whether in doing so we are simply explaining its implicit content or bringing in other values and norms to fill in its indeterminate scope. This raises the possibility that values and norms such as promoting human welfare; agency/autonomy; and fairness partially constitute the idea of human dignity rather than being derived from it (see Macklin 2003).

3. Which Rights are Human Rights?

This section discusses the question of which rights belong on lists of human rights. The Universal Declaration’s list, which has been very influential, consists of six families:

Security rights that protect people against murder, torture, and genocide;
Due process rights that protect people against arbitrary and excessively harsh punishments and require fair and public trials for those accused of crimes;
Liberty rights that protect people’s fundamental freedoms in areas such as belief, expression, association, and movement;
Political rights that protect people’s liberty to participate in politics by assembling, protesting, voting, and serving in public office;
Equality rights that guarantee equal citizenship, equality before the law, and freedom from discrimination; and
Economic and social rights that require that governments to forbid slavery and forced labor, enforce safe working conditions, ensure to all the availability of work, education, health services, and a standard of living that is adequate.

A seventh category, minority and group rights, has been created by subsequent treaties. These rights protect women, racial and ethnic minorities, indigenous peoples, children, migrant workers, and the disabled. This list of human rights seems normatively diverse: the issues addressed cover include security, liberty, fairness, equality before the law, access to work and good working conditions, unduly cruel treatment, and political participation.

In spite of the ample list above, not every question of social justice or wise governance is a human rights issue. For example, a country could have too many lawyers or inadequate provision for graduate-level education without violating any human rights. Deciding which norms should be counted as human rights is a matter of considerable difficulty. And there is continuing pressure to expand lists of human rights to include new areas. Many political movements would like to see their main concerns categorized as matters of human rights, since this would publicize, promote, and legitimize their concerns at the international level. A possible result of this is “human rights inflation”, the devaluation of human rights caused by producing too much bad human rights currency (see Cranston 1973; Orend 2002; Wellman 1995; Griffin 2008).

One way to avoid rights inflation is to follow Cranston in insisting that human rights only deal with extremely important goods, protections, and freedoms. A supplementary approach is to impose several justificatory tests for specific human rights. For example, it could be required that a proposed human right not only protect some very important good but also respond to one or more common and serious threats to that good (Dershowitz 2004; Donnelly 1989 [2003]; Shue 1996; Talbott 2005), impose burdens on the addressees that are justifiable and no larger than necessary, and be feasible in most of the world’s countries (on feasibility see Gheaus 2022; Gilabert 2009; Nickel 2007; and Richards 2023). This approach restrains rights inflation with several tests, not just one master test.

In deciding which norms should be considered human rights it is possible to make either too little or too much of international documents such as the Universal Declaration and the European Convention. One makes too little of them by proceeding as if drawing up a list of important rights were a new question, never before addressed, and as if there were no practical wisdom to be found in the choices of rights that went into the historic documents. And one makes too much of them by presuming that those documents tell us everything we need to know about human rights. This approach involves a kind of fundamentalism: it holds that when a right is on the official lists of human rights that settles its status as a human right (“If it’s in the book that’s all I need to know”.) But the process of identifying human rights in the United Nations and elsewhere was a political process with plenty of imperfections. There is little reason to take international diplomats as the most authoritative guides to which human rights there are. Further, even if a treaty’s ratification by most countries can settle the question of whether a certain right is a human right within international law, such a treaty cannot settle its weight. The treaty may suggest that the right is supported by weighty considerations, but it cannot make this so. If an international treaty enacted a right to visit national parks without charge as a human right, the ratification of that treaty would make free access to national parks a human right within international law, but it may well fail to persuade us that national park access is important enough to be a genuine human right.

The least controversial family of human rights is civil and political rights. These rights are familiar from historic bills of rights such as the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen (1789) and the U.S. Bill of Rights (1791, with subsequent amendments). Contemporary sources include the first 21 Articles of the Universal Declaration , and treaties such as the European Convention , the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights , the American Convention on Human Rights , and the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights . Some representative formulations follow:

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought and expression. This right includes freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing, in print, in the form of art, or through any other medium of one’s choice. ( American Convention on Human Rights , Article 13.1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to freedom of association with others, including the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests. ( European Convention , Article 11) No one shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks. (ICCPR Article 17)

Most civil and political rights are not absolute—they can sometimes be overridden by other considerations. For example, the right to freedom of movement can be restricted by public and private property rights, by restraining orders related to domestic violence, and by legal punishments. Further, after a disaster such as a hurricane or earthquake free movement is often appropriately suspended to keep out the curious, permit access of emergency vehicles and equipment, and prevent looting. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights permits most rights to be suspended during times “of public emergency which threatens the life of the nation” (ICCPR Article 4). But it excludes some rights from suspension including the right to life, the prohibition of torture, the prohibition of slavery, the prohibition of ex post facto criminal laws, and freedom of thought and religion.

The Universal Declaration included economic and social rights (“ESRs”) that address matters such as education, food, health services, and employment. Their inclusion has been the source of much controversy (see Beetham 1995). The European Convention did not include them (although it was later amended to include the right to education). Instead ESRs were put into a separate treaty, the European Social Charter . When the United Nations began the process of putting the rights of the Universal Declaration into international law, it followed the same pattern by placing ESRs in a treaty separate from the one dealing with civil and political rights. This treaty, the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR, 1966), treated these standards as rights—albeit rights to be progressively realized.

The ICESCR includes rights to: freedom from slavery and forced labor; adequate income or services to cover food, water, clothing, and shelter; basic health conditions and services; free public education; freedom to work, choose one's occupation, and have adequate opportunities for remunerative employment; fair pay and safe conditions of work; social security; equality for women in the workplace, including equal pay for equal work; freedom to form trade unions and to strike; special protections for mothers and children; adequate rest and leisure; and nondiscrimination in respecting, protecting, and fulfilling these rights. In terms of underlying values and norms, some of these rights are welfare-oriented, others are fairness-oriented, and still others are freedom-oriented (Nickel 2022b).

Article 2.1 of the ICESCR sets out what each of the parties commits itself to do about this list, namely to

take steps, individually and through international assistance and co-operation…to the maximum of its available resources, with a view to achieving progressively the full realization of the rights recognized in the present Covenant.

In contrast, the Civil and Political Covenant commits its signatories to immediate compliance, to

respect and to ensure to all individuals within its territory the rights recognized in the present Covenant. (ICCPR Article 2.1)

The contrast between these two levels of commitment has led some people to suspect that ESRs are really just valuable goals. For many countries, noncompliance due to inability would have been certain if these standards had been treated as immediately binding.

ESRs have often been defended with linkage arguments which claim that ESRs provide indispensable support to the realization of civil and political rights. This approach was first developed philosophically by Henry Shue. He argued that security and subsistence are so indispensable to the full realization of other rights that anyone who endorses the realization of any other right must also endorse ESRs (Shue 1980; for analysis and critical assessments of linkage arguments see Nickel 2007, 2016, and 2022a).

Do ESRs protect sufficiently important human interests? Maurice Cranston opposed ESRs by suggesting that they are mainly concerned with matters such as holidays with pay which are not of deep and universal human interest (Cranston 1967, 1973; treatments of objections to ESRs include Beetham 1995; Howard 1983; and Nickel 2007). It is far from the case, however, that most ESRs pertain only to superficial interests. Consider two examples: the right to an adequate standard of living and the right to free public education. The former requires governments to work hard at remedying widespread and serious evils such as severe poverty, starvation and malnutrition, and ignorance. The importance of food and other basic material conditions of life is easy to show. These goods are essential to people’s ability to live, function, and flourish. Without adequate access to these goods, interests in life, health, and liberty are endangered and serious illness and death are probable. The unavailability of educational opportunities typically limits (both absolutely and comparatively) people’s abilities to participate fully and effectively in the political and economic life of their county

Are ESRs too burdensome? Another objection to ESRs is that they are too burdensome on their dutybearers. It is very expensive to guarantee everyone basic education and minimal material conditions. Frequently the claim that ESRs are too burdensome suggests that ESRs are substantially more burdensome or expensive than liberty rights. Suppose, however, that we use as a basis of comparison liberty rights such as freedom of communication, association, and movement. These rights require both respect and protection from governments. And people cannot be adequately protected in their enjoyment of liberties such as these unless they also have security and due process rights. The costs of liberty, as it were, include the costs of law and criminal justice. Once we see this, liberty rights start to look a lot more costly.

Further, we need not generally think of ESRs as simply giving everyone a free supply of the goods they protect. Guarantees of things like food and housing may be intolerably expensive and undermine productivity if everyone simply receives a free supply. A viable system of ESRs can require most people to provide these goods for themselves and their families through work, as long as they are given the necessary opportunities, education, and infrastructure. Government-implemented ESRs provide guarantees of availability (or “secure access”), but under many conditions governments should only have to supply the requisite goods in a small fraction of cases.

Countries that do not accept and implement ESRs must still somehow bear the costs of providing for the needy since these countries are unlikely to find it tolerable to allow sizable parts of the population to starve and be homeless. If government does not supply food, clothing, and shelter to those unable to provide for themselves, then families, friends, and communities will have to shoulder this burden. It is only in the last hundred or so years that government-sponsored ESRs have taken over a substantial part of the burden of providing for the needy. The taxes associated with ESRs are partial replacements for other burdensome duties, namely the duties of families and communities to provide adequate care for the unemployed, sick, disabled, and aged. Deciding whether to implement ESRs is not a matter of deciding whether to bear such burdens, but rather of deciding whether to continue with total reliance on systems of informal provision that distribute assistance in a very spotty way and whose costs fall very unevenly on families, friends, and communities.

Are ESRs feasible worldwide? Another objection to ESRs alleges that they are not feasible in many countries (on feasibility see Gheaus 2013, Gilabert 2009, and Nickel 2007). It is very expensive to provide guarantees of subsistence, measures to protect and restore people’s health, and education. Many governments will be unable to provide these guarantees while meeting other important responsibilities. Rights are not magical sources of supply (Holmes & Sunstein 1999). As we saw earlier, the ESR Covenant dealt with the issue of feasibility by calling for progressive implementation, that is, implementation as financial and other resources permit. Does this view of implementation turn ESRs into high-priority goals? And if so, is that a bad thing?

Standards that outrun the abilities of many of their addressees are good candidates for treatment as goals. Viewing them as largely aspirational rather than as imposing immediate duties avoids problems of inability-based noncompliance. One may worry, however, that this is too much of a demotion for ESRs because goals seem much weaker than rights (see O’Neill 2005 and Tomalty 2014). But goals can be formulated in ways that make them more like rights. They can be assigned addressees (the parties who are to pursue the goal), beneficiaries, scopes that define the objective to be pursued, and a high level of priority (see Langford, Sumner, & Yamin 2013 and Nickel 2013; see also OHCHR and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, UN ). Strong reasons for the importance of these goals can be provided. And supervisory bodies can monitor levels of progress and pressure low-performing addressees to attend to and work on realizing their goals.

Treating very demanding rights as goals has some advantages. Goals coexist easily with low levels of ability to achieve them. And goals are flexible: addressees with different levels of ability can choose ways of pursuing the goals that suit their circumstances and means. Because of these attractions it may be worth exploring sophisticated ways to transform very demanding human rights into goals. The transformation may be full or partial. It is possible to create right-goal mixtures that contain some mandatory elements (see Brems 2009). A right-goal mixture might include some rights-like goals, some mandatory steps to be taken immediately, and duties to realize the rights-like goals as quickly as possible.

Do ESRs yield a sufficient commitment to equality? Objections to ESRs as human rights have come from both the political right and the political left. A common objection from the left, including liberal egalitarians and socialists, is that ESRs as enumerated in human rights documents and treaties provide too weak of a commitment to material equality (Gilabert 2018a and Moyn 2018). Realizing ESRs requires governments to ensure everyone an adequate minimum of resources in some key areas but does not require strong commitments to equality of opportunity, redistributive taxation, or wealth ceilings (see the entries on equality , distributive justice , and liberal feminism ).

The egalitarian objection cannot be that human rights documents and treaties show no concern for people living in poverty and misery. One of the main purposes of including ESRs in human rights documents and treaties was to promote serious efforts to combat poverty, lack of education, and unhealthy living conditions in countries all around the world (see also Langford, Sumner, & Yamin 2013 on the UN Millennium Development Goals). The objection also cannot be that human rights facilitated the hollowing out of systems of welfare rights in many developed countries that occurred after 1980 (for criticism of this view see Song 2019). Those cuts in welfare programs were often in violation of the requirements of realizing ESRs.

Perhaps it should be conceded that human rights documents and treaties have not said enough about positive measures to promote equal opportunity in education and work. A positive right to equal opportunity, like the one Rawls proposed, would require countries to take serious measures to reduce disparities between the opportunities effectively available to children of high-income and low-income parents (see Rawls 1971 and the entry on equality of opportunity ).

A strongly egalitarian political program is probably best pursued partially within but mostly beyond the human rights framework. One reason for this is that the human rights movement will have better prospects for ongoing acceptance and support if it has widespread political acceptance. To achieve this, the rights it endorses must appeal to people with a variety of political views, ranging from center-left to center-right. Support from the broad political center is less likely to emerge and survive if the human rights platform is perceived as mostly a leftist program.

Equality of rights for historically disadvantaged or subordinated groups is a longstanding concern of the human rights movement. Human rights documents repeatedly emphasize that all people, including women and members of minority ethnic and religious groups, have equal human rights and should be able to enjoy them without discrimination. The right to freedom from discrimination figures prominently in the Universal Declaration and subsequent treaties. The Civil and Political Covenant, for example, commits participating states to respect and protect their people’s rights without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth, or social status (ICCPR Article 2.1). On minority and group rights see Kymlicka 1995.

A number of standard civil and political rights are especially important to ethnic and religious minorities, including rights to freedom of association, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, and freedom from discrimination. Human rights documents also include rights that refer to minorities explicitly and give them special protections. For example, the Civil and Political Covenant in Article 27 says that persons belonging to ethnic, religious, or linguistic minorities

shall not be denied the right, in community with other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language. (ICCPR Article 27)

Feminists have often protested that standard lists of human rights do not sufficiently take into account the unique risks faced by women. For example, issues like domestic violence, reproductive choice, and the trafficking of women and girls for sex work did not have a prominent place in early human rights documents and treaties. Lists of human rights have had to be expanded “to include the degradation and violation of women” (Bunch 2006; see also Okin 1998). Violations of women’s human rights often occur in the “private” sphere, i.e., in the home at the hands of other family members. This suggests that governments cannot be seen as the only addressees of human rights and that the right to privacy of home and family needs qualification to allow police to protect women within the home.

The issue of how formulations of human rights should respond to variations in the sorts of risks and dangers that different people face is difficult and arises not just in relation to gender but also in relation to age, race, sexual orientation, profession, political affiliation, religion, and personal interests. Due process rights, for example, are much more useful to young people (and particularly young men) than they are to older people since the latter are far less likely to run afoul of the criminal law.

Since 1964 the United Nations has mainly dealt with the rights of women and minorities through specialized treaties such as the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (1965); the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979); the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2007). See also the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007). Specialized treaties allow international norms to address unique problems of particular groups such as assistance and care during pregnancy and childbearing in the case of women, custody issues in the case of children, and the loss of historic territories by indigenous peoples.

Minority groups are often targets of violence. Human rights norms call upon governments to refrain from such violence and to provide protections against it. This work is partly done by the right to life, which is a standard individual right. It is also done by the right against genocide which protects groups from attempts to destroy or decimate them. The Genocide Convention was one of the first human rights treaties after World War II. The right against genocide is clearly a group right. It is held by both individuals and groups and provides protection to groups as groups. It is largely negative in the sense that it requires governments and other agencies to refrain from destroying groups; but it also requires that legal and other protections against genocide be created at the national level.

As a group right, can the right against genocide be a human right? More generally, can a group right fit the general idea of human rights as rights of individual persons proposed earlier? Perhaps it can if we broaden our conception of who can hold human rights to include important groups that people form and cherish (see the entry on group rights ). This can be made more palatable, perhaps, by recognizing that the beneficiaries of the right against genocide are individual humans who enjoy greater security against attempts to destroy the group to which they belong (Kymlicka 1989).

Although contemporary lists of human rights are already long, there are doubtless norms that should be counted as human rights but are not generally recognized as such. After all, there are lots of areas in which people’s basic welfare, dignity, and fundamental interests are threatened by the actions and omissions of individuals and governments. New technologies create new problems and require us to rethink old solutions. And new political movements emerge and create demands for their goals and norms as human rights.

Prominent recent proposals of new human rights include Kimberley Brownlee’s advocacy of a right against social deprivation that would address severe unwanted loneliness (Brownlee 2020 and 2022), the proposal of a universal right to internet access that was endorsed by the UN General Assembly in 2016 (UN Resolution 32/13), and the similar endorsement in 2022 of a right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment (UN Resolution 76/300; see also the entry on environmental ethics ).

The right to a healthy environment provides a good example of how new human rights can slowly emerge. After a right of this sort was added to many national bills of rights, environmental NGOs began to promote it within international organizations. In 2000 the European Union’s Bill of Rights, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union , included in Article 37 an environmental protection norm:

A high level of environmental protection and the improvement of the quality of the environment must be integrated into the policies of the Union and ensured in accordance with the principle of sustainable development.

In 2012 the UN Human Rights Council created a Special Rapporteur (independent expert) on the Environment, eventually approved the right to “a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment”, and forwarded it to the General Assembly—where 80 percent of the world’s countries voted for it (UN Resolution 76/300). Human rights approaches to climate change have also been developed in recent decades (see Bodansky 2009; Caney 2009; Gardiner 2013; and Vanderheiden 2008).

Worries about the proliferation of human rights have not disappeared. Lawyers and international organizations have proposed standards to limit the introduction of new human rights (for example, Alston 1984 and the UN General Assembly 1986). And human rights treaty-making has slowed. After the approval of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court in 1999, the only human rights treaty approved by the UN is the 2006 Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In 2007 a declaration (not a treaty) on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was approved by the General Assembly. Prominent philosophers have also advocated smaller lists of human rights (see, for example, Cranston 1967 and 1973; Rawls 1999; and Griffin 2008). Griffin also opposed squeezing new content into existing human rights—which he described as the “ballooning” of rights.

Two familiar philosophical worries about human rights are that they are based on beliefs and attitudes that are culturally relative and that their creation and advocacy involves ethnocentrism. Human rights prescribe universal standards in areas such as security, law enforcement, equality, political participation, and education. The peoples and countries of planet Earth are, however, enormously varied in their practices, traditions, religions, and levels of economic and political development. Putting these two propositions together may be enough to justify the worry that universal human rights do not sufficiently accommodate the diversity of Earth’s peoples. A theoretical expression of this worry is “relativism”, the idea that ethical, political, and legal standards are only true or justified relative to the traditions, beliefs, and conditions of a particular country, culture or region (see the entry on moral relativism ).

During the drafting in 1947 of the Universal Declaration, the Executive Board of the American Anthropological Association (“AAA”) warned of the danger that the Declaration would be “a statement of rights conceived only in terms of the values prevalent in Western Europe and America”. A central concern of the AAA Board in the period right after World War II was to condemn intolerant colonialist attitudes of the day and to advocate cultural and political self-determination. But the Board also made the stronger assertion that “standards and values are relative to the culture from which they derive” and thus “what is held to be a human right in one society may be regarded as anti-social by another people” (AAA 1947).

Such assertions have continued to fuel accusations that human rights are instruments of ethnocentrism, arrogance, and cultural imperialism (Renteln 1990). Ethnocentrism is the assumption, usually unconscious, that “one’s own group is the center of everything” and that its beliefs, practices, and norms provide the standards by which other groups are “scaled and rated” (Sumner 1906; see also Etinson 2018a who argues that ethnocentrism is best understood as a kind of cultural bias rather than a belief in cultural superiority). Ethnocentrism can lead to arrogance and intolerance in dealings with other countries, ethical systems, and religions. Finally, cultural imperialism occurs when the economically, technologically, and militarily strongest countries impose their beliefs, values, and institutions on the rest of the world (for a useful discussion of several power-related concerns about human rights, see Gilabert 2018a).

As in the AAA Board’s case, relativists often combine these charges with a prescription, namely that tolerance of varied practices and traditions ought to be instilled and practiced through measures that include extended learning about other cultures. The idea that relativism and exposure to other cultures promote tolerance may be correct from a psychological perspective. People who are sensitive to differences in beliefs, practices, and traditions, and who are suspicious of the grounds for extending norms across borders, may be more inclined to be tolerant of other countries and peoples than those who believe in an objective universal morality. Still, philosophers have been generally critical of attempts to argue from relativism to a prescription of tolerance (see Williams 1972 [1993] and Talbott 2005). If the culture and religion of one country has long fostered intolerant attitudes and practices, and if its citizens and officials act intolerantly towards people from other countries, they are simply following their own traditions and cultural norms. Accordingly, a relativist from a tolerant country will be hard-pressed to find a basis for criticizing the citizens and officials of the intolerant country. To do so the relativist will have to endorse a transcultural principle of tolerance and to advocate as an outsider cultural change in the direction of greater tolerance. Because of this, relativists who are deeply committed to tolerance may find themselves attracted to a qualified commitment to human rights.

Perhaps for these reasons, relativism is not the stance of most anthropologists today. Currently the AAA has a central Committee whose objectives include promoting, protecting, and developing an anthropological perspective on human rights. While still emphasizing the importance of cultural differences, anthropologists now often support the protection of vulnerable cultures, non-discrimination, and the rights and land claims of indigenous peoples (see the AAA’s 2020 Statement on Anthropology and Human Rights).

The conflict between relativists and human rights advocates may be partially based on differences in their underlying philosophical beliefs, particularly in metaethics. Relativists are often subjectivists or noncognitivists and think of morality as entirely socially constructed and transmitted. In contrast, philosophically-inclined human rights advocates are more likely to adhere to or presuppose cognitivism, moral realism, and intuitionism.

As the AAA’s 1947 Statement shows, the accommodation of diversity has been a concern facing the contemporary human rights regime since its inception. As part of a 1946–47 UNESCO inquiry into the theoretical basis of human rights, the French philosopher, Jacques Maritain, famously suggested that universal agreement on human rights was possible so long as questions of underlying justification were ignored: “Yes… we agree about the rights but on condition no one asks us why” (Maritain 1949: 9). The International Bill of Human Rights appears to violate this embargo when it asserts, in the Preamble to both major Covenants, that “these rights derive from the inherent dignity of the human person”. Nonetheless, Maritain’s idea has strong echoes in contemporary philosophical work (see Taylor 1999), including John Rawls’ idea that human rights can have a minimal public or “political” justification which may be accepted from various “comprehensive” religious, moral, and philosophical points of view (Rawls 1999; Beitz 2009). Indeed, some have argued that international human rights law’s justificatory appeal to human dignity should be understood in precisely this ecumenical way (McCrudden 2008).

Other important methods of accommodating diversity include the abstract formulation of human rights norms, which allows for diverse, context-sensitive modes of social and institutional implementation (see Etinson 2013). As discussed in section 1 , a modest understanding of the aims of human rights would leave more room for democratic decision-making at the domestic level, and for cultural and political variation across countries (see also the European Court of Human Rights’ notion of a “margin of appreciation”, discussed in Letsas 2006). And it is worth noting that, within limits, state parties to international human rights treaties are entitled to submit “reservations” that alter the legal effect of treaty provisions as they pertain to that state. This provides a further avenue for legal variation and accommodation.

In the 1990s, Singapore’s Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and others argued that international human rights as found in United Nations declarations and treaties were insensitive to distinctive “Asian values”, such as prizing families and community (in contrast to strong individualism); putting social harmony over personal freedom; respect for political leaders and institutions; and emphasizing responsibility, hard work, and thriftiness as means of social progress (on the Asian Values debate see Bauer & Bell [eds] 1999; Bell 2000; and Sen 1997). Proponents of the Asian values idea did not wish to abolish all human rights; they rather wanted to deemphasize some families of human rights, particularly the fundamental freedoms and rights of democratic participation (and in some cases the rights of women). They also wanted Western governments and NGOs to stop criticizing them for human rights violations in these areas.

At the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna, countries including Singapore, Malaysia, China, and Iran advocated accommodations within human rights practice for cultural and economic differences. Western representatives tended to view the position of these countries as excuses for repression and authoritarianism. The Conference responded by approving the Vienna Declaration . It included in Article 5 the assertion that countries should not pick and choose among human rights:

All human rights are universal, indivisible and interdependent and interrelated. The international community must treat human rights globally in a fair and equal manner, on the same footing, and with the same emphasis. While the significance of national and regional particularities and various historical, cultural and religious backgrounds must be borne in mind, it is the duty of States, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms.

In recent decades widespread acceptance of human rights has occurred in most parts of the world. Three quarters of the world’s countries have ratified the major human rights treaties, and many countries in Africa, the Americas, and Europe participate in regional human rights regimes that have international courts (see the Georgetown University Human Rights Law Research Guide in the Other Internet Resources below). Ratification does not, of course, guarantee compliance. Further, all of the world’s countries now use similar political institutions (law, courts, legislatures, executives, militaries, bureaucracies, police, prisons, taxation, and public schools) and these institutions carry with them characteristic problems and abuses (Donnelly 1989 [2020]). Finally, globalization has diminished the differences among peoples. Today’s world is not the one that early anthropologists and missionaries found. National and cultural boundaries are breached not just by international trade but also by millions of travelers and migrants, electronic communications, international law covering many areas, and the efforts of international governmental and non-governmental organizations. International influences and organizations are everywhere and countries borrow freely and regularly from each other’s inventions and practices.

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International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, adopted 21 December 1965. [ available online ]
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), adopted 16 December 1966. ICCPR available online ]
International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), adopted 16 December 1966. [ ICESCR available online ]
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), adopted 1979. [ CEDAW available online ]
Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted 20 November 1989. [ CRC available online ]
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Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (DRIP), adopted 13 September 2007. [ DRIP available online ]
A/RES/76/300 The human right to a clean, healthy and substainable environment, adopted 28 July 2022. [ A/RES/76/300 available online (pdf) ]
Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, adopted 17 July 1998, came into force 1 July 2002. [ Rome Statute available online ]
Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, adopted 25 June 1993, World Conference of Human Rights in Vienna. [ Vienna Declaration 1993 available online ]
United States Constitution
Declaration of Independence (United States), July 1776. US Declaration of Independence available online
American Convention on Human Rights (Pact of San José), adopted 22 November 1969, came into force 18 July 1978. [ American Convention on Human Rights available online ]
African (Banjul) Charter on Human and People’s Rights, adopted 27 June 1981, came into force 21 October 1986. [ African Charter available online (pdf) ]

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The International (UN) Human Rights System , Georgetown Law Library Human Rights Law Research Guide
International Human Rights Law , United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
Human Rights entry in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy .

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100s of Free Human Rights Law Dissertation Topics and Titles

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Human Rights Law Dissertation Topics

Topic 2: The role of social media apps in spreading awareness among youth about human right

Topic 3: What obstacles do international human rights policies encounter in terms of implementation? An academic review

Topic 4: How are the rights of men being violated in the society? A human right perspective

Topic 5: Define the rights to ethics, religion and life in the context of human rights law in US

Topic 6: Investigating the impact of nationalist movements and ideologies on the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in India

Topic 7: Examining the rights and legal status of stateless persons who are forced to flee their countries of origin

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Topic 1: An assessment of life imprisonment under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Topic 2: Should prisoners be allowed to exercise their right to vote in a democratic society?

Topic 3: The European Court Of Human Rights and its effectiveness amongst the EU member states

Topic 4: The link between human rights and same-sex marriage

Topic 5: Assessment of human rights in the workplace

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Topic 7: Should the death penalty be reinstated in the United Kingdom post-Brexit?

Topic 8: Social media and the right to hold an opinion

Topic 9: Should Article 14 of the Human Rights Act 1998 be amended to implement more protected characteristics?

Topic 10: Should Human Rights be ignored when taking counter-terrorism measures?

Topic 11: The EU Supremacy and the Constitutional Rights of the Member States

Topic 12: The importance of Human Rights in a democratic society

Topic 13: The role of courts in safeguarding fundamental rights in their domestic jurisdiction

Topic 14: Does the General Data Protection Regulation Act as a Safeguard to the Basic Right To Privacy?

Topic 15: Should Countries Implement A Constitutional Court for Fundamental Rights Breaches?

Topic 16: Can Torture Be Justified Under Human Rights?

Topic 17: CCTV Surveillance and the Right to Privacy

Topic 18: The Need to Standardise Disability Rights around the World

Topic 19: Should the Right to Education Be Extended to Tertiary Education

Topic 20: The Role of Legislators and the Right to Education in the Sub-Saharan Region

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