The Philosophy of Human Rights: Its Role in Global Justice. What can we learn from a clash between a philosopher and an historian?

Abstract

What is the role of philosophy in the human rights project?4 And what is the role of human rights in creating a better world? These are the questions at the core of a dispute between the philosopher John Tasioulas and the historian Samuel Moyn, although it takes considerable work to see past the cross-talk and arrive at this core. In this paper I will show that disentangling the arguments of Moyn and Tasioulas is a fruitful task that lights a path towards advancing both human rights and global justice. Specifically, I will show that while human rights play a crucial role in bettering the world, it is in the interests of global justice for that role to be strictly delimited. Philosophers of human rights are necessary for this process of delimitation. The irony is that Moyn, instead of discrediting philosophers of human rights, actually helps us to better understand the urgency of their work.