Empowering Human Rights for Revolutionary Change

ABSTRACT: Human rights are meant to control states, but states control human rights. This article aims to liberate human rights from this paradox. Inspired by Third World Approaches to International Law, it highlights the links between Western imperialism and human rights and introduces a conceptual human rights framework consisting of a state-centered sphere, people-centered sphere (communities, peoples, and social movements), and a relational space between the two. The state-centered sphere is dominant while the people-centered sphere is neglected but emergent. The article argues that it is time for the global human rights movement to become more bold, imaginative, structural, and attune to history. It provides three illustrative initiatives to strengthen the people-centered sphere: accountability “from below,” Freirean human rights and praxis, and challenging conversations on a range of issues, including colonization and reparative justice. The article argues for a paradigm shift that empowers human rights and rights-holders and places them on the threshold of revolutionary change. The author is primarily speaking to human rights commentators from the Global North.