Introduction

The history of human rights has thus far been perceived as a history of the West. The more human rights have been thought to be philosophized, the more the idea and concepts concerning human rights have been firmly rooted in a Western context ( Vermeule 2011 ; Slaughter 2007 ; Moyn 2010 ; Hunt 2007 ; Edelstein 2018 ). However, the human of human rights could be anyone. It could be a woman from Ukraine, a Black man from the United States, or closer to the Indian context, a boy from Kashmir or a man from Assam. In other words, the history of human rights has been constructed as one of only the West, ignoring facets of global thought that point otherwise. This book seeks to engage with the assumption that human rights are only a Western concept.