This title was first published in 2003. In this collection of essays that explores Western and Chinese perspectives on human rights, leading Canadian and Chinese scholars bridge the global divide on some of the key aspects of human rights. Issues covered include the role of civil society in human rights protection, the imperative of the rule of law in the protection of human rights, freedom of expression and its relation to social, economic and cultural development and corruption in the public and private sectors. The volume also focuses on the domestic implementation of human rights treaties and offers gender perspectives on implementing social and economic rights in an era of globalization. The independent Chinese and Canadian scholars present a new vision of global pluralism in the area of human rights protection in a modernizing China and in the rest of the world.

The core idea shared by all cosmopolitan views is that all human beings belong to a single community and the ultimate units of moral concern are individual human beings, not states or particular forms of human associations. Nevertheless, the attempts to ground a political theory on overarching universal principles is in contradiction with the plurality of social, cultural, political, religious interpretative standpoints in the contemporary world. Is dissent cosmopolitan? Is there a legacy of dissent for a theory of cosmopolitanism? This book is a comparative, historical analysis of dissident thought and practice for contemporary debates on cosmopolitanism. Divided into two parts, the editors and contributors explore the contribution of ‘paradigmatic’ dissidents like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Havel, Sakharov, Mandela, Liu Xiaobo, Aung San Suu Kyi towards a post-universalist cosmopolitan theory. Part Two examines the inherent cosmopolitanism of the seemingly ‘peripheral’ dissent of contemporary forms of protests, resistance, direct action like NO TAV movement and Occupy Wall Street. A timely book which allows for a much needed new engagement in contemporary debates of cosmopolitanism, we learn how practical resistance to totalizing/hegemonic claims is generated, and how dissident thinking might contribute to new, enriched ways of conceiving the non-totalizing foundations of cosmopolitanism. An innovative look at what lessons can scholars of cosmopolitanism learn from dissent/dissident movements, and what the role of dissent in cosmopolitan democracy could be.

This book offers a stimulating introduction to the links between areas of global governance, human rights global economy and international law. By drawing on a range of diverse subject areas, Errol P. Mendes argues that the foundations of global governance, human rights and international law are undermined by a conflict or ‘tragic flaw’, where insistence on absolute conceptions of state sovereignty are pitted against universally accepted principles of justice and human rights resulting in destructive self-interest for both the state and the global community. The book explores how human rights and international law are applied in some of the critical institutions of global governance and in the operations of the global private sector, and how States, institutions and global civil society struggle to fight this ‘tragic flaw’. The book is brought up to date by considering developments in the role of the IMF, the World Bank, bilateral investment treaties; the likely failure of the Doha round of WTO negotiations; the legacy of the 2008 financial crisis; and the role of the International Criminal Court and the evolving Responsibility to Protect doctrine in international peace and security crises in the Middle East, Central and West Africa among other regions of the world. With its intensely interdisciplinary approach, this book motivates new thinking in the realm of global governance and international law, and promotes the development of new strategies for negotiating between conflicting leadership and organisational values within global institutions. The book will be of great interest and use to students and researchers of public international law, international relations and political science, business and human rights, global governance and international trade and economic law.

The existence of human rights helps secure the peace, deter aggression, promote the rule of law, combat crime and corruption, and prevent humanitarian crises. These human rights include freedom from torture, freedom of expression, press freedom, women's rights, children's rights, and the protection of minorities. This book surveys the countries of the Americas and is augmented by a current bibliography and useful indexes by subject, title and author.

This text looks at the reasons why and how some states promote human rights internationally, risking their citizens' lives considerable portions of their national budgets, and repercussions from opposing states to protect helpless foreigners.

This book aims to contribute to the global observance of the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 1948. It considers nature and development of international human rights law. It considers how human rights interact with other regimes such as intellectual property, foreign direct investment, corporate social responsibility, international environmental law, humanitarian law, refugee law, economic law, and criminal law. The book then presents human rights of vulnerable populations and sets out contemporary challenges and issues relating to human rights, such as globalisation, the effects of COVID-19, religion, nationality, and the implementation of economic, social, and cultural rights.

Explains that international law is not a monolith but can encompass on-going contestation, in which states set forth competing interpretations Maps and explains the cross-country differences in international legal norms in various fields of international law and their application and interpretation in different geographic regions Organized into three broad thematic sections of conceptual matters, domestic institutions and comparative international law, and comparing approaches across issue-areas Chapters authored by contributors who include top international law and comparative law scholars all from diverse backgrounds, experience, and perspectives.