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11 - Human Rights Responses to the Populist Challenge

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2020

By
Gerald L. Neuman
Edited by
Gerald L. Neuman
Gerald L. Neuman
Affiliation:
Harvard Law School, Massachusetts
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Summary

This concluding essay draws on the insights of earlier chapters and provides the author's own conclusions regarding how monitoring bodies in the human rights system should deal with the challenges created by the current wave of exclusionary populism. As the varied accounts illustrate, one size does not fit all. Moreover, international human rights institutions should not address populism as such, but should rather continue to focus on the specific human rights violations that populism leads to, and on the violations that have contributed to the rise of populism. Meanwhile, human rights institutions should also be attentive to the criticisms that populists have directed against the international human rights system, some of which (as examples show) may be meritorious even within a human rights analysis. These recommendations would not solve the problem that the spread of populism poses, but they would enable human rights institutions to contribute positively toward particular solutions.

Keywords

Populismhuman rightstreaty bodieshuman rights courtsframingbacklashcivil societyopposition partieseconomic and social rights
Type
Chapter
Information
Human Rights in a Time of Populism
Challenges and Responses
 , pp. 250 - 272
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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