What Is Meant by Human Rights Law

Human rights are inalienable. They should not be removed except in certain situations and on a regular basis. For example, the right to liberty may be restricted if a person is convicted of a crime by a court. States and other officials must comply with the legal norms and standards enshrined in human rights instruments. If they fail to do so, the holders of injured rights have the right to seek an appropriate remedy from a competent court or other arbitrator in accordance with the rules and procedures provided for by law. Find out the reasons to emphasize the rights of the child in their own human rights convention The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) is an autonomous body of the Organization of American States, also based in Washington, D.C. Together with the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, based in San José, Costa Rica, it is one of the organs that make up the inter-American system for the promotion and protection of human rights. [22] The IACHR is a standing body that meets several times a year in ordinary extraordinary sessions to investigate allegations of human rights violations in the hemisphere. Its human rights obligations derive from three documents[23]: the Council also promotes the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages and the European Social Charter. [26] Membership is open to all European states that seek European integration, accept the principle of the rule of law and are able and willing to guarantee democracy, fundamental human rights and fundamental freedoms. [27] Human rights are relevant to all of us, not just to those who face repression or ill-treatment. The adoption of national and international law is clearly one of the ways in which human rights exist.

But many have suggested that this may not be the only way. While human rights exist only by decree, their availability depends on the evolution of the national and international political situation. Many people have been looking for a way to support the idea that human rights have roots that are subject to deeper and less human choices than legal decrees. One version of this idea is that people are born with rights, that human rights are somehow innate or inherent in man (see Morsink 2009). One way in which a normative status can be inherent in man is to be given by God. The United States Declaration of Independence (1776) states that people are “endowed by their Creator with natural rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” From this point of view, God, the supreme legislator, has promulgated certain fundamental human rights. This section attempts to explain the general idea of human rights by identifying four defining characteristics. The aim is to answer the question of what human rights are with a description of the basic concept and not with a list of specific rights.

Two people may have the same general idea of human rights, although they do not agree on which rights belong to a list of these rights and even on the existence of universal moral rights. The four-part declaration below attempts to cover all types of human rights, including moral and legal human rights and old and new human rights (e.g. B Locke`s natural rights and contemporary human rights). However, the declaration assumes that certain types of human rights will have additional characteristics. Starting from this general concept does not require us to treat all types of human rights in a single unified theory (see Buchanan 2013 for an argument that we should not seek to theorize together universal moral rights and international legal human rights). Attributing human rights to God`s commandments may give them a metaphysically secure status, but in a very diverse world, it makes them virtually dangerous. Billions of people do not believe in the God of Christianity, Islam and Judaism. If people don`t believe in God or the kind of God who dictates rights, and if you want to base human rights on theological beliefs, you have to convince those people of a theological view that supports human rights. This may be even more difficult than convincing them of human rights.

Legal remission at the national and international levels offers a much safer status for practical purposes. In practice, many human rights are legally difficult to enforce because there is no consensus on the application of certain rights, no relevant national legislation or bodies empowered to take legal action to enforce them. [40] The most obvious way in which human rights emerge are the norms of national and international law created by decrees, customs and court decisions. At the international level, human rights standards exist on the basis of treaties that they have transposed into international law. For example, the right not to be held in slavery or serfdom exists in Article 4 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (Council of Europe, 1950) and Article 8 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (UN 1966), because these treaties establish it. At the national level, human rights standards exist because they are now part of a country`s law through legislation, a judicial decision or a habit. For example, anti-slavery law exists in the United States because of the 13th Amendment in the United States.