Limitations of human rights
Limitations of human rights refer to the restrictions placed on certain rights and freedoms to protect the rights of others or for the greater good of society. These limitations are often necessary to balance conflicting rights and interests, such as national security, public order, and public health. They are typically outlined in legal frameworks and international human rights instruments.
4 Key excerpts on "Limitations of human rights"
eBook - ePub- Hilaire Barnett(Author)
- 2009(Publication Date)
- Routledge-Cavendish(Publisher)
...In the United Kingdom, with its uncodified Constitution, the traditional approach to human rights has been rather different. Here, individuals are free to do whatever they please, provided that they do not contravene the law. Freedoms and rights exist but may be limited by what Parliament may enact. For example, in order to understand the scope (and limits) of the right to freedom of speech it is necessary to know that defamation (making wrongful and damaging falsehoods about another person) is actionable; that expression which threatens a breach of the peace or speech, which stirs up racial hatred, is a criminal offence. The ‘right’ is what remains once all the restrictions are considered. This conventional approach must now be seen in light of both the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998, which makes the majority of Convention rights enforceable in the domestic courts. Before looking at these in detail, a brief overview of the history of rights is required. The origins of rights In Western societies Christian natural law has historically been highly influential. Natural law thought pre-dates Christianity and may be traced to the ancient Greek philosophers. Natural law theory in essence claims that there is a higher source of authority than the government. That higher source is – for Christian natural law theorists – God. For secular theorists, the higher source of authority is man’s rationality, which enables humans to understand what is morally required for the law of the State to be valid and to require the obedience of its citizens. In either case – religious or secular – natural law sets moral standards with which the law must comply. Failure to comply with this essential morality would make the law of the State invalid. Furthermore, according to some theorists, if the law of the State (the positive law) fails to match up to moral standards, citizens are not obliged to follow that law...
eBook - ePub- Jack Donnelly(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...4 HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE LIMITS OF STATE ACTION: COMPETING THEORIES AND APPROACHES Establishing limits on the legitimate range of state action is one of the primary functions of human rights; 1 most human rights are held or exercised primarily in relation to one’s own government. Human rights, however, are only one of many strategies for limiting the state. In this chapter we will briefly examine three prominent alternatives to human rights, namely, natural law, the principle of utility, and prescription. Chapter 5 will consider two further alternatives. In the course of these comparisons my concern will be both to elaborate further the nature of human rights, and to suggest some of the important political and practical advantages of human rights. Natural Law and Natural Rights It is widely believed that the concept of human rights emerged from the notion of natural law (Maritain 1947:64–8; Messner 1965:278, 326; Cranston 1973:7; Palumbo 1982:9, 22). It is not even uncommon to find ‘natural law’ used as a rough synonym for ‘natural rights’. In fact, though, the two concepts are largely unrelated; natural law represents an approach to questions of political order quite different from that of natural or human rights. This is particularly clear in Aquinas’ theory of natural law and right, perhaps the best developed and best known of the classic natural-law theories. For Aquinas, a law is ‘an ordinance of reason for the common good, made by him who has care of the community and promulgated’ [90.4]. 2 All law is encompassed within what Aquinas calls the ‘eternal law’ of God [93.3]. However, this eternal law is specified in two main branches, which are largely independent of one another: the ‘divine law’, the inspired revelation of the Bible, which deals primarily with questions of spiritual salvation; and the natural and human laws...
eBook - ePubCovid-19 and Business Law
Legal Implications of a Global Pandemic
- Adnan Trakic, Adnan Trakic(Authors)
- 2021(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter(Publisher)
...It focuses on two key areas that impact human rights in times of a crisis or emergency: Derogation of Human Rights in times of emergency – respect for the rule of law and democratic principles in times of emergency, including limits on the scope and duration of emergency measures and to avoid potentially disproportionate measures. Fundamental human rights standards, including freedom of expression, privacy, and data protection. Limitations and Derogations of Human Rights in Time of Emergency Though human rights put people in center stage, however, in times of crises it is often the first casualty. For governments confronted with civil wars, military coup. insurgencies, economic crises, natural disasters, and similar threats, the pressures to restrict individual liberties can be irresistible. International law scholars have long recognised that “the response of a state to a public emergency is an acid test of its commitment to the effective implementation of human rights”. 5 Emergency powers provide a situation in which governments are authorised within limited boundaries to be able to put through special powers that it would normally not be permitted to do, primarily for the safety and protection of their citizens. Most democracies have a range of special powers available to respond to emergencies that threaten safety, property, or the integrity of the state. The normal workings of legislative and executive powers that have been established by a country’s constitution are set aside when these special powers are approved and put in place. What these special powers do is to confer broad regulation-making powers in an official within the executive government. Once these special powers are triggered, the executive government is authorised to make regulations with respect to whatsoever is believed to be necessary to respond to the emergency...
eBook - ePubFeeding the Hungry
Advocacy and Blame in the Global Fight against Hunger
- Michelle Jurkovich(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- Cornell University Press(Publisher)
...Formal law surrounding a prohibition against torture still exists but, Foot notes, the anti-torture norm may be eroding. Whether a norm exists around a human right already codified in law should be an empirical question, not an assumed given. Laws and norms are not only conceptually distinct, but one does not presuppose the other. And when scholars write in terms of norms surrounding legal commitments, they should be clear among whom they expect this norm to exist. Is the norm expected to exist among states, activists, domestic publics, or some other community? Highlighting the distinction between laws and norms matters for more reasons than conceptual integrity or abstract theorizing. Understanding that laws and norms are not the same thing and do not necessarily walk hand in hand improves our ability to understand the limits of legal frameworks for human rights which lack norms and enables us to question the value of law in improving human rights if no corresponding norm is present. I will continue this discussion at the end of this chapter. The Right to Food in International Law Let us return briefly to existing state obligations in international law around the right to food. Previous chapters discussed the historical process of including the right to food in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the ICESCR (chapter 1) and the creation of the Voluntary Guidelines to Support the Progressive Realization of the Right to Adequate Food in the Context of National Food Security (chapter 2). For ease of reference, I have reproduced here the table that is provided in chapter 1, documenting the varied covenants and agreements recognizing the right to food (see table 5.1). The precise language of what the right to food constitutes varies by covenant and convention but in all of them states are the actors who adopted and ratified the law and states, with a primary focus on the national government, are the actors obliged to ensure adequate food for their people...
