Human rights inflation

The concept of human-rights inflation expresses the belief that people - such as human-rights activists - claim increasing numbers and varieties of human rights. Karel Vašák, for example, has theorised a development through three successive generations of sets of rights:[1]

  1. civil and political
  2. socio-economic and cultural
  3. solidarity-related

Commentators who identify trends of growing the cases labelled "rights" sometimes suspect that an increasing number of claims will erode the regard for those human rights which they consider more fundamental. Fears of human-rights inflation have been expressed since the mid-twentieth century.[2] Economic and social rights are particularly likely to be cited as examples of human rights inflation.[3]

References
  1. Kaisary, Philip (6 January 2022). "The Haitian Revolution and Socio-economic rights". In Jensen, Steven L. B.; Walton, Charles (eds.). Social Rights and the Politics of Obligation in History. Human Rights in History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 84. ISBN 9781009020664. Retrieved 20 November 2022. [...] liberté (first-generation civil and political rights), égalité (second-generation socio-economic and cultural rights) and fraternité (third-generation rights of solidarity).
  2. Theilen, Jens T. (2021). "The inflation of human rights: A deconstruction". Leiden Journal of International Law. 34 (4): 831–854. doi:10.1017/S0922156521000297. ISSN 0922-1565. Worries about the inflation of human rights are not new – indeed, they can be traced back at the very least to mid-century responses to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
  3. Theilen, Jens T. (2021). "The inflation of human rights: A deconstruction". Leiden Journal of International Law. 34 (4): 831–854. doi:10.1017/S0922156521000297. ISSN 0922-1565. It is remarkable, in particular, how consistently socio-economic human rights in the form of welfare rights have been denied the status of 'real' human rights on the basis of the anti-inflation mindset.

Further reading
  • Avbelj, Matej (2018). "Human rights inflation in the European Union". The Fragmented Landscape of Fundamental Rights Protection in Europe The Role of Judicial and Non-Judicial Actors. Elgar Online. pp. 7–24. ISBN 9781786436054.
  • Baxi, Upendra (2001). "Too Many, or Too Few, Human Rights". Human Rights Law Review. 1: 1–10. doi:10.1093/hrlr/1.1.1.
  • Clément, Dominique (2018). Debating Rights Inflation in Canada: A Sociology of Human Rights. Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. ISBN 978-1-77112-276-4.
  • Ignatieff, Michael (2014). "Rights Inflation and Role Conflict in the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights". The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Conscience for the World. Brill. pp. 33–44. ISBN 9789004254251.
  • Letsas, George (2007). "Public Morals, Consensus, and Rights Inflation: A Critique". A Theory of Interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-920343-7.
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