(in Polish) Human Rights in the New World (Dis)Order 3800-HRNO26-S

The primary objective of the course is to examine issues related to the idea of human rights in the
domains of politics, law, and ethics. These issues will be discussed not only in the domestic context,
but also in the international one, since it is no longer possible to reflect on the legitimation and
enforcement of the various dimensions of human rights without taking into account the processes of
globalization and deglobalization. The course will include an analysis of selected cases, such as organ
trafficking and labor conditions in postcolonial countries, from the perspective of human rights
protection, but also, more broadly, from the standpoint of global justice.
A further central aim of the course will be to identify the strengths and weaknesses of human rights
discourse. One of the fundamental questions currently being raised concerns the extent to which
human rights can provide a foundation for international law, as well as whether the effective
implementation of human rights on a global scale requires a specific and commonly shared axiological
vision, that is, the universalist argument. The assumption of a shared moral foundation capable of
uniting humanity, however, has been challenged by many theorists, particularly through the argument
from cultural particularism. Standards of human rights protection, including the protection of basic
human existence, such as access to shelter, food, and education, differ across cultures.
Moreover, the idea of human rights reveals a number of additional philosophical problems, including
the question of state sovereignty and the role of state borders in enforcing standards developed by the
United Nations, as well as the problem of the global distribution of resources and global poverty.
These issues, together with the increasing shift of major state actors, such as the United States and
China, toward political realism, weaken the legitimacy of the current international order.

The course will consist of three parts. The first part will focus primarily on the conceptual analysis of
human rights. It will include such elements as the history of the emergence of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and other documents constituting the framework of human rights; an
analysis of the content of human rights, their successive generations, the sources of their legitimacy,
and critiques advanced from other normative perspectives.The second part will address questions of
justice in the international sphere. Standards of human protection will be discussed through examples
such as Rawls’s idea of the Law of Peoples and the capabilities approach associated with Amartya Sen
and Martha Nussbaum. These theories will be examined, among other things, with regard to the
anthropology that underlies them in relation to human life, for example reproduction, survival, and the
conditions of human flourishing.The third part will be devoted to the analysis of specific problems
arising from the two preceding parts. This section will also take into account the processes of
globalization and deglobalization, along with the transformations in relations and rights among
international actors that accompany them. Particular attention will be given to a philosophical analysis
of: (a) the tension between civil rights and human rights; (b) the issue of state sovereignty in the age of
globalization; and (c) moral problems in both domestic and international contexts, such as the question
of refugees, hunger, and related forms of vulnerability.