In Defense of Economic and Social Human Rights

Christian Olaf Christiansen is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy and History of Ideas at Aarhus University. He is an intellectual historian focused on historicizing issues of pressing contemporary concern, including human rights.

• Introduction: human rights and distributive justice; Part I. Internationalizing Human Rights: 1. War aims: Ralph Bunche, H. G. Wells and 'world social democracy'; 2. A 'Just share in social progress:' revisiting Hersch Lauterpacht; 3. Bridging the cold war divide: Ralph Bunche, Gunnar Myrdal and Moses Moskowitz advocating rights in the 1950s; Part II. Criticizing Global Inequalities Through Human Rights: 4. Deploying human rights against global inequalities in the 1960s: catholics and pan Africanists; 5. The 'Widening gap' as a threat to human rights: Manouchehr Ganji; Part III. Legitimizing Human Rights: 6. The derailment of a dream: Amartya Sen and the Sisyphean task of defending rights; Epilogue; Acknowledgements; Selected bibliography; Index.

'Christiansen provides an original and insightful account of the vicissitudes of efforts to ensure that economic and social rights have been taken seriously within the international human rights. He sheds valuable new light on the vital role of Global South actors in those endeavours.' Philip Alston, NYU