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The Human Rights of Others: Sovereignty, Legitimacy, and “Just Causes” for the “War on Terror”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 March 2020

Margaret Denike
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Abstract

In this essay, Denike assesses the appropriation of international human rights by humanitarian law and policy of “security states.” She maps representations of the perpetrators and victims of “tyranny” and “terror,” and their role in providing a “just cause” for the U.S.-led “war on terror.” By examining narratives of progress and human rights heroism Denike shows how human rights discourses, when used together with the pretense of self-defense and preemptive war, do the opposite of what they claim—entrenching the sovereignty of Western imperialist states while eroding the conditions necessary for the recognition of the human rights of others.

Type
Research Article
Information
Hypatia , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , June 2008 , pp. 95 - 121
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 by Hypatia, Inc.

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