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Declaration Of Rights

Decent Essays

The historic development of rights is associated with the development of western philosophical ideas and political principles. The recognition of man as a moral entity with self-worth and human dignity are ideas rediscovered in the Age of Enlightenment, most famously by the philosopher Immanuel Kant, ideas which challenged the authority of institutions deep rooted into society like the church and state. Although pre-Enlightenment, Britain already had a set of codified rights laid out in documents like the ‘Magna Carta of 1215’ or ‘The Bill of Rights of 1968’ . The rights contained in both documents were not human rights but rather political settlements between the monarch and property owning men. It was therefore until 1789, with the creation of the ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in France’, and the ‘Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution’, that had there been an article which laid out a formal …show more content…

It was “solemnly” proclaimed that “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights [UNDHR] states a common understanding of the peoples of the world concerning the inalienable and inviolable rights of all members of the human family and constitutes an obligation for the members of the international community” . The UNDHR gave value to the term ‘human rights’, stressing the value of human dignity. However, the article also recognises the need for social order, Article 29 acknowledges that limits to these rights must be determined by law and can only be for the purposes of securing recognition and respect of others and to meet “the just requirements of morality, public order, and the general welfare in a democratic society”. Any restriction on these rights has to be justified as proportionate to the aims pursued by the restriction, for example, a police officer is justified in wielding a firearm against an individual deemed to be putting other lives in

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