Cultural Rights in the 20th Century

On the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Human Rights at the United Nations in New York, Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the current status of that original declaration. Is it possible for any sort of rights to be ‘universal’? What are the implications of the ideas enshrined in that declaration - has the emphasis changed - and if so what are such rights? New thinking in this area has focused on ‘cultural rights’ but do these work alongside human rights, or do they supplant them? Has the advent of globalisation had an impact on human rights, and if so, how? At the end of the 20th century, can we look back to any progress in this area, and, if we look forward, do we see the oncoming train, or the light at the end of the human rights tunnel?

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Professor Homi Bhabha No other episodes
  Professor in English Literature and Art, Chicago University and Visiting Professor of the Humanities, University College, London
• Profesor John Gray No other episodes
  Professor of European Thought, London School of Economics

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Programme ID: p005458s

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/p005458s

Auto-category: 320 (Political science)