Inventing Human Rights

Lynn Hunt will be visiting Duke as part of the Provost’s lecture series on January 19th, and will be visiting our class that day in 326 Allen Building on Duke’s West Campus from 10:05-11:20 to talk about her book Inventing Human Rights (which is our first reading assignment for the semester). It a great deal of attention when it was published in 2007. The eminent U.S. historian Gordon Wood reviewed it in the New York Times, it rated a brief mention in the New Yorker,  and received a range of responses within academic publications. The questions she posed were, as is so often the case in the writing of history, driven at least in part by contemporary events, most particularly the debates about the use of torture that took place in the U.S. in the years after 9/11.  But it also represents the culmination of decades of thinking about the history of rights and revolution. Since the publication of her ground-breaking 1994 book The Family Romance of the French Revolution, she has been one of the leading scholars in the field of European history, and shaped approaches to history by helping to pioneer and showcase the now widespread approaches of cultural history. (You can see a selection of her publications here).

You can watch Lynn Hunt lecture on the book at University of California Santa Barbara below, and see her give a lecture on “Revolutionary Movements” in her class at UCLA in the video below that.

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Share your comments about these lectures and her book here.

38 thoughts on “Inventing Human Rights”

  1. After reading Lynn Hunt’s “Inventing Human Rights” and hearing her discuss the “clicks” that signaled the beginnings of cultural change, I could not help but think of our constantly changing perceptions of what constitutes our rights as human beings. I found it interesting that the novels Clarissa, Julie and Pamela were engines that awakened a new sense of individuality, but that sense was largely constrained to the upper classes that were interested in reading in the first place. In class, Professor Hunt advanced the idea that the digital age was now the medium for asserting our identity among people of all classes and backgrounds. However, I would argue that it isn’t merely the access to information that changes people’s perceptions but how that information is marshaled. In other words, I believe that the digital communications revolution is not an end that creates social change but a means that newer organizations use to advance their agendas. International non-governmental organizations have flourished in recent decades and they are competing to direct people’s energies to achieve specific goals. In this sense, these groups are shaping our conceptions of what we believe is right, wrong or otherwise. They give us a sense of identity beyond traditional forms of association, such as the state, religion, ethnicity or political party.

    Had I registered for this class earlier and known that Professor Hunt was coming to answer questions about her book, I would have asked her on her opinion on where she thinks human rights are headed. Have we achieved satisfactory de jure human rights, if not de facto human rights? Are we now and forever going to reconsider and reformulate what human rights are? For instance, the current debate about healthcare in America divides many people on whether it is a human right or a privilege. More specifically, is universal healthcare a human right or does that create moral hazard?

  2. I found various aspects of Lynn Hunt’s Inventing Human Rights, interesting and it provides an new outlook on facts and statements we seem to take at face value. We all know that the famous, possibly the most quoted, line of the Declaration of Independence begins with, ” We hold these truths to be self-evident…”. If these truths are truly self-evident, why do these authors feel the need to state them in elaborate documents? Before this book, I never questionsed why these rights needed to be stated.

    Another point I enjoyed came up in Chapter Four, “There Will Be No End To It” – which by the way is a fitting title to describe how cascaded, or more like rippled in the case of women especially- from rights to the majority to rights to the minorities. However, one can see how these men in late 18th century France were more comfortable granting rights to those who most resembled themselves and were less willing to grant those same rights to others, i.e free blacks, slaves, ( which eventually did occur) and women. One case where this is seen clearly is when they were granting rights to the Jews and many were less willing to grant the same rights to the Jews who lived in Eastern France because they looked more different than the Jews from the southern part of France. I also found the effort made to keep the ” Les Droits De l’Homme et le Citoyen” out of the colonies- as if the founders themselves realized that they were being hypocrites. As if “climate” has an effect on universal, self-evident rights.

  3. I found Lynn Hunt’s account of human rights insightful and almost refreshing. She looks at human rights from a unique angle and questions the concept, the process of its’ creation, and the validity of its’ claims. One of the concepts that I found refreshing was the reference to novels and the concept of imaginative identification. Yes it is valid to say that novels may have provided insight to people, mostly minorities, around the world into what their life could be. However, I question the sequence of this theory. Is it not also valid to question whether or not the novels in fact reflect the already changing social situations, as minority groups around the world gain little freedoms and thus becoming closer to being independent citizens of the world? However, with that being said females were one of the last groups to gain the political freedoms that they rightfully “deserved” according to human rights documents yet many of the revolutionary novels that Hunt references are about female heroines.

    Finally, I just wanted to touch on the area where Hunt states the “three interlocking qualities: rights must be natural (inherent in human beings); equal (the same for everyone); and universal (applicable everywhere).” If these are the required traits, and Hunt has referenced numerous events in French, American, and world history where people did not have these rights or gained them much later than their comrades, I question whether it is even valid to say that we have a concrete set of “human rights.” I almost believe that it is still valid to refer to them as political freedoms for specific groups rather than laying claim that all humans are equal because unfortunately groups around the world, who are not necessarily minorities, are still today lacking the simple political freedoms that we now assume are given to all peoples of the world.

    Hunt refers to so many events and theories in just the few parts of her reading that we read that I am interested to see what major points she touches on and which argument she finds most effective when talking to university audiences.

  4. I want to say that it feels strange reading an “actual book” that is neither a science/math textbook nor a French book once again. Having said that, I would like to address a few of my thoughts and questions that I came across while reading Mrs. Hunt’s book “Inventing Human Rights.” Firstly I would like to comment on her use of a vast number of sources, which she dovetailed into a comprehensive history of the origins of the rights of humans. The section that stood out the most for me was the “degradation or uplift.” I had never thought about the negative aspects of reading novels before – honestly I found this section quite amusing. “The danger lay precisely in their [novels] attractive powers; by constantly harping on the seductions of love, they encouraged readers to act on their worst impulses, to refuse the advice of their parents and church, to ignore the moral strictures of the community” (p 51). That quotation and the next one almost seem as if someone – who doesn’t like reading- wrote satiric pieces to justify why he or she should spend their time doing something other than reading. “The increase of novels will help to account for the increase of prostitution and for the numerous adulteries and elopements that we hear of in the different parts of the kingdom” (p 53). But on a more serious note, I am looking forward to Mrs. Hunt’s visit today!

  5. I really enjoyed the Professor Hunt’s book. As a a student who has taken some classes that has addressed various topics of human rights, I am very interested in today’s class session.

    One particular aspect of the reading that caught my idea was how US rights were seen to be given by God while in comparison the France were seen to be more secular in nature in terms of human rights. It is very interesting how in the United States religion tends to play a role in our nation’s early foundings and even today with symbols in our currency, pledge of allegiance, and marriage that have caused firestorms of debate. In France, they seem to be addressed much more fervently now with with issues such as the headdress in school, and the intensively divisive issues of separation of church and state that they has brought up. I was wondering how professor Hunt would compare and contrast how the two societies react to such issues with possibly an explanation if they have reacted significantly different in her eyes, why that has been.

  6. Reading this book was a lot different than I would have thought being a Cultural Anthropology major. Usually in Cultural Anthropology, when we talk about something along the lines of human rights, it is in relation to how such a concept functions within society. This book describes it more in terms of the linguistics, history, and psychology related to human rights.

    One thing that caught my attention particularly was in the introduction when it stated “Rights remain open to question because our sense of who has rights and what those rights are constantly changes. The human rights revolution is by definition ongoing.” This brings up a definite uncertainty for the future. Will human rights be fully developed as a concept when all groups are accepted into the category of having the “self-evident rights” or will the concept yoyo from widely accepting to one with a narrow definition once again?

  7. J’ai beaucoup aimé lire et écouter sur le web, Inventing Human Rights par Lynn Hunt. Elle est vraiment une historienne accomplie. En particulier, j’ai apprécié sa capacité d’intégrer l’histoire et des détailles spécifiques dans sa thèse concernant les doits humains.

    Au lycée, j’ai écrit un essai a propos de la Révolution Française qui a parlé beaucoup des motivations de la révolution, et en particulier le bourgeoisie et comment ils ont utilisé les idéals de la révolution (comme les doits humains) pour créer l’Assemblé Nationale. Donc, c’est fascinant pour moi de mieux comprendre d’ou viennent les idéaux dont j’ai beaucoup recherché et qui ont joué un rôle incroyablement implorant dans la Révolution Française et même la Révolution entre les Etats Unis et l’Angleterre.

    La chose qui m’a frappé le plus dans l’écriture de Hunt était quelque chose que j’ai lu dans l’introduction de son œuvre. Elle a remarque « Si l’égalité des droits est assez évident, pourquoi est ce qu’on devrait faire cette assertion [que les vérités sont évident]. Cette question rhétorique est très intéressant parce que c’est une question intégrale parce qu’il fait référence a une idée et une supposition qui est le base pas seulement de la création de la Première République en France, mais aussi de la création des Etats Unis.

    Je suis enthousiaste de faire la connaissance de Mme. Hunt et d’écouter ce qu’elle va dire dans notre cours !

  8. “Thinking and deciding for oneself therefore required psychological and political changes as much as philosophical ones.”
    I found it fascinating how Hunt examined the development of the “universal” and “self-evident” nature of human rights, historically dominated by Western-centric values and public consciousness of individuality and “self.” She calls to our attention the fallacy of presuming the static and all-encompassing language that is common in international human rights dialogue. In the realm of morality, it is easy to forget that our morals are rooted in learned behaviors and is not biologically innate (to differentiate from evolutionary leanings for certain behaviors). Fundamental in shaping these cultural definitions or expectations for personal and psychological boundaries (empathy, autonomy, behavioral expectations) that radiate from within the individual, the Enlightenment philosophers as well as some of their influential epistemological novels helped propel citizens to think beyond and eventually challenge the blatant commonly accepted inequalities in society.
    I couldn’t help but draw parallels between the potential implications of boosted literacy and increased media access for democracy in developing Francophone African nations. After the fall of many former colonies during the wars of liberation in Africa, there was a tremendous rise in the number of democracies. However, they were soon termed “pseudo-democracies” or “hybrid regimes” because it was debatable whether they were liberal governance systems (functional democracies with legitimate contested elections and emphasis on human rights) or authoritarian regimes with the trappings of democratic processes. This renewed debate over democracies’ effectiveness in upholding civil liberties brought into question the idea of “political citizenship”. Hunt touches on this topic by addressing the lack of complete and easy cultural transferability of “human rights language” used by international development agencies and non-profits that are funded by Western nations and laden with Western-centric human rights value. An Afrobarometer 2009 publication, “Are Democratic Citizens Emerging in Africa?” surveyed Africans about their political attitudes. Although many (despite low expectations for government efficacy or transparency) expressed high hopes that democracy was the best route to higher quality of life (economic but also personal freedoms), they also viewed democracy to be a parent-child model, citizens as being completely subject to the whims and demands of their government. Africans, exposed to the abundant Western rhetoric of democracy’s benefits, still had more to learn about the (expensive) implementation of democracy where citizens would demand more of an employer-employee model where citizens could hold their government accountable through political action. With our very culturally influenced definition of “civil liberties” and “human rights,” could it be that our political interventions are setting up African nations for failure by encouraging an unsustainable political system that is ultimately not rooted in local African values or given adequate infrastructural support? How will increased technological access (via internet, text, tv, news) also shift African political attitudes and the type of regimes that may emerge? My question is then, “How do we approach supporting political systems (regardless of whether they are democracies in our own fashion) that are rooted in local perceptions of human rights?”
    Other food for thought—in reading back, this conversation is painfully relativistic which may render policy impossible to make. Is having a set of human rights commonly accepted by most major state actors better than a world where human rights were entirely subjective? In a globalized economy and the largest, most crucial being the knowledge sector, will there eventually be a homogenization of cultural values/human rights?

  9. I’d like to piggyback on Claire’s comments about the differences between American and French conceptions of human rights. It is clear that French society weights certain rights as a people – for instance, health care is generally accepted as a responsibility of the state. On the other hand, individual rights take the backseat to the cooperation and well-being of the population (one example would be the burqa, which is banned in schools in France since it is seen as a disruptive religious symbol). The obvious historical reason I can think of for this is that France has a much longer history of unity than America. In addition, it is a smaller nation with a more centralized government, factors which would enhance societal cooperation. While Professor Hunt did a wonderful job of outlining the events that led to the development of human rights in each France and the U.S., I am left wondering if there are any specific historical differences she has come across that could account for this modern contrast. Have these changes in the perception of individual and societal rights come about recently, or do they date back to pre-revolutionary or revolutionary years?

    In addition, I was left contemplating the overall definition of “human rights.” In the introduction, Prof. Hunt discusses the paradox of self-evidence: if human rights are self-evident, then why is our approach to them constantly shifting, and why must we debate and discuss them in the first place? Later on, in chapters 3 and 4, we see how the definition of human rights slowly grew to include more and more people and re-define rights for certain demographics. Even today, the term faces scrutiny in the face of gay and immigrant rights movements. If the term “human rights” has been revised many, many times, can we say there is a ideal definition of the term at all, a point at which the revisions will end?

  10. Dans sa lecture “Inventing Human Rights”, Lynn Hunt attribue le développement des droites de l’homme aux changes en l’appréciation du corps et la privance. Elle conclut que les droits de l’homme développent continuellement à cause des actions qui sont acceptables de la société. Avec la naissance de la télévision et le déclin de la littérature et appréciation du temps toute seul, je crois (et crains) que note société est retourner au sentiment qui ressemble l’un avant l’Enlightenment. Le contenu des divertissements en cours montre en plus la violence et la sexualité. Je crains que les générations qui grandissent dans cette culture penseront que ces actions sont acceptables. Bien que le système légal protège les citoyens, je crois que la vie quotidienne verrai moins respect pour l’individuel à cause de l’influence du culture pop. Je suis d’accord avec Lynn Hunt que les droits de l’homme changent parce que ils sont associés beaucoup avec les actions acceptables en culture, mais je voulais savoir si elle croit qu’il y aura un grand changement dans les actions acceptables et une perte des droites de l’homme dans la vie quotidienne.

  11. One passage I found particularly interesting in Lynn Hunt’s Inventing Human Rights was her passing mention of the fact that, in the U.S., natural rights were seen to have been bestowed by God whereas in France these rights were secular in nature: “Jefferson had felt the need to assert that all men were ‘endowed by their Creator’ with rights; the French deduced rights from the entirely secular sources of nature, reason, and society.” This seems to present somewhat of a paradox. If natural rights are supposedly innate, then how can society be their source? What this brings to mind is John Rawl’s veil of ignorance, in which actors would be unaware of their own position in society as they were choosing the rights of everyone in that society. Not knowing what role they would end up, the actors would be proponents of universal equality. Could this concept be related to the source of “secular” natural rights?

  12. Like others, I found Lynn Hunt’s discussion of the role of novels in the gradual understanding and acceptance of human rights to be fascinating. I am particularly interested in applying Hunt’s ideas to the 1950s and 1960s when Algeria was fighting for its independence. Did novels play a role during this period of allowing French people to empathize with the native people of Algeria and other African colonies? What was the relationship between psychology and politics during this time period?

    Although many groups in France, including women, had made significant progress in obtaining rights, the idea of human rights, even those clearly stated in the Preamble to the Constitution of 1946, did not apply to les indigènes of the colonies. I would like to ask Dr. Hunt her opinion on how the French could justify colonization in the midst of a growing acceptance of human rights. It is clear that empathizing with others of European descent, no matter their sex or religion, came easier to the French than did empathizing with people of different races or ethnicities. What are possible reasons for this? Fear? Hunt provides a possible explanation for this attitude when she says, “Educational theory, shaped most influentially by Locke and Rousseau, therefore shifted from an emphasis on obedience through punishment to the careful cultivation of reason as the chief instrument of independence” (60). Ironically, as the Enlightenment placed more emphasis on autonomy, many European countries gained colonies. Orientalist views and colonial policy commonly attributed a lack of reason and rationality to indigenous peoples; did Europeans thus feel that the same standards of human rights and independence did not apply to those they colonized? In Algeria for example, the “Code de l’indigénat” lasted well into the 20th century and incorporated discrimination into the law. Furthermore, torture was widespread during this conflict. Was this period of conflict a “necessary” stage in the evolution of empathy and universal human rights in France? Some in France believe that the prejudice that exists today is an indication that “colonization” still exists, despite statements of equality in the Preamble (… [La France] garantit à tous l’égal accès aux fonctions publiques et l’exercice individuel ou collectif des droits et libertés proclamés ou confirmés ci-dessus.) Do recent events in les banlieues of Paris indicate a growing disconnect between the law’s definition of human rights, or the ideal of equality, and the interpretation of those rights by society?

  13. Lynn Hunt a proposé des idées intéressantes dans son livre Inventing Human Rights. Elle a écrit la première chapitre concernant l’effet des romans au dix-huitième siècle. Ces romans comme Clarissa et Julie ont appris aux hommes et aux femmes, aux nobles et à la classe moyenne à comprendre ce que ressent ces personnages qui n’étaient pas un membre de la famille. C’était une évolution nécessaire pour le commencement des droits de l’homme, Hunt a exprimé.

    Ce que je trouve intéressant est la durée du temps avant que les femmes aient gagné des droits politiques. Les femmes étaient le dernier groupe à les gagner. C’est extrêmement surprenant selon moi. Si le commencement des droits de l’homme est lié aux citoyens qui pouvaient sentir les mêmes émotions que les femmes comme Clarissa et Julie, on penserait que les femmes seraient un des premiers groupes à gagner des droits politiques. Néanmoins, Hunt a bien expliqué les raisons pourquoi les juifs, les noirs et des autres peuples ont reçu des droits politiques avant que des femmes.

  14. Professor Hunt offers a narrative of human rights thought and language that is rooted in the traditions, cultures, and values of Western nations (namely France, Britain, and the United States). I think it’s interesting to think about how, in contrast to its rootedness in the Western world, human rights thinking and law is more recently used to define conditions and redress injustices in the “Third World.” I’d like to ask Professor Hunt what she believes are the implications of this. The book attests to the cultural and contextual specificity of how human rights are understood at different times and in different places. The book also attests to the fact that, at least in practice, human rights are far from universal. So what are the implications of making use of this language and logic that evolved in regions of the world that, at the same time they appealed to human rights, denied the humanity of the very same people who currently appeal to universal human rights language and logic to combat injustice (i.e. colonized peoples)? Moreover, can non-Western, “Third World” peoples, truly gain justice through human rights thinking as Hunt has framed it, or does it merely provide ways of remedying certain injustices, at certain times, in certain places, without ever really attacking the root causes of injustice and inhumane treatment globally?

  15. I would like to ask Prof. Hunt to comment on the concept of nationhood and the collective identities of the peoples discussed in her book Inventing Human Rights. I think her argument can be boiled down to the fact that notion of human rights as we know it today began to emerge in the West when major social axioms were questioned and broken down in the 18th century. The end of the Age of Absolutism signaled huge paradigmatic changes that placed great emphasis on individuality and personal autonomy. Hunt presents particularly convincing evidence of this by drawing attention to the decreasing value of birthright She writes that “under the new dispensation, honor had to do with actions, not birth” (143). Similarly, she draws attention to the changing role that religion and religious institutions played in morality. People began to question the idea that “the equality of souls in heaven is not the same thing as equal rights here on earth” and discussion of natural rights increased as the legitimacy of divine right decreased. It is interesting then to note that even in this highly individualistic climate it was a unanimous decision to name the nation and society sovereign (40). In Chapter 4, Hunt asserts that “nation” had a less nationalistic meaning in the 18th century. What then defined the concept of “nation”? Race? Religion? Presumably variations in the understanding of nationhood affect colonial/post-colonial relations.
    Finally, like many of my classmates, I too am intrigued and convinced by the link that Lynn Hunt draws between the epistolary novel, empathy and the development of human rights in Chapter 1. I thought that the assertion that “each culture shapes the expression of empathy in its own particular fashion” might be particularly pertinent to our class (39). How do cultural disparities in empathetic expression affect postcolonial relations? And again, like many of my fellow students, I noticed that though Hunt argues that many epistolary novels allowed their readers to transcend class and gender boundaries, there was no mention of race and I would be interested to discuss this omission.

  16. In her speech at UCLA, Dr. Hunt examines the importance of empathy as developed through literature, art, and performance in the eighteenth-centry shift away from the practice of public corporal punishment. Specifically, she notes the belief held by many leaders that external suffering was the best way to cause change in criminals was overruled by populist opinion as people began to identify more deeply with one another. However, while it is true that corporal punishment diminished through the period the phenomenon of public punishment did not, as she suggests, decrease. Instead, the form of punishment shifted from physical to sociophysiological.

    Instead of public beating and torture, people were now jailed or fined, leading to a shift from short-term corporal pain to longer-term physiological removal and strife. Even in the comparison of a drawn-out hanging to a shorter death by guillotine, there remains an increased psychological pain for the latter. While before an execution was viewed as sacrifice and was met with societal catharsis, a quick, private killing had none of this and left those affected with longer-term grief. Criminals now were hated for longer but less pointedly and physical pain was traded for mental.

    A quote from Benjamin Rush cited by Dr. Hunt says that “The men whose persons we detest posses souls and bodies composed of the same materials as those of our friends and relations.” While it’s clear that eighteenth-centry societal shifts moved towards preserving bodies, there was an inherent sacrifice as greater damage came to the souls Rush mentioned. Indeed, in the Declaration of the Rights of Man, the twenty-second article, amongst others, speaks of the right to social security (in its literal sense). As Hunt also mentioned, the threshold for what is no longer acceptable changes over time and herein it is visible. While the eighteenth-centry shift away from torture was more a change in forms, the the Declaration suggests that we have since recognized and worked to rectify this.

  17. I found the introduction of Professor Hunt’s book to be particularly interesting. One of the aspects which jumped out to me during my reading was Hunt’s analysis of how equality of rights seemingly emerged out of an environment characterized by an overwhelming disparity in terms of the rights of citizens. Hunt notes on page 19, “It is astounding that men such as Jefferson, a slaveowner, and Lafayette, an aristocrat could speak as they did of the self-evident, inalienable rights of all men”. Hunt goes on to question why such rights must be explained and declared if they are by definition “self evident”. I personally had never thought about the emergence of human rights in this manner and found it be a particularly interesting context to frame Hunt’s other assertions regarding the development of human rights. In addition, I was intrigued by Hunt’s explanation of how the public concept of human rights ran parallel to the emergence of the novel as an art form in the 18th century. It is impressive how large an impact an art form such as the novel can have on the political realm of human rights. In my opinion this highlights the way in which art may be used as a tool for disseminating different view points and ideas to the masses, but perhaps most importantly the ability of art to transcend class boundaries within society.

  18. Hunt brought about an interesting angle in discussing human rights through introducing empathy. Today, the term human rights in daily use is discussed as if it is a set of fixed rules, especially because of the presence of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the citizen and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. However, this belies the history of how certain ideas came to be seen as rights of man, the flexibility and, at times, vague language of the declarations, and the potential for different interpretations and for changes in what constitutes as human rights in the future. By introducing empathy as part of the process gravitating towards new “political concept (human rights)” (p34), Hunt addresses an important ingredient to the process.

    Chapter 1 addresses clearly how novels transmitted the message of the equality of man and universality of rights by establishing a social interaction(identification) — and therefore, empathy– between the characters and the readers. However, while Hunt mentions that the characters of the famous novels became “household names” (p41), it was somewhat unclear to me whether the influence of the novels extended beyond just the intellectual, the literate who actually read these novels, and the middle class to even the lower class. If the majority of the French lower class were literate yet did not read novels, how could empathy be established?

    Chapter 1 cites many examples of the middle and upper class having been impacted by these novels. For example, Pamela and Clarissa were “ranked among the three English novels most likely” to be found in private French libraries (p47) and most of the supporters and responders to these novels do not seem to come from lower class peasants. Perhaps then, process towards human rights requires empathy from intellectuals or others who are able to influence the discourse of human rights. Despite the equality of man espoused by human rights, the path to human rights could only be catalyzed by certain societal actors who have the power to guide the discourse. Therefore, learning to empathize may be a guide towards human rights but could it have been that empathy from certain societal actors was necessary rather than empathy from all actors during the eighteenth century?

  19. I found much of the discussion in these chapters very interesting, particularly the sections in Chapter 4 that focused on the relationship between the practice and theory of human rights. Even in the introduction, Hunt demonstrates that the declaration of human rights often remains theory, while practice in the form of law or policy can take on a very different form: “Yet the Declaration of Independence had no constitutional standing. It simply declared intentions, and fifteen years passed before the states finally ratified a very different Bill of Rights in 1791” (18). The case was similar for the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen. Therefore, in practice, the two were very different from their theoretical bases. What are the implications for this fact on the human condition? Are humans inclined to say one thing but then do something quite different?

    I also really enjoyed the discussion of religious minorities and how the order in which they were given political rights revealed the logic behind the establishment of human rights. I would find it very interesting to place this discussion in a modern context by juxtaposing the progression of rights from Catholics to Protestants and then Jews in France in the 18th century to the 2004 law that the French parliament passed regarding conspicuous religious symbols in schools as well as the recently proposed bill that advocates for the banning of burqas and niqabs in public places. How do these new developments in the French sphere of religious freedom fit into the pattern established during the 18th century?

  20. J’ai bien aimé la lecture du livre “Inventing Human Rights” surtout l’introduction et le premier chapitre « Torrents of Emotion ». Une chose qui m’a absolument frappé, peut-être a cause du fait que ceci était mentionné au début de la lecture, est l’idée des droits des hommes comme des vérités évidentes (self-evident truths). Les droits des hommes continuent à être débattus et ils sont loin d’être évidents. Il y en a des injustices sociales partout, des injustices qui violent les droits les plus essentiels. On ne doit pas aller trop loin pour trouver ces injustices : même ici aux Etats-Unis, on a des cas d’esclavage : il y’en a des ouvrier agricoles, la plupart des immigrants, qui ont des conditions du travail qui ressemble aux conditions des esclaves.
    Ce dimanche, l’activiste Dolores Huerta a été invité a Duke pour donner une conférence à Duke Chapel pour la commémoration de MLK Day. J’ai eu l’opportunité d’aller à une petite réunion organisée par le centre multiculturel à Duke juste avant son “speech’ dans la chapelle. Cette expérience a bien complémenté mon lecture de Lynn Hunt car dans cette petite réunion, Dolores Huerta a parlé de l’histoire des droits des hommes. Ma lecture du livre « Inventing Human rights » et les mots de Huerta m’ont fait penser au besoin qu’on a de repenser cette histoire et de lutter contre les injustices actuelles pour qu’on ait des vrais droits humains. J’aimerai bien demander à Lynn Hunt ce qu’il pense de la situation actuelle des droits humains? Est-ce que ces droits sont vraiment évidents ? Beaucoup plus évidents qu’avant ?
    Pour finir, j’ai bien aimé aussi le premier chapitre du livre car j’ai toujours aimé faire des connections entre les romans, leur contexte historique, et la puissance de leur message. Les romans sont presque toujours caractérisés comme un très bon moyen de communication entre les lecteurs et les auteurs; les lecteurs peuvent presque toujours s’identifier avec les personnages et l’histoire présentée. J’aimerai bien savoir un peu plus ce que Lynn Hunt pense de ceci. Est-ce qu’elle peut penser à des exceptions dans la littérature du 18eme siècle, surtout des exceptions où le message de l’auteur a provoqué des réactions absolument inattendues?

  21. It is very interesting that, as Hunt points out, “the three greatest novels of psychological identification of the eighteenth century… were all published in the period that immediately preceded the appearance of the concept of ‘the rights of man’.” I found this intriguing simply because these three novels, PAMELA and CLARISSA by Richardson and JULIE by Rousseau, are based on three women who are each seeking to reach past the limitations imposed on them by both society and their families; in fact, Hunt mentions that even in a happy ending, such as that of Pamela, the woman eventually succumbs to societal expectations and accepts what life has to offer in marrying Mr. B. In the sadder endings, such as those of Clarissa and Julie, both women end up heart broken and dying after their struggles. Thus, though people empathize with the heroines of the novels, there is still the idea that women play an inferior role in society and that they bend to the will of men. In my opinion, this seems directly contrary to the idea of “the rights of man” which show up in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen in 1789, and later in De Gouges’ Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen that accompanied it during the French Revolution.

    These ideas could, however, have helped lead to new motivations for women’s rights. For instance, people such as Wollstonecraft and Sieyes who believed in women’s rights might have drawn from these stories the injustice of society’s expectations as imposed on the three women. Whatever the case, by the end of the eighteenth century, these novels and their heroines had not only led to the concept of the “rights of man,” but also to the concept of the rights of women as well, whether intentionally or not…

  22. After listening to Lynn Hunt’s lecture at UC Santa Barbara, I am not entirely convinced about her argument relating to the “rise of the self-contained person” during the 1760s which coincided with the increased reading of novels. She begins with an excellent evaluation of the role of literature in creating a new sense of shared psychological experiences. While it is difficult to discern whether it is literature which affects political culture or political culture which affects literature, she takes this into account in arguing how novels of that time did have an overwhelming power to influence public sentiment. However, she then focuses her argument on other cultural changes such as the growth of family portraits, improved hygiene, and the acceptance of more self-conscious manners. She attributes these changes to what she terms as the growing identification of a “self-contained person”, in which one recognizes the importance of their own self and individuality and then shows empathy and respect for others. I wonder, though, how much an increase in these cultural aspects may be simply attributed to rising wealth and power, specifically that of the middle class in France. One needs wealth to hire the artist for the portrait, to pay for opera seats rather than just sit on the stage, to expand one’s house so that the parents no longer sleep in the same room as their children, and to afford the production and use of a physionotrace (early camera). I do believe that more subtle political issues spurred the growth trends in these activities, but I feel that Professor Hunt downplayed the importance of wealth that allowed their growth. What role does the interaction of this increased wealth and these political undercurrents play in coming to the conclusion that human rights are “self-evident”? Is the growth of wealth a necessity for a nation to come to this conclusion?

  23. I was amazed upon learning of the contribution of 18th century novels to growing ideas of equality. Evoking empathy is an excellent way to make readers understand the characteristics shared by humankind. It seems as if authors opened up the minds of their readers to ideas that were logical yet unspoken. Are there works today that can compare to these epistolary novels in terms of promoting equality or other social ideas?

    Also in the third chapter I was intrigued by the differing views of what constituted natural rights and even the Bentham’s view that men have no natural rights. Individuals published their own interpretations of what rights all men should have, yet I imagine it must be extremely difficult to reach agreement for formal bills of rights adopted by assemblies.

    I also greatly enjoyed learning of debate that declaring rights spawned. The very general language of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen seems all-encompassing. How did it pass in this form if some of the same men who affirmed wanted to restrict the rights of some groups?

  24. I particularly enjoyed Hunt’s comments on the paradox of self-evidence. I feel that she accurately summed up the paradox in the words: “if equality of rights is so self-evident, then why did this assertion have to be made and why it was only made in specific times and places?” Hunt continues to explain why the self-evidence of “natural” rights arose during this time period; however, I feel as though she does not fully address the real core of the paradox that of whether equality of rights is really self-evident. If cultural and social conditions (such as empathy and a respect for the physical body) are required to reveal the self-evidence of natural rights then are natural rights really self-evident? I would ask Hunt whether she would argue for a relativistic morality over an absolute mortality and why. From my perspective, Hunt develops her arguments based upon a relativistic morality as social and cultural conditions are required to give rise to a universal declaration of “natural” rights.

    1. Chapter three gives a pretty clear picture of the connection between human rights (or morality, as the two are tied) and political uprising and revolution. Specifically, she notes that rights are often cited as the reason for change as evidenced in both the French and Colonial revolutions. Herein, it is clear that while the codification of human rights literally appears to suggest absolutism, the context in which the declarations are written evidences relativism.

      Looking from a more basic viewpoint, all aspects of human rights must be relativistic, built on the basic evolutionary principles of our society. Underlying what a society deems as rights are two inherently antagonistic forces: individual freedoms and individual guarantees. To guarantee such things as social security, education, and the right to work (and receive wages), you inherently limit the freedom of an individual to work for himself, to excel on his own, and to gain all the advantages that a capitalistic society holds so highly. Because at the baseline, evolution demands survival of the fittest (capitalism, again), any moral statement that limit the absolute freedom that this entails is a necessarily relativistic one. To have absolution, one must go to the opposite extreme yet I find that few will venture to argue socialism as the pinnacle of morality.

  25. I found Hunt’s use of female heroines in novels to explain the development of the idea of universal human rights very interesting. Often times when studying great social or historical movements, we study the authors and artists that were far ahead of their time, who had a role in initiating or nurturing those movements. In the case of discovering equality as a self-evident right, I like Hunt’s examples using Clarissa and Pamela as novels that showed the idea of “interiority” (p. 48) and how that might make females more aware of the rights of equality, as all people might share this “interiority”.

    I would like to ask Hunt what modern novels can appeal to society’s sense of equality or rights by allowing the reader to empathize with the character and how that message may have changed over the years, especially after the feminist movement, for other minority groups. Furthermore, I’m interested to hear why she picked women in novels as the example, as opposed to another minority group at the time. Was it simply the example most-available? What minority groups, if any, are shown today or in recent history in literature that might provoke the same types of societal sentiments?

    Finally, in Chapter 3 Hunt breaks it down into sections of “Declaring Rights in America” and “Declaring Rights in France”. In relation to the effect that literature had on these movements, as highlighted in Chapter 1, did the setting of the novel have any effect on how women (or others) felt the sense of interiority? Adding to Lucy’s question, would a reader in France feel a strong sense of interiority or likeness to the heroine of the novel if she was an Englishwoman? How strong do the demographic features have to be?

    1. I also found the use of novels as a model for the development of her concept of “interiority” to be incredibly interesting. Studying English, one often realizes how much the literature and media of a society can both reflect and shape the society that creates them. This is highlighted again in her discussion of the Calas/Voltaire affaire– Voltaire was active as both a writer and an activist and each role served to advance the other.

      Beyond the simple relationship between a society’s shifting values and its most memorable works, Hunt demonstrates an ample relationship between the idea of written declarations of rights and the development of liberty in a society. While ultimately she concludes that the paradox of needing to state self-evident rights is resolved by saying we know the violation of these rights inherently (which is a slightly problematic solution, since often I think the violator does not feel that same internal pang of conscience), without writing, the strong urge to write down those rights remains.

      Since even self evident rights usually exist as a function of the law-abiding institutions of a society, the question is this: can a society hold to higher level human rights, the abstract conceptions of truth, justice and rights of man, without having them in writing? I think they can, but I wonder where that fits in this model.

  26. I very much enjoyed Hunt’s method of recounting history through a psychological lens although in the introduction, she indicates that this approach is certainly not mainstream for a historian and perhaps even frowned upon…why is this? Also, I agree with Amy that it is interesting to examine the emergence of human rights through the proliferation of the 18th century novel (and the wave of empathy it generated), but I am curious how Hunt first came up with this argument.

    On another note, I am intrigued by how the French reconcile laïcité (secularism) with right 10 (no one should be disturbed for his opinions, even in religion…) of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (p. 222). If I am not mistaken, there is a push for reducing if not eliminating religious paraphernalia (including voiles) in public places though this seems to be in direct opposition to the aforementioned right.

    In response to one of Lucy’s questions, I do not think the public proceeded “logically” from rights for certain groups to others. The early novels that Hunt describes (Pamela, Clarissa, and Julie) all had female heroines with which males and females alike indeed empathized, yet we are reminded throughout the Chapter 1 section entitled “The Strange Fate of Women” (and specifically on p.67), women were one of the most victimized groups in history, not gaining equal political rights anywhere until the twentieth century. To me, since these female characters were featured in novels early on and gained empathy from many, the “logical” progression would have been for women to have been among the first to benefit from equal rights (which was not the case).

    In response to Andrew’s question, I think Hunt’s partial answer is on p.120-121. To summarize, I think what she is saying is that if the colonists wanted to separate from Britain and establish a new country, they needed to appeal to universal rights instead of their rights as British citizens since the latter would indicate a desire for reform, not independence. However, once they had their independence, perhaps they were more concerned with establishing rights specific to the citizens of the new country, thus transitioning back to particularistic thinking.

  27. I enjoyed reading this book and look forward to talking with its author in class tomorrow. Here are a couple of questions that came up for me as I was reading:

    First, I was very interested in Professor Hunt’s idea that western political thought made a distinct and important transition in the 18th century, embracing the idea of human rights as “self-evident” and “natural” for the first time. In part she attributes this shift in thought to the parallel rise of the novel as a popular form. I thought Professor Hunt made a strong case for the correlation between these two events, however, I was less clear on how one caused the other. I would like to know what in particular led Professor Hunt to theorize that the idea of universal human rights developed from the empathy and individualism present in the era’s novels and not the other way around (i.e. that the themes and subject matter of novels of this era reflected the changing political philosophy of the time).

    Second, I was wondering if Professor Hunt thinks that there are any meaningful distinctions between the ways that British, French, and American thinkers viewed or treated human rights that impacted their differing styles of governing colonized peoples over the next few centuries? Or are all of these thinkers too connected across national boundaries to have any important differences?

  28. Having just taken a class about contemporary France and its political, social, educational, etc. institutions, I was particularly interested in the section of Chapter 3 that deals with the difference between particularistic and universalistic rights. I believe that this difference manifests itself in the French and American governments and societies today. In the late 18th century, “the Americans…set up their own particularistic tradition in the Constitution of 1787 and the 1791 Bill of Rights.” Both documents were designed to protect individual freedoms and sovereignty specifically among Americans, and the government was set up to protect individual interests. The individual is responsible only for himself and his family, rather than for his fellow citizens. Thus American society has come to be associated with individualism, and people are often wary of a strong central government. In contrast, France adopted a universalistic approach in its Declaration of Rights and dealt with the universal rights of mankind. Today, France has a strong national government that controls a large portion of its citizens’ lives, from education to medical care to social welfare programs. Unlike Americans, the French believe that the government has a duty to ensure the well-being of all of its citizens and guarantee a certain quality of life. The individual has a responsibility to society as a whole; for example, those who are able to pay more of their income in taxes do so to aid their fellow citizens. Historically speaking, does one approach seem to be more effective than the other? Moreover, is one morally superior, or does each have its own separate merits?

  29. La lecture du livre “Inventing Human Rights” m’a aidé apprécier les idées révolutionnaires du 18ème siècle, car quelques écrivains ont commencé à penser aux hommes comme des êtres égaux. Bien que leur vision sur les droits de l’homme avait des limitations en ce qui concerne les femmes, les esclaves, tous ceux qui n’avaient pas des biens individuels ou les minorités religieuses, je trouve intéressant le fait qu’ils ont introduit l’idée de la vérité d’évidence de ces droits. Cela demande immédiatement une question : est-ce qu’il s’agit vraiment d’une vérité d’évidence, spécialement si on pense à la multitude des débats inspirés par ce sujet ?

    Les romans épistolaires sont devenus très importantes dans le 18ème siècle, car ils ont permis aux lecteurs s’identifier avec les personnages et donc sympathiser sans tenir compte de la classe sociale, du sexe ou de l’ethnicité. Lynn Hunt suggère que cela a fait penser que “all people are fundamentally similar because of their inner feelings,” mais comment est-ce que cela se traduit dans un nouvel ordre social et politique? Si on considère que la population française restait de façon majoritaire illettrée, l’influence de ces romans pouvait-elle être si importante ? Un grand nombre des ecclésiastiques et même docteurs ont soutenu leur influence négative du point de vue moral et religieux sur la population, surtout les femmes. Est-ce que cela a peut-être diminué l’effet de ces romans dans la création d’un « interior feeling » ? Lynn Hunt discute aussi l’idée que les femmes et les hommes se sont également identifiés avec les héroïnes féminines des romans. Pourquoi est-ce que ce fait n’a pas eu un effet clair dans la façon dans laquelle les femmes étaient regardées pendant ce siècle (citoyens passives) ?

    Une dernière observation: dans le troisième chapitre, on apprend que Richard Price – un philosophe britannique – fait appel à l’universalité des droits de l’homme. Comment est-ce qu’il est arrive à cette conclusion, bien que cela signifie qu’il soutient la cause des colonies américaines ?

  30. I thought the introduction and the first chapter were particularly interesting from Lynn Hunt’s book. I really liked how she tied the emergence of human rights with the rise of the novel in the eighteenth century. Obviously I had never made this connection previously, but what she says about people identifying with characters makes sense. Once someone reads about another person, no matter from what background, class, etc, who suffers and experiences similar emotional experiences, one realizes that the core of each person is the same. Being able to recognize this has enabled human rights to develop. This ties into her point about how in order for rights to become self-evident, people needed to experience different types of feeling and emotion. The fact that she points to novels as an instrument of emotion is fascinating. It also made me wonder if she could connect the rise of film to another development in human rights. Clearly people connect to movie characters and movies invoke feelings, so do these feelings have anything to do with human rights?

  31. Firstly, I feel that in the introduction Lynn Hunt had a particularly true sentence regarding the nature of human rights: “Human rights only become meaningful when they gain political content. They are not the rights of humans in a state of nature; they are the rights of humans in society” (p 21). She goes on to demonstrate this point in the chapters we read in using instruments that she chooses – ie, human rights through novel reading. It is this particular connection, gaining empathy and opening a path to human rights from reading popular epistolarian novels, that drew my interest. While reading this chapter, I found her arguments to be persuasive but I couldn’t help but wonder what pointed, or led, Lynn Hunt to these three particular books, in particular, and to idea of empathy (and subsequently rights) through popular literature, in general?

  32. I particularly enjoyed reading Chapter 3 and Lynn Hunt’s interpretation of why women were treated differently than religious and racial minorities. Hunt explains, “This neglect may have been due to the fact that women were not a persecuted minority” (168). In my opinion, this may be too simple of an explanation to explain a discriminatory trend against women that continues to persist in different forms even today. It seems to me that the language of rights is embedded in a larger patriarchal construct. Although early political actors claimed that rights were naturally endowed, why did these historically white male actors feel empowered to make declarations of human rights on behalf of others? I would argue that this action can be understood within a patriarchal context. While these actors began to acknowledge the rights of minority groups, there still persisted an overarching tone of superiority, which remains an important component of the historical narrative.

  33. In chapter one Lynn Hunt describes the way in which novels evoked and cultivated empathy from their readers. Yet, is empathy an emotion that can be enhanced, or rather is it more of an inborn characteristic? Did novels perhaps simply offer a framework in which to better understand empathy rather than actively changing the reader’s capacity for empathy?
    A particularly interesting quote from this chapter is, “Female heroines were so compelling because their quest for autonomy could never full succeed” (59). Were these novels a success because, though they presented radical story lines, ultimately they did not contest the accepted social order? Thus, readers were able to push the boundaries of the social order, yet still remain rooted in a society not so different from their own. Had the women in these novels achieved a true sense of autonomy, would these novels have endured a greater onslaught of criticism?

  34. In chapter three (“They Have Set a Great Example”) of Inventing Human Rights, Lynn Hunt discusses the different declarations of rights in the United States and France at the end of the 18th century. As she points out, although the American Declaration of Independence of 1776 is a strikingly “universalistic” document in its proclamation that all men are endowed with certain unalienable rights, the Bill of Rights of 1791 is by contrast extraordinarily particularistic (because it merely “protected American citizens against encroachment by their federal government” [126]). Are there any specific reasons for this contraction of scope? Was the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence no more than an attempt to legitimize America’s decision to revolt (rather than call for reform), and, if so, is the 1776 declaration somewhat incompatible with the formal construction of American political infrastructure?

  35. The lecture on “Revolutionary Movements” discussed how the Enlightenment and the French Revolution influenced other revolutions, theories, and political movements. How have revolutions in other countries affected and shaped France? (I know this is a broad question and that we will be discussing the impact of the Haitian revolution, but I was wondering about the effects of the other European countries mentioned in the lecture – Russia, England – and whether there was a continual “back and forth” influence of ideals with France.

    As Professor Hunt states in her book and lecture, human rights are ever expanding. What is “self-evident” is constantly reevaluated. So what are the biggest or most controversial human rights challenges today? (specifically in France) What rights are just now becoming “self-evident”?

    On a related note, are there any clear, specific links between literature, art, and political movements today or in recent history?

  36. I enjoyed the presentation of the interplay between political thought and popular culture in Chapter One (Torrents of Equality). At the end of the introduction is the statement that: “For human rights to become self-evident, ordinary people had to have new understandings that came from new kinds of feelings.” Chapter One argues that these “new kinds of feelings” arose from reading of novels, such as Pamela. To what extent did OTHER factors contribute to these “lessons” in empathy? Were novels the principal source of the “new feelings”? If so, were the “new feelings” restricted to the portions of society who had access to the novels? As long as the men in charge read the novels and learned how to empathize, however, did it matter if the illiterate did not have the same experience–since the illiterate are not responsible for shaping new laws and policies?

    As the end of the chapter states, “learning to empathize opened the path to human rights, but it did not ensure that everyone would be able to take that path right away” (68). Was this limitation related to the characters portrayed in the novels? For example, if a novel had been written with a black hero or heroine, would the public have been able to empathize with that character in the same way that white men empathized with a female heroine? Or was it necessary for the public to proceed logically (and sometimes slowly), as described in the chapter—from rights for Protestants, to rights for Jews, etc…

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