Rights Recognition and Cosmopolitanism: Global Egalitarian Rights Recognition

Abstract

This chapter applies egalitarian rights recognition to the international level, and argues that it works as a theory of human rights, not just rights within a state. The chapter assesses competing theories of cosmopolitanism and argues that each has weaknesses in areas where egalitarian rights recognition can provide more satisfactory solutions. This is further demonstrated in the second half of the chapter, which argues that egalitarian rights recognition addresses the needs and complexities of contemporary international politics more successfully than approaches based on theories of innate rights. Recognition theories of rights can be applied to the international level and can provide us with a compelling theory of cosmopolitan human rights.