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Modernisation, Human Rights and the Search for Fundamentals

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The Search for Fundamentals
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Abstract

The advent of the industrial society is related to the rise of a new image of society in which the individual and not the collectivity plays a major role. Civil and human rights, as formulated in the eighteenth century in Europe and the USA, are tied to an individualistic view of man and society. In this view individualism is combined with rationalism, universalism and cosmopolitanism, and as such these values stand in opposition to particularism, collectivism and historically determined conditions and traditions.1 Human rights refer to the individual beyond his particular social relationships and roots.

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Notes

  1. G. Haarscher, Philosophie des droits de l’homme. Editions de l’Université de Bruxelles, 1987, p. 21.

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© 1995 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Berting, J. (1995). Modernisation, Human Rights and the Search for Fundamentals. In: van Vucht Tijssen, L., Berting, J., Lechner, F. (eds) The Search for Fundamentals. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8500-2_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-8500-2_12

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-90-481-4568-3

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