Dr Margot Salomon TW3.8.02D and Prof Chetan Bhatt TW3.8.02A

This course is compulsory on the MSc in Human Rights. This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

The course is capped but a limited number of places are usually available to students from outside the MSc in Human Rights who wish to take this as an option. Priority is given to postgraduate students in the Sociology Department and those registered on the LLM. The course is also available as an outside option for other MSc degrees where regulations and numbers permit. Students from other programmes who wish to apply for a place on SO424 must complete the online application form on LSEforYou stating reasons for wishing to take the course.

This is a multi-disciplinary course that provides students with a rigorous and focused engagement with different disciplinary perspectives on the subject of human rights including philosophy, sociology and law. It provides students with contending interpretations of human rights as an idea and practice from the different standpoints that the disciplines present (including debates from within and between the disciplines), and investigates the particular knowledge claims and modes of reasoning that the respective disciplines engage. The course applies the insights of disciplinary frameworks of understanding to key human rights issues such as universality, the right to life, free speech, humanitarian intervention, war, genocide, human rights activism, globalization, and states of emergency.

10 hours of lectures and 18 hours of seminars in the MT. 10 hours of lectures and 20 hours of seminars in the LT. 1 hour of lectures and 2 hours of seminars in the ST.

Reading weeks: week 6 MT and week 6 LT.

Students will be expected to produce 1 essay in the MT and 1 essay in the LT.

Active participation in the workshops is expected and students may be asked to make a presentation to their group.

Indicative reading: No one book covers the entire syllabus and students are expected to read widely from more general texts on human rights, to more specific texts outlining the debates on human rights from a particular disciplinary perspective. Introductory reading: Relevant books that provide an introduction and overview of the key areas include: Jack Donnelly, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice; Michael Freeman, Human Rights; Philip Alston and Ryan Goodman, International Human Rights (2013).

Philosophy: P. Jones, Rights, (1994); A. Swift, Political Philosophy: a Beginners' Guide for Students and Politicians, (2006).

International Law: A. Cassese, International Law, 2nd ed. (2005), chapter 19; P. Sieghart, The Lawful Rights of Mankind (1985).

Domestic Law: European Human Rights Law: S.Greer, The European Convention on Human Rights : Achievements, Problems and Prospects, Cambridge University Press, 2007, Chaps 1 & 4.

Domestic Human Rights Law: Roger Masterman & Ian Leigh (eds) The United Kingdom’s Statutory Bill of Rights, constitutional and comparative perspectives, Oxford University Press, 2013, Chaps 1,2,3 &13; Stephen Gardbaum, The New Commonwealth Model of Constitutionalism: theory and practice, Cambridge University Press, 2013, Chapter 7.

Sociology: L. Morris, Rights: Sociological Perspectives (2006); B. Turner, Vulnerability and Human Rights (2006); A. Woodiwiss, Human Rights (2005), part 1.

Exam (70%, duration: 3 hours) in the main exam period.
Essay (30%, 3000 words) in the ST.