Description
Book SynopsisA passionate and provocative argument that the idea of universal human rights has become not only ill adapted to current realities but also overambitious and unresponsive.
Trade Review[R]eadable and brilliantly written, as well as... [rich] in information... and... controversial but challenging ideas.
-- Pierre Hassner * Survival *
Christian Imperialism is a very welcome addition to the field of both missionary history and the history of the early American republic... For historians of missionsit shows that Americans were deeply involved in global missionary work well before they had officially crafted an overseas empire. For scholars of the early American republicit challenges that customary periodization of empire and demands that we look both within and beyond borders to recognize that the American past was never exclusively American.
-- Edward E. Andrews * Journal of Church and State *
According to Hopgood, we are witnessing the last gasp of human rights as the prospect of one world under secular human law is receding and thefoundations of universal liberal norms and global governance are crumbling (p. 1). It is from this vantage point that Stephen Hopgood launches into a nuanced and powerful demolition of the normalising metanarrative of the Human Rights agenda.... [T]his is a compelling text as Hopgood grapples with issues of 'who gets to decide global rules' and who gets to define "legitimate exceptions to them" (p. 2). Further, we see Human Rights are not, and never have been, above the fray of national sovereignty as organisations and states have always sought to set the parameters of the political sphere and define who would be excluded from the outset.
-- Brian R. Gilbert * Critical Race and Whiteness Studies *
Hopgood's point of view, sure to be controversial, is argued with clarity, passion, and verve. Hopgood challenges those concerned with humanitarianism to look beyond Western-led human rights organizations, especially to activists working within their own communities, for hope. It seems certain that this book will cause both celebration and discomfort, even outrage, within the human rights community. Readers with an interest in human rights policy, humanitarianism, and even cultural history more broadly will find much to like in Hopgood's brisk, witty prose, even if they are discomfited by his arguments.
* Library Journal *
In this scathing indictment of the human rights movement, Stephen Hopgood contends that it has sold out its moral clarity for an alliance with interventionist liberal states.... Hopgood's provocation is powerful, and his privileging of locally and nationally inspired activism rings true. He does an excellent job of drawing together specific incidents to support his controversial views.... The Endtimes of Human Rights is a bracing alert for human rights professionals and all who care about global ethics. Scholars, practitioners, and NGO contributors will need to reckon with this important book.
-- Clifford Bob * Ethics & International Affairs *
This is a provocative, angry book–and an important one.... The book is particularly good on the link between human rights and liberalism, and how the larger the human rights non-governmental organization is, the greater the likelihood that it has been tamed by capital, existing to raise money rather than raising money to exist.... This is a disturbing read, the anger driving the narrative, the passion evident in every paragraph.
-- Conor Gearty * Times Higher Education Supplement *
Table of ContentsPreface1. Moral Authority in a Godless World2. The Church of Human Rights3. The Holocaust Metanarrative4. The Moral Architecture of Suffering5. Human Rights and American Power6. Human Rights Empire7. Of Gods and Nations8. The Neo-Westphalian World
