Human rights: a stop sign, not a road map

Much contemporary discussion of ethics takes the form of claims about human rights. Yet the popularity of this mode of discourse threatens to narrow the range of ethical reflection. Although rights have a limited usefulness as a warning of imminent (or present) danger, by themselves they are a woefully inadequate conceptual resource for structuring reflection and behaviour. Rights provide a negative limit of obligation, borders beyond which one must not pass. But they lack a sense of a positive project, of growing a community, maturing a self in caring and variegated relation to others. The strongest positive statement in the widely cited UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) is that "human beings... are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood." Nearly all the rest of the thirty articles outline protective measures restricting the power of the state over against an individual. This declaration is rightly important, and does serve a very useful function. But it is not and should not be expected to be a comprehensive basis for our life together. And this is not simply because it is a product of its age and culture (notice that we are to live in a spirit of brotherhood, and that - understandably after WWII - the main fear is of state-initiated oppression of individuals); it is because rights themselves are a backstop measure, not the main game.

When a relationship has reached a point where both sides are standing on their rights, we are already in damage-control territory. If you have to claim your right to something, the positive goal of the relationship has broken down and it has now become a question of harm-minimisation.

In 1 Corinthians 8-14, Paul argues for the priority of love over rights, of thoughtful passionate concern for the other over the unrestricted exercise of my freedoms. God's love for us in Christ liberates us, not to do whatever we wish, but to do good to others, to serve them for the common good.

Often, our cultural assumption of the good life comes down to each of us pursuing our own agenda as relatively free from outside interference as possible. But there is so much more possible. Others are not obstacles to be negotiated in the fulfillment of my desires; they are opportunities for growth, visible signs pointing to God's coming presence and glory, the primary way in which we love God. The other is a gift to me; indeed, a significant part of that gift is that in the other I too can become a gift.

Rights are merely a stop sign; only faithful, hope-filled love gives us a map.