Book Review: Human Rights on Trial — A Genealogy of Democratic Skepticism

Abstract

The aim of this book, as the title suggests, seems to follow the formative origins of the skepticism of contemporary French intellectuals and thinkers such as Pierre Menant, Marcel Gauchet and Claude Michelet towards human rights, despite subscribing to political modernism and defending democracy, political participation and the values of citizenship. They believe that commitment to human rights requirements poses a danger to democracy and national cohesion. In their opinion individualistic trends lead to the proliferation of demands for rights and consequently weakens the bonds of interdependence woven by the history of each political group. This usually intensifies tendencies towards self-preservation and individualism at the expense of the bonds that bind a community.