A Positivist Approach to Human Rights: An Ex Post Explanation of Violations

This article defends a positivist view of human rights while highlighting the limitations of the naturalistic view in the context of human rights violations: the naturalist’s nontemporal, categorical conception of rights oversimplifies ex post moral reflection; its notion of unenforceable rights fails to address moral life after violations; and it marginalises viewpoints not already committed to human rights norms. By presenting these critiques, the article underscores the merits of the positivistic view, which can avoid these shortcomings. It ultimately claims that the positivist approach, recognising human rights norms as social facts, clarifies various perspectives on the normative force of these norms, thereby potentially envisioning a future commitment to them.