Human Rights: An Examination of Universalism and Cultural Relativism

The social work profession is only beginning to incorporate human rights into its policies and practices. To understand what is meant by human rights, social workers will need to understand underlying concepts. The two of the most important concepts in terms of understanding the application of human rights to policies and practices will be universalism and cultural relativism. Knowing how to analyze and critique these two concepts will be crucial to developing an acceptable standard of knowledge about human rights.