Indivisible Rights in Radically Unequal Society: Plural Epistemologies, Democratic Renewal, and the Making of a Holistic Jurisprudence

This study reanimates the principle of the indivisibility of human rights developing the notion of a holistic jurisprudence. The international human rights juridical framework rooted in capitalist modernity and its economic imperatives has obscured a rich panoply of economic pathways—plural epistemologies—hindering the creative rethinking of human rights for social possibility. Coupled with this, the impact of economic inequality on representative democracy is limiting the potential for structural change and challenging the legitimacy of the duty-bearing state of human rights. International human rights law lacks a theory of state beyond that which is implied by its reductive "duty-bearer" schematic. As a result, it lacks an effective determination of the legitimate roles of the duty-bearing state today. This work presents generative pathways for reconceptualizing the normative potential of international human rights, prompting socio-economic rights to enable economic life and its political organization in ways that inculcate far-reaching transformational forms.