The Right to Have Rights

Sixty years ago, the political theorist Hannah Arendt, an exiled Jew deprived of her German citizenship, observed that before people can enjoy any of the “inalienable” Rights of Man—before there can be any specific rights to education, work, voting, and so on—there must first be such a thing as “the right to have rights”. The concept received little attention at the time, but in our age of mass deportations, Muslim bans, refugee crises, and extra-state war, the phrase has become the centre of a crucial and lively debate. Here five leading thinkers from varied disciplines—including history, law, politics, and literary studies—discuss the critical basis of rights and the meaning of radical democratic politics today.

Author Biography

STEPHANIE DEGOOYER is assistant professor in
the Department of English at Willamette University. Her
work focuses on the intersection between law, politics, and aesthetics.ALASTAIR HUNT is associate professor in the Department of English at Portland State University. His current book project is called Rights of Romanticism.
SAMUEL MOYN is professor of law and history at Harvard University. He is the author of Human Rights and the Uses of History, Christian Human Rights, and other books.
LIDA MAXWELL is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Trinity College.
ASTRA TAYLOR is a writer, documentary filmmaker, and activist. Her films include Examined Life, and her books include The People’s Platform.