Citation

Elliott MA. Cult. Sociol. 2007; 1(3): 343-363.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2007, British Sociological Association, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1749975507082052

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Despite ongoing attention to the subject, cultural accounts of the globalization of human rights are surprisingly scarce. Most accounts describe this phenomenon either as a function of evolutionary progress or the rational/strategic action of states and social movement organizations. As a result, they have difficulty explaining both the moral impulse to act on behalf of human rights and the tremendous expansion of the ideology itself. Borrowing insights from global cultural analysis, I argue that the increasing concern for, and elaboration of, human rights points to a world-cultural environment where the individual is increasingly regarded as sacred and inviolable. To demonstrate this, I explore how human rights have developed historically as a 'cult of the individual' and present new data on their recent worldwide expansion.