@article{ref1,
title="Human Rights and the Triumph of the Individual in World Culture",
journal="Cultural sociology",
year="2007",
author="Elliott, Michael A.",
volume="1",
number="3",
pages="343-363",
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.<p />",
language="",
issn="1749-9755",
doi="10.1177/1749975507082052",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1749975507082052"
}