The gentrification of human rights

Abstract

This article addresses what is increasingly perceived as a crisis of human rights. While contemporary critiques of human rights address a diverse set of challenges and issues, this article focuses specifically on the “populist” demagogic challenge to human rights within those notionally liberal-democratic societies in which human rights have been typically considered most secure. While agreeing with those who have argued that human rights is in crisis, in part, because of its relationship with neoliberalism, this article goes beyond this argument and outlines a way of understanding that relationship through identifying what I term the “gentrification of human rights.” This article outlines the concept of the gentrification of human rights, while also seeking to demonstrate how gentrification restricts the ability of human rights to engage robustly with rising deprivation, inequality, and marginalization within affluent, “liberal-democratic” societies. It also presents some of the key challenges that confront human rights.