No link and perm- critiques of liberal rights provide the fuel for progressive reclamation

(Zachary Manfredi is the Litigation and Advocacy Director at the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project. , 6-21)

What is at stake in couching these visions of tax policy—a domain often sealed off from larger debates about values—in the language of human rights? On the one hand, it might be thought to deepen the appeal of progressive political programs by highlighting how they aim to improve the basic economic, social, and political needs of their constituents. On the other hand, even as major figures on the U.S. political left mount such arguments, recent critical commentary on human rights evinces a longstanding tradition of skepticism about human rights’ emancipatory potential. Some scholars argue that the simultaneous ascendancy of human rights advocacy and neoliberal governance since the 1970s is far from coincidental and trace how neoliberal reformers often relied upon the language of human rights and its affinity with the self-interested, consumerist individual. Others criticize human rights advocacy for its minimalist vision and lament its compatibility with radical inequality. Although this legacy of left skepticism about human rights retains valuable lessons for advocates, our political moment also provides opportunities for the reconceptualization and radicalization of human rights programs. Contemporary appeals to human rights arguably have the most to offer by developing a more egalitarian dimension to the politics of human rights. The traditional liberal conception of human rights as individual entitlements limits the capacity of the state to regulate private power and mobilizes state authority on behalf of private property and capital accumulation. By contrast, progressive appeals to human rights can link this language to a normative vision for a more just social order and the provision of public welfare. Developing an egalitarian vision requires moving beyond a guarantee of sufficient minimums and instead emphasizing how radical social and economic inequality stifle the realization of a more robust and radical human rights project.