The virtual human rights library brings together resources from multiple libraries and information services, both internal and external, to create an online hub dedicated to the study of human rights. This curation is unique in its interdisciplinary concerns and focuses on writings and research from social sciences, humanities, and law.
The virtual library is continually updated with the latest academic research in issue areas, as well as with relevant films, recorded conversations, and other forms of media.
Please Note:
The Virtual Library is usable by all visitors, but the hyperlinks to materials listed are for UChicago community members with a CNet ID and password.
Please direct feedback and suggestions to Kathleen Cavanaugh.
For technical assistance, email pozenhumanrights @ uchicago.edu.
Searchable Database
Click into the dropdowns to select the disciplines, keywords, and media type for your search, and then hit "Apply."
"The Sociological Discourse on Human Rights: Lessons from the Sociology of Law."
Since when, how, and why have sociologists discussed human rights in their work? In which forms of theoretical and empirical inquiry have such investigations been conducted, and what are some of their consequences for the praxis of sociology as well...
"The Sociology of Law as an Empirical Theory of Validity."
Contrary to current tendencies, the founders of sociology as a discipline regarded the sociology of law as an integral part of social theory. Law and its historical variations were treated by them as a constitutive component of social life. This...
"The Strange Triumph of Human Rights, 1933–1950"
This article explores the origins of the UN's commitment to human rights and links this to the wartime decision to abandon the interwar system of an international regime for the protection of minority rights. After 1918, the League of Nations...
"Toward a new sociology of rights: A genealogy of “buried bodies” of citizenship and human rights."
Although a thriving social science literature in citizenship has emerged in the past two decades, to date there exists neither a sociology of rights nor a sociology of human rights. Theoretical obstacles include the association of rights with the philosophical...
A False Tree of Liberty: Human Rights in Radical Thought
This book is concerned with the history of the idea of human rights. It offers a fresh approach that puts aside familiar questions such as 'Where do human rights come from?' and 'When did human rights begin?' for the sake...
A New Deal for the World: America's Vision for Human Rights
Elizabeth Borgwardt describes how a cadre of World War II American planners inaugurated the ideas and institutions that underlie our modern international human rights regime. Borgwardt finds the key in the 1941 Atlantic Charter and its Anglo-American vision of "war...
After Evil: A Politics of Human Rights
The way in which mainstream human rights discourse speaks of such evils as the Holocaust, slavery, or apartheid puts them solidly in the past. Its elaborate techniques of "transitional" justice encourage future generations to move forward by creating a false...
Are There Any Natural Rights?
The author advances the thesis that if there are any moral rights at all, it follows that there is at least one natural right, the equal right of all men to be free. By saying that there is this right...
Between Justice and Politics: The Ligue Des Droits De L'homme, 1898-1945
Between Justice and Politics is a history of the first fifty years of the Ligue des droits de l'Homme—the League of the Rights of Man. This is the first book-length study of the Ligue in any language, and it is...
Debating Human Rights in China: A Conceptual and Political History
Tracing the concept of human rights in Chinese political discourse since the late Qing dynasty, this comprehensive history convincingly demonstrates that-contrary to conventional wisdom-there has been a vibrant debate on human rights throughout the twentieth century. Drawing on little-known sources...