Moral Imperialism: A Critical Anthology

by Berta Esperanza Hernández-Truyol

Overview

In the controversy over female genital mutilation, Congress was quick to condemn practices throughout Africa and the Middle East and to take action criminalizing the practice domestically. Yet at the same time, it bluntly dismissed Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch when they pointed out human rights violations closer to home in the form of the disproportionately high rate of the imposition of capital punishment on black men, and the disempowerment of poor women under new draconian welfare rules. The irony of the United States' international condemnation of types of activities in which it engages within its own borders is not lost on Third World critics.
Moral Imperialism sets out to bring an international human rights framework to the analysis of current international and domestic legal, political, and cultural crises. It explores the United States' moral supremacy during a time of clear domestic shortcomings and asks whether insisting that other nations adhere to norms that derive from dominant U.S. culture and history may harm societies—both within and outside of the U.S.—with radically different cultures and histories.
Contributors include Beverly Greene, Kevin Johnson, M. Patricia Fernandez Kelly, Holly Maguigan, Boaventura De Sousa Santos, Saskia Sassen, and Eric Yamamoto.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814736142
Publisher:	New York University Press
Publication date:	10/27/2002
Series:	Critical America , #64
Pages:	400
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Berta Esperanza Hernández-Truyol is Levin, Mabie & Levin Professor of Law at Levin College of Law, University of Florida. She is editor of Moral Imperialism: A Critical Anthology (NYU Press).

Table of Contents

I Civil and Political Rights

1 Imperial Humanitarianism

2 Toward a Multicultural Conception of Human Rights

3 Orientalism Revisited in Asylum and Refugee Claims

4 Homophobia/Heterosexism in African Americans

5 Children and Right to a Fair Trial

6 Domestic and International Adoptions

II Social, Cultural, and Economic Rights

7 Economic Globalization and the Redrawing of Citizenship

8 The Recognition of the Individual

9 Rerouting the Race to the Bottom?

10 Both Work and Violence

11 Policing the Boundaries of Truth in Narratives

12 Imperial Knowledge

13 U.S. Policy on “Female Genital Mutilation”

14 Bridging False Divides

15 Membership Denied

16 The Moral High Ground?

17 Indigenous Peoples’ Human Rights in U.S. Courts

18 Climate Change, Opinions, and Imagination

19 Immigration, Poverty, and Transnationalism

20 Human Rights, Globalization, and Culture

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Too much of the literature in human rights has been limited to a consideration of the detail of specific civil and political rights. This book breaks this pattern by introducing political, economic, social, and theoretical issues in a single volume. Moral Imperialism is an interesting and informative collection and should become part of any syllabus on the international protection of human rights."

-Law and Politics Book Review

Editorial Reviews

""Too much of the literature in human rights has been limited to a consideration of the detail of specific civil and political rights. This book breaks this pattern by introducing political, economic, social, and theoretical issues in a single volume. Moral Imperialism is an interesting and informative collection and should become part of any syllabus on the international protection of human rights.""

Law and Politics Book Review

"Too much of the literature in human rights has been limited to a consideration of the detail of specific civil and political rights. This book breaks this pattern by introducing political, economic, social, and theoretical issues in a single volume. Moral Imperialism is an interesting and informative collection and should become part of any syllabus on the international protection of human rights."

- Law and Politics Book Review

From the Publisher