Decrease in universality and abstractness thesis in the development of new human rights – Lunch Talk mit Mart Susi

There are two main groups of new human rights claims, the first being related to the enhanced protection of certain groups using the existing human rights, and the second being related to the derivation from or implication of new human rights from established stand-alone human rights. The first process is characterized by the decrease of the universality of established human rights, and the second by the decrease of the level of abstractness of the respective new human rights claim. This is termed “the decrease in universality and abstractness thesis”, which, inter alia, leads to the rejection of the proposition that the universe of human rights can grow endlessly.

Due to the elements of abstractness and universality required by definition in all human rights, and since the evidence shows that these elements are decreasing in new human rights claims, then the elements of universality and abstractness cannot diminish indefinitely and at some point new claims cannot surpass the threshold of a human right. Consequently, the process of human rights inflation has limits.