Redescribing human rights

The 1998 Northedge Essay demonstrates that an integral part of Richard Rorty's 'postmodernist bourgeois liberalism' is the 'human rights culture' which has grown steadily around the world since the end of the Second World War. Rorty seeks to establish a new way of talking about human rights that is not entrapped by the metaphysical and essentialist doctrines they are usually associated with. The article uses general criticisms against Rorty's liberalism and focuses them on his approach to human rights.