Can the concept of cultural relativism be reconciled with a Universal Code of Human Rights?

Question

Can the concept of cultural relativism be reconciled with a Universal Code of Human Rights?

Answer 1

Cultural relativism can not be reconciled with a evolved and universal human moral code, that is for sure.

Answer 2

Human rights and that storybook have nothing in common, take your hatred elsewhere, Christian scum.

Anyways, absolutely there can be reconciliation between upholding cultural mores and a Universal Code of Human rights.  Bad socially constructed practices only require education to change them, beyond that everyone wants the same rights.  With enough time every misogynistic culture sees the light of equality, it takes a tyrant to prevent that enlightenment...  Amnesty and others are not jaded in their search for universal rights, we just have to educate!

Answer 3

I really don't have anything to say about cultural relativism but if by "Universal Code," you mean the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (the terms imply two very different things but are sometimes used interchangeably), you should read The East Asian Challenge for Human Rights by Bauer and Bell: http://www.amazon.com/East-Asian-Challen... which is a post-colonial critique of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  If you read the UDHR, you'll notice that it is incredibly individualistic, so much so that one of my political theory classes assigned a paper asking us to explain why the Soviet Union would even think about signing onto such a document (becuase they did, even though it went against their fundamental political ideology).  The UDHR encompasses mostly what are called "negative rights": a right not to be subjected to something.  This is part of the reason that the Soviet Union could sign it.  Doing so didn't mean that they had to provide anything, merely that they thought that it was politically expedient at that moment to promise that at some undetermined future time, they would consider providing the negative rights for their citizens.  There are a few "positive rights" like the right to education, to a minimum standard of living, etc. in the UDHR but none of these rights are given a threshold, a measure of enforcement, or a source for the provision of those rights.  Nor could it really do so.  A good standard of living is very different in rural Bangladesh than in Manhattan just as ideas about who should provide health care are different in London than in Washington, DC.  The idea that there are minimum, universal entitlements that can be called Human Rights is misleading.  There is some general agreement about things like torture and judicial systems and freedom of movement (baring infection) but the UNDR shouldn't be taken as something pure and self-evident which proves the existence of a universal morality.

Answer 4

Mike, how can you talk about hatred if you call someone scum? How can you say you respect other cultures if you can't be respectfull of others religious beliefs?

Cultural relativism and it's original proponents (Boas's students like Mead, Benedict and others) helped pave the way to a more respectfull relationship with cultures formerly regarded as primitive or otherwise "wrong" in their ideas and lifestyles. But the original definition has since been reviewed. Anthropologists must accept that people unconsciously acquire the categories and standards of their culture, and are thus bound by their values. But we must admit that not all cultural practices deserve being preserved, specially when not all members of a given culture agree with all their traditional values.

So there are ways to discuss cultural practices that can strive to change without being disrespectful of other cultures.

Tyranny is the imposition of our own values based on our own ideas of "good" and "bad", even when these are presumptuously based on scientific "truth".

Answer 5

Wow he thinks! There for he is....

Answer 6

i think what you are talking about is how to solve the problem of culture. if there was such a code possible there would be no more relativism of culture because the morality of society would have a central axiom. still later societies might look back and say, "oh, they did that wrong, but relative to their culture..." and we will still have the same "problem" when we look back at our past. you still need to use cultural relativism a lot of places in the bible (since it came up earlier). it would also be impossible to come up with said Universal Code of Human Rights exactly because of the concept of cultural relativism. it would be nice maybe, but impossible.