thoughts in and out of season
James Kalb The following sites present criticisms and complaints regarding “human rights,” at least as now generally understood and institutionalized.
At present there are practical limits to the effects of human rights theory. However, it is in principle an absolutist ideology that enjoys the support of elites worldwide. In order to safeguard its beneficial aspects, principled limitations are necessary to make it consistent with tradition and subsidiarity.
What is to be done about human rights?… More ...
The current human rights movement proposes a comprehensive system of social morality. That system demands forcible action to promote universal equality and guarantee the well-being of everyone in the world. Universal empire is therefore its natural organizational form, and opposition to empire, in the name of limited government and particularism, is opposition to what now … More ...
What follows is the text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with comments regarding aspects of the document that foreshadow the present state of overreaching and confusion, and suggestions for a more modest and coherent understanding. The comments and suggestions should be read in conjunction with our discussion of the current human rights movement … More ...
I. Introduction
Today we will be discussing liberalism, which is a subject we all know something about. It is so much around us that it is difficult to get perspective on it and see what it is. That can make … More ...
A slightly edited version of the following essay appeared in the Summer 2002 issue of Telos.
To understand conservatism we must understand how conservatives differ from leftists and libertarians.
Basic oppositions in politics usually have to do with fundamental issues of social organization. Will king or parliament be supreme? Pope or emperor? Local community, … More ...
Contemporary liberalism honors diversity and tolerance above all, but what it calls by those names is different from what has been so called in the past. Its diversity denigrates and excludes ordinary people, and its tolerance requires speech codes, quotas, and compulsory training in correct opinions and attitudes. Nor do current liberal totems and tabus … More ...
Today I will present a very general perspective on liberalism: what it is, where it comes from, where it might go.
I’m a lawyer, and after preparing my remarks I realized that they took a lawyer’s point of view. What I had … More ...
The following review was published in the September 2003 issue of American Renaissance.
The Scorpion is the leading publication in English about the thinkers and themes of the European New Right (ENR). It is edited by Michael Walker, an Englishman living in Germany who is well-connected in Nationalist circles in Europe. American Renaissance readers … More ...
James Kalb
Yale Law School
Supervised Analytic Writing — Charles Gray, supervisor
January 10, 1978
In the course of this draft I refer to a number of books and articles on the benefit of clergy and the privilege of sanctuary. While helpful to anyone wanting to understand these institutions, these sources tend to … More ...