The Picture of Human Rights

This article considers the ways in which the social sciences can and should be a critical friend to the field of human rights. After surveying a selected number of recent interventions that depict the current status of human rights in quite different, even opposing, ways, the article concludes on a guardedly optimistic note: that well-meaning critiques of human rights can play an important role in reforming the broader human rights enterprise, but only if they are grounded in a realistic assessment of the ultimate limitations of human rights in the face of the most important present and looming global challenges.