The Sociology of Human Rights

Frezzo, Mark. The Sociology of Human Rights. Cambridge and Malden: Polity Press, 2015. 192 pp., $26.95 paper (9780745660110)

The Sociology of Human Rights is an introductory text for students and non-specialists. The author has two objectives. First, he examines theoretical perspectives and the historical evolution of human rights. Secondly, the author advances a new framework for understanding human rights by focussing on four concepts: rights conditions, rights claims, rights effects and rights bundles. In this way, Frezzo seeks to demonstrate how sociology offers new insights on the nature of human rights

Frezzo draws primarily from three sociological fields: political economy, social movements and political sociology. As the author notes, there is a long tradition dating back to Durkheim, Marx and Weber of scepticism towards universal principles that exist outside society. And yet sociology is ideally situated to contribute to this field of study given the discipline's long-standing concern with issues such as poverty and inequality. The book is divided into chapters based on traditional categories of human rights: civil and political (first generation or negative rights); economic and social (second generation or positive rights); and culture, environment and sustainable development (third generation). There are, as Frezzo notes, some benefits to categorizing rights in this way: civil and political rights have been useful in the past for securing other rights, and these distinctions help explain the differing functions of human rights. At the same time, however, the author explores the interrelationship of rights or "rights bundles". Frezzo concludes by arguing for the recognition of three rights bundles, which presumably are the inevitable result of a sociological approach...