Porsdam, Helle --- "Human Rights: A Possible Civil Religion?" [2012] ELECD 285; in Porsdam, Helle (ed), "Civil Religion, Human Rights and International Relations" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2012)

Book Title: Civil Religion, Human Rights and International Relations

Editor(s): Porsdam, Helle

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781781000519

Section: Chapter 2

Section Title: Human Rights: A Possible Civil Religion?

Author(s): Porsdam, Helle

Number of pages: 21

Extract:

2. Human rights: a possible civil
religion?
Helle Porsdam

`What makes the difference between Good and Bad Government?', asks
Tom Bingham in his book The Rule of Law from 2010. Not surprisingly
perhaps, considering the title of his book, Bingham's answer is: the rule of
law. This concept, he goes on to say, is not a fixed one. It will change;
indeed,

some countries do not subscribe to it fully, and some subscribe only in name, if
that. Even those who do subscribe to it find it difficult to apply all its precepts
quite all the time. But in a world divided by differences of nationality, race,
colour, religion and wealth it is one of the greatest unifying factors, perhaps the
greatest, the nearest we are likely to approach to a universal secular religion. It
remains an ideal, but an ideal worth striving for, in the interests of good
government and peace, at home and in the world at large.1

From the Magna Carta in 1215 to the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, adopted in 1948, various historical milestones have contributed to
our understanding of what is meant by the rule of law. Among the
principles that jointly define it in western democracies today may be
mentioned notions such as equality before the law, procedures that safe-
guard fair trials, laws that are accessible, intelligible and predictable, and
respect for human rights. As Bingham sees it, the rule of law is not some
remote legal concept, but instead ...