Changing face of global human security.

Basically, human rights refer to all human beings having universal status to which all are entitled simply by being human. It is not limited to providing all human beings with the needs for their physical subsistence but involves a certain degree of minimal comfort beyond merely keeping one's organs working because human subsistence also consists of being able to function. Having grown out of the liberal traditions of the 18th century Europe, the concept had roots in the philosophical traditions of most civilizations which ranged for over 2000 years. The main idea of Aristotle that like should be treated alike remained a motivating factor in the history of human existence.

Typically human rights are categorized as two, negative human rights and positive human rights. The concept of negative human rights denotes actions that a government should not take as it follows mainly the Anglo-American tradition. It was codified in the USA's Bill of Rights, the English Bill of Rights and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom and include freedom of speech, religion and assembly.

On the other hand, positive human rights denote rights that the state is obliged to protect and provide. It follows mainly the Rousseauian Continental European legal tradition and is codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in many constitutions of the contemporary world. Examples of such rights include: the right to education, to a livelihood, and to legal equality. The legal concept of human rights is itself the product of a specific process of history. In Europe it emerged as a consequence of the political and legal values gained from 16th century Renaissance and 18th century Enlightenment. In later centuries even the legal frameworks also began to be based on liberal and Marxist philosophies. While the liberal philosophers from Locke to Rawls thought of individual rights in terms of personal freedom, Marx considered rights in a bourgeois framework as constraints on human freedom. Further these two schools of thought also differ in their analysis of the relation between the individual and the collective. While liberals have always interpreted this relation in terms of the private and the public, the logic of Marxists has always been to create the conditions for greater human solidarity through resolution of tensions rooted in the structures of dominance, the power and property, in particular.

The basic themes of human security have been elaborated in a...