Latest blog articles

I wrote my PhD towards the last days of the debate over “social rights”. This debate harkens back to the fifties, when the International Covenant on Social and Cultural Rights was being negotiated. Some claimed that social rights could never be true rights. Others claimed that without social rights...

In this entry I want to mention four considerations that suggest that human rights lawyers should be cautious in embracing basic income as a replacement for human rights. These reflections should be seen as merely exploratory. The basic income in full has never been put in practice, and consequently...

To speak of economic justice today is to speak of the basic income. A basic income can be defined as an unconditional cash payment to all persons who form part of a political community. As automation increases, there is fear that labor will be replaced by “robots”. The basic income seems to be a...

Trevor Burrus claims that health care cannot be a fundamental right. He is not alone in saying this, but the way he says it is noteworthy. His article is not original (nor does it claim to be), but it represents an admirably clear retelling of an old story: Positive rights cannot be rights, this is...

Sinds 1 juli 2017 is prof. Teun Dekker hoogleraar Liberal Arts and Sciences Education. Zijn hoofdtaken worden het Liberal Arts-woord verspreiden in Nederland en in het buitenland en onderzoek doen naar Liberal Arts education in Europese context, maar ook naar de sociale, politieke en educatieve...

On 1 July 2017, Prof. Teun Dekker became the first Professor in Liberal Arts and Sciences Education in Europe. His main duties will be creating public awareness of Liberal Arts in the Netherlands and abroad, and conducting research on Liberal Arts education in the European context as well as its...

On Saturday 16 of April an earthquake struck Ecuador. At 7.8 on the Richter scale, it levelled various towns of the province of Manabí, in particular Pedernales, Manta and Portoviejo. At current estimates, it has killed more than 500 persons. Many of them died a slow death, after days of being...