All aspire to liberty and security in their lives but few people truly enjoy them. This book explains why this is so. In what Conor Gearty calls our 'neo-democratic' world, the proclamation of universal liberty and security is mocked by facts on the ground: the vast inequalities in supposedly free societies, the authoritarian regimes with regular elections, and the terrible socio-economic deprivation camouflaged by cynically proclaimed commitments to human rights.
Gearty's book offers an explanation of how this has come about, providing also a criticism of the present age which tolerates it. He then goes on to set out a manifesto for a better future, a place where liberty and security can be rich platforms for everyone's life.
The book identifies neo-democracies as those places which play at democracy so as to disguise the injustice at their core. But it is not just the new 'democracies' that have turned 'neo', the so-called established democracies are also hurtling in the same direction, as is the United Nations.
A new vision of universal freedom is urgently required. Drawing on scholarship in law, human rights and political science this book argues for just such a vision, one in which the great achievements of our democratic past are not jettisoned as easily as were the socialist ideals of the original democracy-makers.
About the Author
Conor Gearty is Professor of Human Rights Law at the London School of Economics and practices law for Matrix Chambers, of which he is a founding member.
Features
A major new book examining the interconnections between freedom and security, and the way these are affected by ever-increasing inequalities. The theme is explored in relation to both old and new democracies and the growing division between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’
Argues for a version of liberty and security that moves toward a democratic government, the rule of law and respect for human rights, and the necessity that everyone must be subject to the same laws
Maintains the necessity of the human rights movement and a commitment to an egalitarian vision of the world, one in which we all should have a right to the freedoms that were once assumed to be the privilege of the few
Drawing on scholarship in law, human rights and political science, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars, journalists and policy-makers, as well as the interested general reader
