Reconciling rights-based discourse with Pacific culture and way-of-life: Re-defining our understanding of ‘rights’

Abstract

There is no denying that human rights play an integral role in our social and legal existence. However, contemporary developments of rights-based discourse have become preclusive to cultural accommodation. Drawing on a case-study of the application of Western conceptions of human rights in Papua New Guinea, this work will illustrate Mutua’s argument that the dissemination of rights-based discourse through hegemonic voices can undermine the universality and effective application of rights-based doctrines in non-Western contexts. This article will thus argue that informing rights-based discourse with local-cultural circumstances and social values is necessary for the genuine achievement of ‘universal’ human rights.