How did the culture of human rights develop? How did different schools of thought influence the legal documents and measures over the centuries? Was the French Revolution truly the turning point for human rights?

This book analyses these fundamental questions and outlines the history of human rights from the 18th century to the present day. It captures in one lucid source the essential aspects of the subject and is both an introduction to the arguments, and the key to indepth study of the concepts and principles.

While pushing the traditional boundaries between philosophical histories of rights and legal ones, Flores provides an objective approach to the modern-day, "westernised" concept, and expands it to analyse the contributions from African, Asian and Islamic cultures.

Marcello Flores is Professor of Contemporary and Comparative History and coordinator of the European Master in Human Rights and Genocide Studies at the University of Siena. He has published extensively on human rights and genocide, totalitarianism, history of communism.