right

right, in politics, the more conservative groups in the political spectrum, in contrast to the radical left and the liberal center. The designation stems from the seating of the nobility on the right side of the presiding officer in the French National Assembly of 1789. In some European legislative assemblies conservative members are still seated in that position.

Right, Petition of: see Petition of Right.

In law, the right of one who owns riparian land (land abutting or including a stream or river) to have access to and use of the shore and water. These rights are a form of real property (see real and personal property) and are inherited with the land. A landowner whose property abuts an ocean, sea, lake, or pond is said to possess littoral rights. Specific water-use laws vary from state to state.

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In the U.S., any state law forbidding various union-security measures, particularly the union shop, under which workers are required to join a union within a specified time after they begin employment. Supporters of such laws maintain that they are more equitable because they allow a person to choose whether or not to join a labour union. Opponents contend that the name right-to-work law is misleading because such laws do not guarantee employment to anyone. On the contrary, they maintain that such laws tend to reduce workers' job security by weakening the bargaining power of unions.

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Any of five species (genera Balaena, Eubalaena, and Caperea) of baleen whales (family Balaenidae) with a stout body and an enormous head. (The name refers to two species considered the “right” whales to hunt because of their value, slowness, and buoyancy after death.) The upper jaw is strongly arched, and the lower lip curves upward along the side, giving the lower jaw a scooplike form. There is no dorsal fin except in the pygmy right whale (Caperea marginata), a small, seldom-seen whale of the Southern Hemisphere. The bowhead whale (Balaena mysticetus), inhabiting Arctic and northern temperate waters, is black, with a white chin, throat, and sometimes underparts. It grows to about 65 ft (20 m). The northern right whale (E. glacialis) grows to 60 ft (18 m). Similar to the bowhead but with a smaller, less strongly arched head, it may also have a “bonnet,” a horny growth infested with parasites, on its snout. Both species have been protected since 1946.

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Protection from arrest and extradition given to political refugees by a country or by an embassy that has diplomatic immunity. No one has a legal right to asylum, and the sheltering state, which has the legal right to grant asylum, is under no obligation to give it. It is thus a right of the state, not the individual. Its traditional use has been to protect those accused of political offenses such as treason, desertion, sedition, and espionage. Beginning in the 20th century, asylum also was granted to those who could demonstrate a significant risk of politically motivated persecution if they returned to their home countries.

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In criminal law, the giving of evidence that might tend to expose the witness to punishment for a crime. The term is generally used in relation to the privilege of refusing to give such evidence. In some continental European countries (e.g., Germany), a person fearing self-incrimination may make his own decision as to whether or not he will testify. In Anglo-American practice, a person other than an accused cannot refuse to testify; he may only cite his privilege against self-incrimination, and the judge then decides whether he must testify. If required to testify, he must answer all questions except those he considers to be self-incriminating. The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution contains a provision that protects a person from being compelled to make self-incriminating statements, one intention being to prevent coercion of testimony. Seealso rights of the accused; exclusionary rule.

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Right of a person to be free from intrusion into matters of a personal nature. Although not explicitly mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, a right to privacy has been held to be implicit in the Bill of Rights, providing protection from unwarranted government intrusion into areas such as marriage and contraception. A person's right to privacy may be overcome by a compelling state interest. In tort law, privacy is a right not to have one's intimate life and affairs exposed to public view or otherwise invaded. Less broad protections of privacy are afforded public officials and others defined by law as “public figures” (e.g., movie stars).

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Religio-political concept that views a ruler as an incarnation, manifestation, mediator, or agent of the sacred. In some nonliterate societies, members view their rulers or chiefs as inheritors of the community's own magical power. The ruler may exercise this power either malevolently or benevolently, but he is usually responsible for influencing the weather and the land's fertility to ensure the harvest necessary for survival. In other societies, particularly those of ancient China, the Middle East, and South America, the ruler was identified with a particular god or as a god himself; in Japan, Peru (among the Inca), Mesopotamia, and the Greco-Roman world, the ruler was regarded as the son of a god. In either case—whether the ruler embodies his own magical power or that of the community—the ruler protects the community from enemies and generally feeds and cares for his people. A third form of divine kingship, one practiced in Europe, is that of the ruler as mediator or executive agent of a god. In this form it is the institution of kingship, more than an individual ruler, that bears the mark of the sacred.

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A right is a legal or moral entitlement or permission. Rights are of vital importance in theories of justice and deontological ethics.

The contemporary notion of rights is universalist and egalitarian. Equal rights are granted to all people. By contrast, most historical notions of rights were authoritarian and hierarchical, with different people being granted different rights, and some having more rights than others. For instance, the rights of a father to be respected by his son did not indicate a duty upon the father to return that respect, and the divine right of kings to hold absolute power over their subjects did not leave room for many rights to be granted to the subjects themselves. Conversely, modern conceptions of rights often emphasize liberty as among the most important of rights, though conceptions of liberty (e.g. positive vs negative) frequently differ.

Theoretical distinctions

There are numerous different theoretical distinctions in accordance with which rights may be classified.

Rights may be considered to be either of a purely moral or ethical character, as in the idea of natural rights, which holds that we obtain certain rights from nature that cannot be legitimately modified by any legislative authority; or they may be considered to be of an artificial, man-made character, as in the idea of legal rights, which are arbitrary human constructs, created by legislative authority and always subject to change.

Another distinction may be drawn between claim rights and liberty rights. A liberty right grants permission, whereas a claim right grants an entitlement. As entitlements, claim rights serve as rules of interaction between people, as they entail constraints and obligations upon the actions of other individuals or groups (e.g. if a person has a right to life, others cannot have the liberty to kill that person). As permissions, liberty rights are also known simply as liberties, but are still frequently referred to as rights (e.g. "I have a right to do x" often means "I am permitted to do x"), though some deny that such usage is proper.

A further distinction may be drawn between negative and positive rights, where the former require inaction on the part of others and the latter require action on the part of others (in the sense of rights as claims or entitlements), or where the former permits inaction and the latter permits action (in the sense of rights as liberties or permissions).

Furthermore, rights may be divided into individual rights, which are held by individual people, and group rights, which are held by an ensemble of people or a subgroup of people who have a certain characteristic in common. In some cases there can be tension between individual and group rights. In other cases, the view of rights held by one group can come into sharp and bitter conflict with the view of rights held by another group. For instance, compare Manifest destiny with Trail of Tears.

Other distinctions between rights draw more on historical association or family resemblance than on such precise philosophical distinctions. These include the distinction between civil and political rights and economic, social and cultural rights, between which the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are often divided. Another conception of rights groups them into three generations. These distinctions have much overlap with that between negative and positive rights, as well as between individual rights and group rights, but these groupings are not entirely coextensive.

The specific enumeration of rights accorded to people has historically differed greatly from one century to the next, and from one regime to the next, but nowadays is normally addressed by the constitutions of the respective nations (in the case of legal rights) or a particular philosophical theory (in the case of natural rights).

Areas of concern

Rights about particular issues, or the rights of particular groups, are often areas of special concern.

Particular issues of concern include labor rights, LGBT rights, reproductive rights, and the right of self-defense.

Particular groups whose rights are of particular concern includes animals, and amongst humans particular groups such as children (see both children's rights and youth rights for two different angles), mothers, fathers, and men and women in general.

Important documents

• The Magna Carta (1215; England) required the King of England to renounce certain rights and respect certain legal procedures, and to accept that the will of the king could be bound by law.
• The Bill of Rights (1689; England) declared that Englishmen, as embodied by Parliament, possess certain civil and political rights; the Claim of Right (1689; Scotland) was similar but distinct.
• The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789; France) was one of the fundamental documents of the French Revolution, defining a set of individual rights and collective rights of the people.
• The United States Bill of Rights (1789/1791; United States), the first ten amendments of the United States Constitution, was another influential document.
• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) is an over-arching set of standards by which governments, organisations and individuals would measure their behaviour towards each other. The preamble declares that the "...recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world..."
• The European Convention on Human Rights (1950; Europe) was adopted under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect human rights and fundamental freedoms.
• The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966) is a follow-up to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, concerning civil and political rights.
• The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966) is another follow-up to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, concerning economic, social and cultural rights.
• The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (1982; Canada) was created to protect the rights of Canadian citizens from actions and policies of all levels of government.
• The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (2000) is one of the most recent legal instruments concerning human rights.

See also

• Contractual rights
• Droit
• Duty
• Equal rights
• Exclusive rights
• Freedom
• Freedom of religion
• Freedom of speech
• Freedom of the press
• Fundamental Laws of England
• Jurisprudence
• Law
• Law of obligations
• Rite
• Roman Law
• Social contract
• Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld

References

External links

• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, article by Leif Wenar.
• Human Rights Watch
• Amnesty International
• Teacher's Rights
• International Freedom of Expression Exchange
• U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
• Comparative Analysis of Human Rights