Die prekäre Verbindung von Menschenrechten und Frieden

»The Precarious Connection of Human Rights and Peace. On the Ambivalence of Liberalism and the Patterns of International Law«: Considering world affairs today and the antiliberal currents within western societies (backlash), not to mention the rise of China or Russia’s ongoing war of aggression against the Ukraine, it certainly seems misguided to propagate a so-called triumph of Western values or an »end of history« as Fukuyama perceived 1992 the victory of human rights, democracy and of law itself in the course of the fall of the iron curtain. Although, this does not imply the conclusion that the West has given up its claim to a liberal world order (»the great battle for freedom: a battle between democracy and autocracy«). Following Carl Schmitt’s dictum »whoever invokes humanity wants to cheat« it thus stands to reason to take a critical look at the postulated universality of liberal values in the context of the highly complex relationship between human rights and peace as well as the ambivalence of liberalism, i.e. its universalist façade with discriminatory and imperialistic practices.