The logic of consistency and the rise of human rights institutions

This thesis proposes a theory to explain the conditions under which moral argument matters in world society, called the logic of consistency. The theory is the result of an examination into the rise of international scrutiny of national human rights practices, with a focus on the three United Nations monitoring institutions: the Treaty Bodies, the Special Procedures, and the Universal Periodic Review. The move to these institutions, which serve to identify, verify, and publicise the (in)ability of states to comply with their human rights obligations, represents a curious phenomenon that cannot be explained by IR middle-range or grand theories, but it can by the logic of consistency. The logic of consistency identifies and connects traces of political action in relation to international scrutiny of human rights over the last hundred years, offering a revisionist account of the rise of human rights institutions. Building exclusively on primary sources, the empirical analysis demonstrates how appeals of political actors to universal principles has generated a universal horizon that pulls them towards the spirit of the universal principles they invoke, irrespective of their intentions. This universal horizon has subverted the resistance of states to external scrutiny and has compelled them to embrace permanent scrutiny of all states, in relation to all rights at all times, with or without their consent. The logic of consistency reveals the immanent ground of universalism, beyond metaphysical principles or assumptions of cultural unity in world society. It draws on philosophy, sociology, history, legal theory, and politics and aspires to contribute to the understanding of the behaviour and significance of moral argument in all these fields. Its scope is so wide that it is hard to identify social norms and institutions not shaped by it. Indeed, the social world is unthinkable without consistency.