【Course description】
This course aims to reflect philosophically on the idea of human rights. We will start with looking into several Japanese thinkers of the 19th century who struggled to understand the idea of human rights and translate it into Japanese in order to introduce it into the Japanese society.

Then we will discuss some fundamental questions about the universality, purpose, justification and content of human rights, studying different answers given by past and contemporary philosophers. Such an investigation will necessarily lead us to a philosophical reflection on the nature of human person and human dignity.