Chapter 2 A Posthumanist Critique of Human Rights
Towards an Agonistic Account of Rights in Inclusive Education
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Abstract
This chapter problematizes the philosophical and ethical assumptions about the entanglement between human rights and inclusive education. Specifically, it asks: What is the moral and political basis of inclusive education as a human right? Does inclusive education as a human right imply that inclusion is enforced as a universal moral norm that binds all people in all places at all times? To respond to these questions, the chapter moves in three phases. It first offers a brief overview of contemporary human rights discourses and their critiques, highlighting in particular how the concept of human rights as universal moral principles often becomes an obstacle to social justice projects such as inclusive education. Then it turns to the philosophy of posthumanism and presents some of its basic tenets to show how this philosophical perspective might offer valuable alternatives to human rights critiques. Finally, it opens up a discussion on how posthumanism may inspire new ways of thinking about human rights concerning inclusive education. It is argued that critical posthumanist perspectives emphasize the need to rethink inclusion beyond its current legalistic and organizing frameworks of human rights to a more politically ethic-onto-epistemological based relationality through which new ways of living together may be enacted.