Inhumanity of Right

Christos Yannaras, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the Panteion University of Athens, is, in the words of Basilio Petrà, 'one of the most important Orthodox thinkers of the second half of the twentieth century and the beginning of the present millennium'. Norman Russell, a patristics scholar in his own right and Honorary Research Fellow of St Stephen's House, Oxford, is an experienced interpreter of Yannaras' thought and has previously translated seven of his works.

During the long crisis of late modernity, future-oriented theorists are struggling to identify and to overcome the limits and design flaws of our era's paradigm. Human rights form one of the pillars of this paradigm, and their inadequacy, even inability to deliver is by now clear to anyone with a modicum of discernment. Need one mention Guantanamo Bay, the weaponization of human rights in the context of the 'responsibility to protect' doctrine, the evidence published by Julian Assange and Edward Snowden, or the price they paid? In this prophetic book from the late 1990s, published here for the first time in English, Christos Yannaras speaks not merely of the inadequacy of individual rights, but even of their inhumanity and fatal design flaw: their inherent inability to reflect and safeguard the relational, communal nature of human society and fellowship. The unusual philosophical, political and theological genealogy painted by Yannaras will intrigue and fascinate anyone trying to make sense of our current deadlock's origins - and anyone trying to find a way out of it.

• PrefaceChapter 1 The Logical Image of RightChapter 2 Consequences of the Logical Image of Right(a)Defining acts and defining relations(b)Defining truth and defining utilityChapter 3 The Political Hermeneutic of Right(a)Right: a pre-political achievement(b)The alienation of politics and the citizen(c)The 'homeopathic' paradox of right(d)The religious foundations of the utilitarianism of rightChapter 4 A Preliminary Transcendence of the Logic of Right(a)'Law' (Dikaion) and 'law' (nomos): the classical Greek version(b)'Law' (Dikaion) and 'law' (nomos): the Roman and early Christian versionsChapter 5 Cultural Resistance to the Individualism of Right(a)The 'civilization' of ecclesial Orthodoxy today(b)Orthodoxy, the West, and Islam(c)Orthodoxy and nationalism(d)Orthodoxy and liberalismChapter 6 The Inhumanity of Right or the Humanizing of Right?(a)The dilemma of political anthropology(b)Oughtness and isness(c)The state and the community(d)The consumer and the citizenBibliographyIndex