Mikael Rask Madsen is Director of iCourts, Centre of Excellence for International Courts and a Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen.
Gert Verschraegen is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Antwerp.

Human rights have become a defining feature of contemporary society, permeating public discourse on politics, law and culture. But why did human rights emerge as a key social force in our time and what is the relationship between rights and the structures of both national and international society? By highlighting the institutional and socio-cultural context of human rights, this timely and thought-provoking collection provides illuminating insights into the emergence and contemporary societal significance of human rights. Drawn from both sides of the Atlantic and adhering to refreshingly different theoretical orientations, the contributors to this volume show how sociology can develop our understanding of human rights and how the emergence of human rights relates to classical sociological questions such as social change, modernisation or state formation.

Making Human Rights Intelligible provides an important sociological account of the development of international human rights. It will be of interest to human rights scholars and sociologists of law and anyone wishing to deepen their understanding of one of the most significant issues of our time.

1. Making Human Rights Intelligible: An Introduction to a Sociology of Human Rights
Mikael Rask Madsen and Gert Verschraegen
PART I - SOCIOLOGICAL UNDERSTANDINGS OF HUMAN RIGHTS
2. State Building, Constitutional Rights and the Social Construction of Norms: Outline for a Sociology of Constitutions
Chris Thornhill
3. Differentiation and Inclusion: A Neglected Sociological Approach to Fundamental Rights
Gert Verschraegen
4. Beyond Prescription: Towards a Reflexive Sociology of Human Rights
Mikael Rask Madsen
5. Human Rights between Brute Fact and Articulated Aspiration
Paul Stenner
6. International Human Rights versus Democracy Promotion: On Two Different Meanings of Human Rights in US Foreign Policy
Nicolas Guilhot
7. Towards a Socio-legal Analysis of the European Convention on Human Rights
Steven Greer
8. In Defence of Societies
Judith Blau and Alberto Moncada
PART II - HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF KEY INSTITUTIONS OF MODERN SOCIETY
9. From Citizenship to Human Rights to Human Rights Education
Francisco O Ramirez and Rennie Moon
10. (Human) Rights and Solidarity: Restructuring the National Welfare Space
Frederik Thuesen
11. Adapting Locally to International Health and Human Rights Standards: An Alternative Theoretical Framework for Progressive Realisation
Lesley A Jacobs
12. 'Legal Form' and the Purchase of Human Rights Discourse in Domestic Policy-Making: The Achievement of Same-Sex Marriage in Canada
Luke McNamara
13. Activating the Law: Exploring the Legal Responses of NGOs to Gross Rights Violations
Loveday Hodson
14. The Complexities of Human Rights Implementation within the Costa Rican Police System
Quirine Eijkman