Includes bibliographical references (pages 225-245) and index.

Field missions -- Human rights as moral concepts -- Human rights as political concepts -- Human rights as legal concepts -- The plan of the book -- Sovereignty and structure -- Sovereignty and its exercise -- Between the national and international -- Sovereignty and its distribution -- Human rights : three generations or one? -- Generations as chronological categories -- Generations as analytical categories -- And political rights as monitors of sovereignty's exercise -- Social and economic rights as monitors of sovereignty's exercise -- International law at work -- Labour rights as instrumental rights -- Labour rights as universal rights -- Labour rights and the structure of international law -- The ambiguous appeal of minority rights -- The moral ambiguities of minority rights -- The political ambiguities of minority rights -- The interdependence of sovereignty and minority protection -- International indigenous recognition -- Indigenous territories and the acquisition of sovereignty -- Indigenous recognition and the international labour organization -- Indigenous recognition and the united nations -- The purpose of international indigenous rights -- Self-determination in three movements -- Self-determination and the legality of colonialism -- The many paradoxes of self-determination -- Bridging international law and distributive justice -- Global poverty and the right to development -- The emergence of the right -- Implementing the right -- From global poverty to international law -- The right to development and the rise and fall of colonialism.