Rights matter, but conversations about rights can be polarizing, confusing and frustrating. Lawyers and law professors Claudia Flores and Tom Ginsburg have traveled the world getting into the weeds of global human rights debates. On Entitled, they use that expertise to explore the stories and thorny questions around why rights matter and what’s the matter with rights. Entitled is produced with the support of University of Chicago Law School and Yale Law School, and is part of the award winning University of Chicago Podcast Network.
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Animals suffer at the hands of humans every day. Not just in factory farms, but also in our homes, where pets don’t receive enough attention or exercise, and in our oceans, where humans disrupt their habitats and ecosystems. To what extent should animals have rights? In this special episode, we speak to world-leading philosopher Martha Nussbaum, professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, and author of Justice for Animals . Nussbaum expands her theory into why politics and law shou...
Artificial intelligence is all around us—it listens to us, even watches us, and waits for our daily demands. From Alexa to Siri, to Sophia, the social humanoid robot, AIs want to be our companions (at least, the companies who build them want us to think so). However, some people fear that the more sentient AIs become, the more they will have to be treated with basic rights. Do AIs deserve rights? And if they do, what would those rights entail? In this episode, Tom and Claudia imagine a not-so-di...
Sixty-one million adults in the United States live with a disability — that's one in four adults, a staggering number when you consider how widespread ableism is. In a society that largely operates without adequate infrastructure, accommodations, and services for disabled people, what does the right to equal opportunity look like? In this episode, Tom and Claudia explore this question through the perspectives of three disabled individuals. Michael Stein is the executive director of the Harvard L...
While borders have the ability to divide countries both politically and socially, wealth drives an even bigger wedge between us. How do we make sense of the fact that the wealthiest country in the world, the United States, borders one of the poorest countries: Mexico? Despite efforts to mitigate this, global wealth inequality still appears to be growing. According to the World Inequality Report, the poorest half of the global population owns just 2% of the total global wealth. In this episode of...
Fixing discrimination isn't as easy as putting anti-discrimination laws on the books. But, there is a tool that can at least chip away at the effects of discrimination: quotas. Over 130 countries have adopted gender quotas…and around one-quarter of the world uses some form of affirmative action programs. So, do quotas actually work at creating more diverse and equitable societies? In this episode of Entitled, Claudia and Tom learn how quotas are working—or not working—around the world. They spea...
There are two words that sound pretty similar, but they're not synonyms: equality and equity. While equality means that everybody should be given the same resources or opportunities, equity recognizes that we live in an unequal system, so we need to allocate more resources and opportunities to people without equal access. So, what does it really mean to live in an equitable society? In this episode of Entitled, Claudia and Tom zoom out on what equity practices look like around the globe, and zoo...
After years of community protests, and months of legal work, Chile finalized a draft of a brand new constitution this summer. Chileans will vote to pass or reject this constitution in a few days. In this episode of Entitled, Claudia and Tom head to Santiago, Chile! We hear their conversations with local Chileans, from musicians and taxi drivers to the lawyers who helped draft this new constitution, like Ricardo Montero Allende and Isabel Aninat, and Mapuche linguist and Indigenous rights activis...
Would you put a price tag on your rights? If you had to choose between your socio-economic rights or your freedom to peacefully protest, what would you choose? It’s a question that might get a lot of mixed responses, but some might argue you can’t have one without the other. In this episode of Entitled, Claudia and Tom discuss these two groups of rights: socio-economic rights and civil and political rights. They take a deeper look at the United States with Margaret Huang, president and CEO of th...
Lawyers and law professors Claudia Flores and Tom Ginsburg kick off the second season of Entitled — and this time, they’re focusing on one human right (and not just any right) — the right to equality. In the first episode, they explore what equality means in different contexts and to different people. Is it possible or even preferrable for every person to be equal in every way? When do we want equality? How do we get it? And what do we mean when we ask for it? This episode they speak with human ...
The episode delves into the burgeoning global movement to legally recognize the rights of nature, tracing its origins from Justice Douglas's dissent to its adoption in countries like Ecuador and Uganda, where Frank Tumusiime highlights the role of indigenous communities as custodians. However, Aaron Mills offers a critical indigenous viewpoint, arguing that extending Western liberal rights to nature fundamentally misdiagnoses the problem, proposing instead a relational "rooted legality" based on kinship and mutual responsibilities. The discussion ultimately reflects on rights as an ongoing societal conversation to define values and relationships.
Today, medical advances make it possible for a woman to have a baby on behalf of someone else. This has given many people – including many in the LGBTQI community – the exciting possibility of founding a family of their own. But this incredible medical technology raises new questions about rights: how far do reproductive rights go? How do you establish the rights of a parent or citizenship? Who has a right to found a family? In this episode of Entitled, we explore reproduction and bodily autonom...
The right to bear arms is an American touchstone, found in very few other countries. Many think it should not be a right at all, and the debate over it is highly polarized. This episode broadens the lens to show how other countries handle guns, and suggests ways to cut through the charged discussion here at home. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
The collapse of the Afghan government has raised grave concerns for the future of the country, particularly for women. Exit is not a generally available option, but should it be? On this episode, we continue our conversation about migration, and the limits of the current human rights system for protecting the rights of women. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
The right to seek and enjoy asylum has never been more important than in today’s global landscape. At the same time, countries have never been more committed to finding increasingly creative ways to avoid having to take in refugees. Today on Entitled, we discuss the right to asylum and what our rights are at the border of another country. We know the movement of distressed migrants at sea and nations’ borders is the cause for a lot of human tragedy. Are borders necessary – can we conceive of the...
Free speech is one of those all important rights but one whose scope changes over time. Today, it is more likely to take place behind a screen rather than in the town square. What does the right to speak freely really look like when we are speaking in likes, comment bubbles and Tiktok videos? In this episode of Entitled, we explore freedom of speech, how and whether we still have it. We talk to Vietnamese pop star, MaiKhoi, an Artist Protection Fund fellow in residence at the University of Pitts...
Lawyers and law professors Claudia Flores and Tom Ginsburg have traveled the world getting into the weeds of global human rights debates. On this first episode of Entitled, they begin their journey of exploring the stories and thorny questions around why rights matter and what’s the matter with rights. Joining them are professor of ethics and legal philosophy at Oxford University, John Tasioulas; constitution building expert Zaid Al-Ali; and Columbia law professor Jamal Greene, author of "How Ri...
