ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the few Chinese contributions to the recent literature on human rights to deal with the question of human rights and China's cultural tradition. Human rights are usually referred to as universal rights, because their subject consists of all human beings and their contents include stipulations common to all people. Such differences not only exist in human society but also have a very strong influence upon the understanding, enjoyment, and implementation of human rights. The failure of the emergence of the Western concept of human rights in Chinese traditional culture was certainly related to the concept of harmony. Humanism can be said to be the basic characteristic of Chinese traditional culture. The process of the contextual interpretation of human rights test and reform the traditions concerned and make them compatible with the spirit of human rights.
