ABSTRACT
Introduction In the introductory chapter I outlined three concerns that I claimed needed to be further approached within political science. These concerns became the source of inspiration for this project and have been dealt with in different but related ways throughout the book. As regards the first concern, the relationship between human rights and democracy has been problematized. Following in the footsteps of Habermas, it has been argued that discourse theory offers a fruitful toolkit to understand the intricate relationship between political rights, as a substantial action-related right, and other rights. The second concern has been approached by elaborating on an intertwined relationship between democratic means and ends as well as on how procedural and substantial elements of deliberative processes are related. This has been done primarily by reconstructing epistemic elements in language and in our use of communicative action. Thirdly, an attempt has been made to remedy the unwillingness of political philosophers to deal with institutional matters by operationalizing my version of a discourse theory of human rights on a concrete institution.
