Decolonial Thinking as a Necessary Epistemic Key for the Reconstruction of Human Rights in (and for) Latin America

Abstract

The article problematizes the question of the hegemonic discursive construction of human rights, centered on human dignity, and the historical-social contradictions that are evidenced when analyzing who is the recipient of this construction, essentially in the Latin American context. Its main objective is the search for an understanding of who is the recipient of human rights in Latin America, through the contribution of decolonial thought and its most expressive authors. A critical formulation of this hegemonic and European concept is sought, redefining human dignity and social struggles from categories of analysis such as class, race and gender, which become, from decolonial thought, an epistemic key and element of the realization of human rights in his broadest sense of the reality of the Latin American peoples. Through the use of the historical-deductive method and bibliographic research, the study concludes that the universal construction of human rights pretends to be universal, but ceases to be plural, thus moving away from the peripheries of the world. In this sense, decolonial thinking, highlighting social struggles for emancipation, is an essential element of approximation and realization of human dignity in the Latin American context.