INTRODUCTION

The relationship between human rights and community is not straight-forward or uncontroversial. On the one hand, individuals, mainly on account of their human rights, are oriented to live isolated, self-centred or narcissistic lives, absolved from duties and responsibilities, or simply unable to show affection and empathise with others. On the other hand, a strong commitment to community implies a threat to the autonomy or identity of individuals as a result of the aggressive assertion of the collective good. In this chapter, I want to propose a specific way of unlocking the deadlock between human rights and community from the standpoint of African moral values of human interdependence; the essence of community, belonging, societal harmony and peaceful co-existence with others.

The success of the proposition above depends very much on challenging the common understanding of human rights. The hypothesis in this chapter would be implausible if the understanding of human rights, as individual claims, remains intact. The success of the proposal depends on the need to tamper with the individualism that underpins human rights by supplanting it with values of interdependence, relatedness and mutual reciprocity, something that is derived from community. It is only from the standpoint of human interdependence that one can begin to realise the possibility of speaking of human rights and community in mutually reinforcing terms, that is, as concepts that can work together and not against each other.