Genealogies of Human Rights Ideas in Timor-Leste: “Kultura”, Modernity, and Resistance

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to explore East Timorese understandings of human rights and to trace the historical and societal dynamics of construing ideas and behaviours concerning rights. This will be done by looking into local genealogies of rights concepts and the dialogue established between the 'globalised script of human rights' and East Timorese knowledges of rights. Based on group interviews with three different generations, this research concludes that certain rights are understood as the product of East Timorese people's agency set in a historical and social context, rather than the passive reception and adoption of the human rights script from international institutions.