This article demonstrates how critical realism can resolve persistent theoretical debates in the human rights literature. Critical realism is a philosophy of science that proposes a complex ontological framework to study causal relations. Methodological and theoretical decisions in research are always premised on some ontological presumption whether they are explicitly stated or not. However, much of the social sciences follow the discipline’s empiricist orthodoxy which often dismisses ontological inquiry. As a consequence, theoretical and methodological debates persist without scholars recognizing how they reflect deeper ontological differences. I argue that this is the case with human rights research and demonstrate how critical realism can resolve tensions between universalism and relativism. Critical realism proposes that social relations resolve across multiple ontological levels. This ontological framework can illustrate how universal structures on one level can generate diverse human rights standards on another level relative to the cultural conditions that bring them about.

本文展示了批判现实主义如何解决人权文学中持续存在的理论辩论。批判现实主义是一种科学哲学，它提出了一个复杂的本体论框架来研究因果关系。无论是否明确陈述，研究中的方法论和理论决定始终以某种本体论假设为前提。但是，许多社会科学都遵循该学科的经验主义正统观念，而后者通常会忽略本体论探究。结果，理论和方法论的争论一直持续着，而学者们没有意识到它们是如何反映出更深层次的本体论差异的。我认为人权研究就是这种情况，并说明批判现实主义如何解决普遍主义和相对主义之间的紧张关系。批判现实主义提出社会关系可以在多个本体论层面上解决。这种本体论框架可以说明一个层面上的普遍结构如何在另一层面上相对于促成人权层面的文化条件产生各种人权标准。