Eric Heinze

In an article[1] in the journal Law & Critique, the feminist scholar Adrian Howe examines how Heinze has innovated within critical theory to offer alternative readings of William Shakespeare.

Citing the example of The Comedy of Errors, Howe explains how, well into the 20th century, scholars often thought that Shakespeare would not have sought to convey a serious socio-legal critique in a seemingly frivolous play.

Heinze argues that a modern democracy has more effective and more legitimate ways of combating social intolerance, without having to restrict speech within the public sphere.

[7] Heinze acknowledges that hate speech has led to violence in Rwanda, the German Weimar Republic, the immediate post-Cold War Yugoslavia, and other weaker democracies.

Full-fledged democracies, by contrast, have more legitimate and effective ways of combatting violence and discrimination without having to punish persons who hold provocative views.

[8]‘Central to the LSPD model’, according to Lesley Abdela, ‘it can be shown that western democratic states have taken moral and symbolic stands—not always perfectly or without contradiction— but certainly in more than peripheral, lip-service ways.

[9] Writing in his regular Irish Times ‘Unthinkable’ Series, columnist Joe Humphreys summarises Heinze’s argument as follows: ‘If a sufficiently democratic environment does not exist, then the thing you are seeking as a “right” is merely a “good”, something desirable which a government may or may not provide.’[10] As of Spring 2022 The Most Human Right has been nominated for ‘The Next Big Idea’, Season 18 (non-fiction published from February - July 2022).

[27] Blake and Dayle continue: Heinze's criticisms of international law and institutions have also reached beyond the specific issues of free speech and sexuality.

[28] Contrary to writers who advocate political compromise and piecemeal approaches, Heinze argues that the criterion of universally even-handed application of norms and standards necessarily inheres within any concept of human rights.

After receiving his Licence and Maîtrise from the Université de Paris, Heinze enrolled as a DAAD scholar at the Freie Universität Berlin.

[31] Before his appointment at the University of London, Heinze completed work for the International Commission of Jurists in Geneva and the United Nations Administrative Tribunal in New York.