Which human rights ought to be the first honored and the last sacrificed? This title addresses the issue of human rights as it relates to US foreign policy. It proposes an original conception of basic rights that illuminates both the nature of moral rights generally and the determination of which specific rights are the basic ones.

Preface to the Second EditionPreface to the First EditionForewordIntroduction5IThree Basic Rights111Security and Subsistence132Correlative Duties353Liberty65IIThree Challenges to Subsistence Rights894Realism and Responsibility915Affluence and Responsibility1116Nationality and Responsibility131Afterword: Right-grounded Duties and the International Turn153Notes181Bibliography229Index231

"With unrelenting logic Shue recommends that American law be broadened to require the termination of aid not merely to those governments that engage in shocking and outrageous conduct but to those countries indifferent to the rights of their citizens to food, shelter, and health care... Shue has written the classical statement affirming that the rich nations are required by justice and by international law to share their abundance with those millions who are chronically malnourished."--Former Congressman Father Robert F. Drinan, Commonweal "This is one of the strongest arguments for an economic human right that I have found to date."--Carl Wellman, Human Rights Quarterly