Lynn Hunt\'s Book \"The French

Lynn Hunt's book "The French Revolution and Human Rights" emphasizes the complex nature of human rights and society's failure to arrive to a strict definition when concerning this concept. Hunt's introduction actually makes it possible for readers to understand the divisiveness of the human rights agenda in the contemporary society, taking into account that things did not actually experience significant change ever since the French Revolution.

Class was an essential factor making it possible for governments to devise a human rights agenda both during the French Revolution and consequent to it. People's feelings of empathy actually enabled them to feel that it would be wrong for them to discriminate others on account of their social status and these individuals gradually came to look at the social order from another perspective. Hunt shows how even though many individuals in the upper class did not actually get involved in trying to have middle classes aware with regard to their position, as they chose to inspire them instead.

3. The "Petition of Women of the Third Estate" involved a group of women presenting King Louis XVI with a series of demands that were expected to provide them with a more honorable status in the country. The petitioners were well-aware of their position and emphasized that they did not expect to become equal to men, as they simply wanted to have more rights. Abbe Emmanuel Joseph Sieyes' pamphlet "What is the Third Estate" was meant to it was important for his compatriots to realize that the common people represented a nation on their own and that it was important for them to avoid being influenced by privileged powers.

4. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen emphasized that all individuals in the country needed to be provided with equal rights. This document highlighted that human rights need to be universal in order for society to be healthy. The document influenced French people in general to get involved in the revolution and to express interest in reform.

5. Calvinists and Jews were persecuted groups up until the revolution and they thus played an active role in devising the human rights agenda. "On December 21, 1789, a deputy raised the question of the status of non-Catholics under the new regime; his intervention started a long debate that quickly expanded to cover Jews, actors, and executioners, all of them excluded from various rights before 1789" (Hunt 84).

6. The idea of slavery was questioned even before the French Revolution started, as there were numerous influential individuals who denounced the institution of slavery. The French National Assembly actually held individuals who believed that black people should have rights and that slavery needed to be abolished.

7. Documents such as the "Petition of Women of the Third Estate" made it possible for the world to understand that women were determined to use the Revolution to their advantage and that they wanted the authorities to acknowledge their overall importance.