Write on the Cultural Relativism. (2022, 10 Marks)
Cultural relativism is the doctrine that beliefs, practices and moral codes must be understood and judged within the culture that produces them, not by an outside yardstick. Born in anthropology as a method, it became a normative challenge to universal human rights.
Origin
- Franz Boas attacked the evolutionist ranking of societies from “savage” to “civilised”. He held that each culture must be studied on its own terms.
- Ruth Benedict (Patterns of Culture, 1934) described cultures as integrated wholes, each selecting a few traits from the range of human possibilities.
- Melville J. Herskovits turned method into moral doctrine. Every judgement, he argued, is shaped by the judge’s own enculturation, so no observer has a neutral standpoint.
Core Claims
- Diversity. Moral codes and institutions vary widely across societies and epochs.
- Dependence. A norm is valid only relative to the culture that holds it.
- Tolerance. Outsiders therefore have no standing to condemn a practice.
Applied to Human Rights
Societies have developed different ideas of human worth and dignity. The UDHR rests on the autonomous, rights-bearing individual; many non-Western traditions place the person inside networks of kinship, caste, religion and duty. For the relativist, an individualist catalogue imposed on them is cultural imperialism.
Forms
Jack Donnelly (1984) arranges the positions along a spectrum:
- Radical relativism: culture is the sole source of validity.
- Strong relativism: culture is the principal source; a few universal rights act as an outer check.
- Weak relativism: rights are prima facie universal; culture justifies only limited variation in interpretation and form. Donnelly defends this position.
A Contemporary Test
The Taliban have barred girls from secondary school since 2021 in the name of Afghan and Islamic tradition. Yet a 2025 UN Women survey found that 92% of Afghans consider girls’ schooling important. The regime’s “culture” is not the people’s.
Critique
- Essentialism. Cultures are internally plural and constantly changing. Relativism freezes them and lets rulers speak for everyone.
- Logical slip. Variation in beliefs does not prove that all beliefs are equally valid. The duty of tolerance is itself a universal claim.
- Moral paralysis. Consistent relativism cannot condemn slavery or genocide.
- Its lasting value. Clifford Geertz (“Anti Anti-Relativism”, 1984) warned that attacking relativism can revive ethnocentrism. The doctrine remains a useful check on Western self-certainty.
Conclusion
The universalism–relativism dichotomy misleads when it is posed as a choice. What survives is weak relativism: a universal floor of dignity, interpreted through cultural idioms and tested by the voices of those who live inside the culture.