Larry Alexander offers a skeptical appraisal of the claim that freedom of expression is a human right. He examines the various contexts in which a right to freedom of expression might be asserted and concludes that it cannot be supported in any of these contexts. Alexander argues that the legal protection affording freedom of expression is definitely of value, although the form such protection takes will vary with historical and cultural circumstances--and, ultimately, is not a matter of human rights.

Larry Alexander is Warren Distinguished Professor, University of San Diego School of Law.

Introduction; Part I. Defining Human Rights and Delimiting the Scope of Freedom of Expression: 1. Preliminaries: what is a human right, and what activities implicate freedom of expression?; 2. Freedom of expression and regulations that affect messages but are not enacted for that reason; 3. The puzzles of governmental purpose; Part II. The Core of Freedom of Expression: Government Regulations and Acts Taken To Affect Messages: 4. The core of freedom of expression: regulations of conduct for the purpose of affecting messages received; 5. Track three: Government speech and subsidies of speech; 6. Miscellaneous regulations of expression; Part III. Theoretical Perspectives on Freedom of Expression: 7. General justifying theories of freedom of expression; 8. The paradoxes of liberalism and the failure of theories justifying a right of freedom of expression; Epilogue: 9. Muddling through: freedom of expression in the absence of a human right.