In “Human rights under pressure: A future-oriented conception of universal rights” (Futures 182, 2026), Dr. Potz argues that our human rights regime, anchored in a metaphysical idea of dignity and reserved for one species, is badly equipped for a future of rising existential risk, radical enhancement, and a “pluriverse” of animals, cyborgs, uploads, chimeras and possibly conscious AIs. Taking an openly instrumental and consequentialist view of rights, he shows how dignity-absolutism can block sensible responses to catastrophe, from court rulings against shooting down a hijacked plane to first-come-first-served pandemic triage, while speciesism denies basic protections to sentient beings who share our capacity to suffer. Building on my (James Hughes’s) “cyborg citizenship” and Tomasz Pietrzykowski’s “inclusive humanism,” he proposes a universal rights system built on four principles: non-speciesism, interest protection, capacity differentiation and substrate-independence, with morphological freedom and cognitive liberty added as fundamental rights. Finally, he sketches a two-tier political citizenship, with representation for every sentient being through bodies like a third parliamentary chamber or an ombudsman, and active participation (voting, office-holding) for persons of any species or substrate. Maciej Potz is a full professor of political science in the Department of Political Systems at the University of Łódź in Poland, with a PhD from the University of Silesia in Katowice (2006) and a habilitation from Łódź (2017). Much of his career has been focused on religion and power: as a Foundation for Polish Science scholar he did fieldwork among the Shakers in Maine, and Mormons in Salt Lake City, and his books include The Limits of Religious Liberty (2008), American Theocracies (2016) and Political Science of Religion: Theorising the Political Role of Religion (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020). He also works on theories of power and democracy and on evolutionary political science. Links * Potz, M. (2026). Human rights under pressure: A future-oriented conception of universal rights. Futures. * Maciej Potz at Researchgate * Maciej Potz contributor profile, World Religions and Spirituality Project This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit technoprogressives.substack.com
