Human rights and democracy: exploring the interchanges between cultural and environmental rights for sustainable development promotion

Taking into consideration the recent developments on the evolution of cul- tural and environmental rights in international law and in other nations, as well as the strengthening of the linkages between human rights and demo- cracy in order promote development, this article aims to critically analyze the relationship between environmental and cultural rights for promoting sustainable development, under the prism of human rights and contempo- rary democratic theory. The hypothesis states that the enforcement of cultu- ral and environmental rights is fostered as constitutive elements of sustaina- ble development, expanding its scope as a theoretical and political proposal. The article is grounded on the field of legal theory, especially human rights theory, analyzed with a critical approach, and is divided into three parts: I - Human rights and democracy in contemporary times; II - Cultural and en- vironmental rights as “new rights”; III - The promotion of sustainable deve- lopment in the era of current “new” human and fundamental rights.