Confused by using articles in the UDHR

Question

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty. (Article 2. UDHR)

Does "the rights" means "rights in this document" based on the context ("...in this Declaration")?

Furthermore, why does the text use definite articles for the words "basis", "country", "political status" if there are general concepts + we have a person so we can't use definite articles for countries and other general ideas.

As far as I know, using articles can sounds formal. Using articles has "its own style". In which situations can using articles sound either formal or neutral or informal? Could you recommend sources to me styles of using articles?

Answer 1

There is nothing "formal" about the use of definite articles here. It is just the normal case of using a definite article to refer to a specified thing, but where that specification is done within the same sentence.

Here is a simpler sentence using the definite article in the same way as in your first question:

The flowers on this table are for you.

Here I can say the flowers because the sentence itself specifies which flowers I'm talking about (the ones on this table).

"The flowers on this table" is exactly the same structure as "the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration". It is a definite reference to the thing specified within the same noun phrase.

For your second question, here's another simple sentence:

The meaning of a word depends on its context.

Here, even though we are talking about a completely unspecified word (and thus we use the indefinite article in front of "word"), we can still use the definite article before "meaning" because once we have chosen a word and placed it in a context, then that specifies the meaning of that particular usage.

The rather long sentence in the UDHR has a much more complicated structure, but the logic is the same. When we consider a person, we can know the country to which that person belongs, the political status of that country, and the basis of that status.

Learners are often told that the definite article is only used for things previously specified. That is not true. As this discussion hopefully shows, the specification can be within the same sentence. It can even be supplied entirely by context: "The sun is high in the sky," is unambiguously understandable even though I have not explicitly specified that I'm referring to planet Earth's sun and the sky that happens to be over my head (as opposed to the sky on the other side of the world).

Answer 2

... the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration

"set forth in this Declaration" specifies which rights and freedoms.

Why the definite article?

A person belongs to a country or territory "whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty".

The country or territory, thus broadly conceived (by the clause introduced by whether) is further broadened inasmuch as its political, jurisdictional or international status cannot be "the basis" for any distinction in respect to the aforementioned rights.

The definite article expresses that such status cannot be, in and of itself, sufficient condition to justify any distinction in respect to those rights. One could argue that the document thereby leaves open the possibility that something other than such status might be a basis for such distinction, provided it is not one of the enumerated reasons: "such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status."

The counterargument would be that the document says "without distinction of any kind".

The counterargument to the counterargument would be "if any kind is to be construed as all-encompassing, why then the "Furthermore..." clause? And wouldn't political, jurisdictional, and international status fall under "other status"?

To which the answer could be "That Furthermore clause refers to the status of the country or territory to which the person belongs, not the innate characteristics or social status of the person."