When does a human right become a right?

Today I got to listen to a very interesting lecture on the International Human Rights system (or systems) from a judicial point of view. The discussion from class that keeps ringing in my ears was the one on when a human right becomes a right(?) Well, we didn't go into the question too thoroughly but it's pretty much what's been pondering my head as I've been reading the course literature. From a judicial standpoint the pragmatic idea of human rights implementation (grounded in "negative rights" in a way - freedom from hunger for example) must almost inevitably be the primary preference of looking at things within the International Human Rights system. What's interesting though, despite the distinction between a convention's state-binding power by International law and a declarations general public agreement, is the notion of how customs become established rights. As these established rights are not legally binding in any way I found it a bit (positively I guess) surprising to hear of how they're used quite frequently from the judicial side of things. Of how these norms are so closely incorporated into the Human Rights system, which has a strong, very strong judicial ground at the foundational level. With the challenges of globalization and multi-cultural society one could wonder whether the established rights (eg. customs) are to stay as obvious for future references. Now when customs colliding with the cultural facts of reality is not a rare case scenario. Or a less new one. On top of that there's a way of dealing with this question within the philosophical school. To ask whether these rights can be claimed to be absolute or universal and in that case, what makes them into what? Hmm...I think I'll leave this post with a very open-ended closure, thinking I might have imposed more questions than answers. One thing I do know for sure is that declarations' be or not to be is a question that will live on in terms of whether conventions live or die. So let's let them [the non-legally binding declarations] be what they are in terms of what they might become. Our Human Rights.