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This volume constitutes a valuable and unique history of the United Nations human rights programme and its secretariat. It offers interpretations of the history of the programme and its secretariat against the background of historical currents such as the Cold War, colonialism and decolonisation, and covers the seminal period during which the programme moved decisively towards human rights fact-finding and the denunciation of violations of human rights, which took place in the latter part of the 1970s and the 1980s. The author was a central player in this period, having served as the Special Assistant to three Directors of the Human Rights Division, and so provides historical materials that only he is aware of, having been at the heart of the action. He also provides snapshots of United Nations human rights leaders from the beginning of the United Nations, all of whom he knew personally, and writes about the contributions of NGOs and NGO leaders who served the cause of human rights with fortitude and determination.
2. The War Begins
Since at least the Middle Ages, the laws of war have distinguished between combatants and civilians under an injunction now formally known as the principle of distinction. The principle of distinction is invoked in contemporary conflicts as if there were an unmistakable and sure distinction to be made between combatant and civilian. As is so brutally evident in armed conflicts, it is precisely the distinction between civilian and combatant, upon which the protection of civilians is founded, cannot be taken as self-evident or stable. Helen M. Kinsella documents that the history of international humanitarian law itself admits the difficulty of such a distinction. In The Image before the Weapon...
In the decades following the triumphant proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, the UN General Assembly was transformed by the arrival of newly independent states from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. This diverse constellation of states introduced new ideas, methods, and priorities to the human rights program. Their influence was magnified by the highly effective nature of Asian, Arab, and African diplomacy in the UN human rights bodies and the sheer numerical superiority of the so-called Afro-Asian bloc. Owing to the nature of General Assembly procedure, the Third World states dominated the human rights agenda, and enthusiastic support for universal human right...
As the system of human rights special procedures goes forward to deal with the continuing and new challenges of human rights protection it is of great value to record and recall the considerable body of practice and precedents they have developed for the protection of human rights since the first special procedure was established in the mid 1960s. That is the particular merit of this path-breaking book. The author, who was one of the pioneers in the establishment and operation of the system of special procedures, tells in this book the story of the establishment, history, operations, successes and challenges of the special procedures through the lens of efforts for international protection. In the introduction he summarises their protection roles, which he sets out further in the substantive chapters. In the conclusion he provides an assessment of their protection roles. He notes that while they contribute greatly, the challenges of international protection are still many, and the author invites the international community to a higher level of protection.
This collection is intended to serve as a thematic textbook on the institutions and procedures devoted to the national implementation of human rights and to the international monitoring of State performance. Albeit not exhaustive, the coverage extends to most of the monitoring instances available at intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations: complaints, fact-finding and investigative procedures, State reporting obligations, good offices actions, dialogue functions, human rights education, dissemination of human rights information, letter campaigns, and technical co-operation. The target audience of the book is students of international human rights law, but the book can also serve as a guide for both officials and activists involved in the realization of human rights.