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This international collection of historical work explores the breadth and creativity of women's struggles for human rights, citizenship and social justice across the world. It brings together twenty contributions by scholars in women's history, whose work reflects the global reach of the International Federation for Research in Women's History. In addition to presenting studies by well known scholars in the United States and Europe, the book is distinctive in also bringing the work of scholars from regions such as South and East Asia and the Pacific to the attention of an international audience.

THIS PAPER EXPLORES THE FOUNDATIONS OF POSITIVE LAW WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND DEVELOPMENT. POSITIVIST THEORIES OF RIGHTS AND LAW HAVE FILLED MUCH OF THE VACUUM LEFT BY THE REJECTION OF DIVINE LAW AND NATURAL LAW AS FOUNDATIONS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS AND POSITIVE LAW. IN GENERAL, POSITIVISTS SEE LAW AS A COERCIVE ORDER CREATED BY HUMAN COMMUNITIES TO PROTECT PEOPLE FROM ONE ANOTHER, AND RIGHTS AS ENTITLEMENTS GRANTED BY LAW. MORALITY IS NOT AN INTEGRAL PART OF THE VIEW AND THERE ARE NO UNIVERSAL BASES OR CRITERIA FOR LAW OR RIGHTS. THERE ARE, HOWEVER, SOME CURRENT CONTRASTING VIEWS--SO-CALLED WORLD ORDER VIEWS--WHICH ARE REMINISCENT OF THE OPTIMISTIC AND HOLISTIC CHARACTER OF THE EARLIER NATURAL LAW THEORIES. THEY INTEGRATE MORALITY, HUMAN RIGHTS AND LAW MORE INTIMATELY, AND GO SOME WAY IN PROVIDING ALL OF THEM WITH A UNIVERSAL FOUNDATION. THE PAPER EXPLORES THIS QUESTION OF FOUNDATIONS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF DEVELOPMENT AND EVOLUTION RATHER THAN FROM A LEGAL PERSPECTIVE.

Abstract
The discussion of the recognition of human rights by law suffers from the acceptance of three myths: that recognition is provided for in human rights instruments, that there exist moral norms ready to be recognised by law and that recognition is what happens when a legal norm that corresponds to a moral precept is adopted. To counter the first myth, the article undertakes a close reading of the relevant passages of human rights instruments. To counter the second myth, the article observes that there exist few if any universally valid moral norms ready to be recognised by law but an abundance of other moral precepts. To counter the third myth, the article argues that what happens is rather the replication of the content of a moral precept in law. From all these, it follows that there cannot be any necessary connection between moral norms or other precepts and legal human rights. This distinctness of moral precepts and legal human rights, it is argued in conclusion, is apt to strengthen legal human rights protection: it diminishes the influence 'traditional values' might otherwise have on this protection.

This comprehensive and up-to-date encyclopedia on human rights issues from 1945 to the present includes more than 400 entries on incidents and violations, instruments and initiatives, countries, and human rights activities. Its scope is global, and its purpose is both to sum up the accomplishments in human rights in our time and also to point out and describe the violations that continue to be perpetrated around the world. Entries cover major issues; incidents and violations; concepts and terms; activists; organizations; and human rights instruments. Entries cover more than 50 countrie

Abstract
Research on international human rights law suggests that the beneficial effects of treaties depend on the strength of democratic political institutions. However, democracies are, by definition, compliant with many provisions in treaties that protect civil and political rights. Additionally, theories of compliance derive from a focus on civil and political rights rather than on other rights, so we lack a good understanding of whether predictions hold for other kinds of rights. We examine compliance with the Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which protects rights that are distinct from those that characterize democratic governance. To measure compliance, we create a new indicator of women's rights that offers several advantages over existing indicators. We examine the conditional effect of CEDAW using models that allow for heterogenous treaty effects. This helps to adjudicate between theories that expect treaties to be most effective in highly democratic countries and those that expect them to be most effective among partial democracies. Our findings do not support either expectation and suggest that effectiveness does not depend on democracy, at least in the case of CEDAW. This points to the need to enrich existing theories of ratification and compliance by accounting for differences in the nature of the rights protected by different treaties.