Suchergebnisse

At the end of World War II, the phrase "human rights" was virtually unknown, whether in the media, in standard textbooks, or as a guideline for state conduct in the emerging international community. It was nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that made the phrase a core element of the United Nations Charter in 1944, even as they pressed for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted three years later. This was but the beginning of a historic effort to make the Declaration a fundamental standard for measuring progress in civilized society. If the principal motivation was the prevention of another Holocaust, NGOs would fulfill the indispensable function, projected by Eleanor Roosevelt, of serving as the "curious grapevine" that would enlighten everyone about their rights and channel information about human rights violations to the world community.This essay is about the "curious grapevine," an extraordinary tale of how NGOs, through their persuasion, have made human rights a major item in international discourse in the media, state chancellories, and international institutions. NGOs have played the leading role in the creation of international standards and in establishing legally binding treaties incorporating these standards. They are central to the process of adopting implementing organs to these treaties and in providing the essential documentation and briefings to make these organs work.

Analyzes roles played by nongovernmental organizations in promoting basic human rights standards, exposing violations, pressuring for UN mechanisms of implementation, and serving as a source of documentation for such institutions.

While the United States is now an international leader in the fight against genocide and human rights abuses, it only recently ratified the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide– forty years after the convention's unanimous adoption by the UN General Assembly. Korey provides a description of the long struggle for ratification of the Genocide Convention, detailing decades of work by a committee of fifty-two nongovernmental organizations lobbying the Senate and the American Bar Association, the treaty's key opponent. Despite the public support for the United Nations and human rights by the United States, failure to ratify the Genocide Convention stemmed primarily from the fear that international covenants were threats to U.S. sovereignty. The United States finally overcame this fear with the ratification of the Genocide Convention in 1988, which opened the door for U.S. leadership.

The "sexiest acronym in international diplomacy." Such was a Washington pandit's roguish, if appropriate, characterization of the CSCE (Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe) just a few of years ago in 1990 after it critically helped ignite the revolutions in Eastern Europe and torpedo the Berlin Wall. Other, more serious, foreign affairs analysts were equally enthusiastic about CSCE. A prominent commentator called it the "premier post-Cold War political forum."

Failure of European nations to enforce provisions of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe condemning ethnic violence.

Despite conservative opposition, in the late 1970s, Jimmy Carter turned the tide in favor of the Helsinki Accord by taking a strong stand in fostering U.S. participation in it. Korey focuses on the U.S. delegation to the Commission on Security and Cooperation (CSCE) in Europe and credits the success of the Helsinki Accord to U.S. adroit negotiation strategies, beginning with the Carter administration. By 1980, U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev came to embrace the "humanitarianism" of the treaty. The Vienna review conference's (1986–89) effort peaked when a milestone was reached in the human rights process, linking it directly to security issues equally pertinent to the East and the West. The author contends that the United States' ardent participation in the monitoring of compliance was particularly effective in putting pressure on the Soviet Union to uphold the agreement within its territory, yielding enormous progress in human rights

Commenting on the Jan. 1989 deliberations.