The International Human Rights Movement
A History
Published on 22. April 2012
Book
Hardback
392 pages
978-0-691-13515-1 (ISBN)
Description
During the past several decades, the international human rights movement has had a crucial hand in the struggle against totalitarian regimes, cruelties in wars, and crimes against humanity. Today, it grapples with the war against terror and subsequent abuses of government power. In The International Human Rights Movement, Aryeh Neier--a leading figure and a founder of the contemporary movement--offers a comprehensive and authoritative account of this global force, from its beginnings in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to its essential place in world affairs today. Neier combines analysis with personal experience, and gives a unique insider's perspective on the movement's goals, the disputes about its mission, and its rise to international importance. Discussing the movement's origins, Neier looks at the dissenters who fought for religious freedoms in seventeenth-century England and the abolitionists who opposed slavery before the Civil War era.
He pays special attention to the period from the 1970s onward, and he describes the growth of the human rights movement after the Helsinki Accords, the roles played by American presidential administrations, and the astonishing Arab revolutions of 2011. Neier argues that the contemporary human rights movement was, to a large extent, an outgrowth of the Cold War, and he demonstrates how it became the driving influence in international law, institutions, and rights. Throughout, Neier highlights key figures, controversies, and organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, and he considers the challenges to come. Illuminating and insightful, The International Human Rights Movement is a remarkable account of a significant world movement, told by a key figure in its evolution.
He pays special attention to the period from the 1970s onward, and he describes the growth of the human rights movement after the Helsinki Accords, the roles played by American presidential administrations, and the astonishing Arab revolutions of 2011. Neier argues that the contemporary human rights movement was, to a large extent, an outgrowth of the Cold War, and he demonstrates how it became the driving influence in international law, institutions, and rights. Throughout, Neier highlights key figures, controversies, and organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, and he considers the challenges to come. Illuminating and insightful, The International Human Rights Movement is a remarkable account of a significant world movement, told by a key figure in its evolution.
Reviews / Votes
"The dialectic between Eastern courage and Western organization deserves a historian and it has found one in Aryeh Neier, a figure who helped to make the history he writes... With Aryeh Neier's retirement from the Open Society Foundations, the human rights movements marks the end of an era, and his book on the history of the movement is an occasion to reflect on how far the movement has come and what it must do next... [Neier] and the thousands of people he drew into the movement have demonstrated what discipline, toughness, professionalism, and integrity can accomplish when up against the despots of our time."--Michael Ignatieff, New York Review of Books "Neier ... has the credentials to tell the story of the movement's philosophical roots, its nature and strength and its goals, challenges, successes and failures... A fact-filled, well-documented, pull-no-punches account by an insider."--Kirkus Reviews "Neier, a longtime official for the American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch, and Open Society Foundations, has written a personalized history of private action for human rights in world affairs... [T]he book is a useful primer for those unfamiliar with human rights developments."--Choice "The International Human Rights Movement: A History is a first-class, insightful resource for understanding a vital phenomenon and an approach to humanity and human relations that is essential to the realization of a better world. Neier skillfully transforms his readers into witnesses of the most important period of our moral evolution, and coopts them into taking responsibility for its eventual success."--Michael Allen Fox, International Journal on World Peace "[L]essons can be learned when we link Neier's assessment of the consequences of strengthened human rights and humanitarian law with a new body of academic work on the consequences of human rights... All along, Neier's movement perspective and his lived experience at the center of the international human rights movement provide further inspiration to scholars, illustrating the potential benefits from Pasteur's Quadrant in the field of human rights research."--Joachim J. Savelsberg, Law & Social Inquiry "[H]ere is an honest version of a vital social movement from a man who was there in the front when the crowd was first gathering and has been at the head of various bits of it ever since."--Conor Gearty, International AffairsMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
New Jersey
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Product notice
Trade binding
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Weight
709 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-691-13515-1 (9780691135151)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Aryeh Neier is president emeritus of the Open Society Foundations and distinguished visiting professor at the Paris School of International Affairs of Sciences Po. Previously he was executive director of Human Rights Watch and executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. A contributor to many major publications, he is the author of Taking Liberties and War Crimes, among other books.
Content
Acknowledgments vii Chapter 1: The Movement 1 Chapter 2: Putting Natural Law Principles into Practice 26 Chapter 3: What Are Rights? 57 Chapter 4: International Human Rights Law 93 Chapter 5: International Humanitarian Law 117 Chapter 6: Defying Communism 138 Chapter 7: Rights on the Other Side of the Cold War Divide 161 Chapter 8: Amnesty International 186 Chapter 9: Human Rights Watch 204 Chapter 10: The Worldwide Movement 233 Chapter 11: Accountability 258 Chapter 12: Rights after 9/11 285 Chapter 13: Going Forward 318 Notes 335 Index 359