Page 121 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol III

940 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

protect captives and civilians in warfare. These treaties Many U.N. delegates wanted a formal treaty to give
were revised in the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 the rights listed in the Universal Declaration even more
and were further updated through two protocols force. The ensuing process of treaty drafting took eight-
adopted in 1977. een more years, complicated by differing national per-
These early efforts were important in providing some spectives on human rights.The United States and others
recognition of individual rights, but the real impetus to viewed human rights as primarily civil and political rights,
protect human rights at the international level did not designed to allow individuals to participate in political
begin until after World War II.The postwar trials of Ger- decision-making and to protect them against government
man and Japanese war criminals held in Nuremberg and abuses. But other countries stressed the additional impor-
Tokyo were defining moments in reinforcing the culpa- tance of economic, social, and cultural rights, arguing that
bility of human rights abuses. Although criticized at the food and shelter, for instance, were more basic and more
time as “victors’ justice,” i.e., punishment of the losers of important for those in the developing world than the more
the war by the winners, the careful and dramatic evi- abstract civil and political rights.These different catego-
dentiary documentation of government planning and ries of rights require different mechanisms of enforcement,
implementation of systematic wartime atrocities made because economic rights can be protected only through
clear the need to work toward a world where such the expenditure of money; thus, the enforcement of eco-
depravities would occur, in the phrase popular at the nomic rights is commonly regarded as best undertaken
time, “never again.” by legislative bodies balancing competing priorities,
rather than by courts with no budgetary responsibility.
International Human Rights Because of differences such as these, it was decided to
Law in the Postwar Era prepare two separate treaties, and in 1966 the U.N. Gen-
The most important event in the development of con- eral Assembly promulgated both the International Cov-
temporary international human rights standards was the enant on Civil and Political Rights and the International
establishment of the United Nations in 1945.The United Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights.
Nations Charter contains two key articles recognizing the In the first treaty, the fundamental civil and political
importance of protecting the human rights of all individ- rights include the right to life; the right to freedom from
uals: Articles 55 and 56 state that the United Nations and torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment; the
its members shall promote “universal respect for, and ob- right to freedom from slavery; the right to freedom from
servance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for arbitrary arrest and detention; the right to equal treatment
all without distinction as to race,sex,language,or religion.” without regard to race or sex; the right to participate in
Pursuant to this mandate, delegates representing the political decision-making, directly or through chosen rep-
founding members of the United Nations, led by former resentatives; the rights to freedom of thought, conscience,
First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt of the United States, and religion; the rights to freedom of opinion, expres-
drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, sion, association, and assembly; the right to privacy; the
which listed the fundamental rights of individuals. This right to freedom of movement; and the right to fair pro-
text was promulgated by the U.N. General Assembly in cedures in criminal, civil, and administrative matters.
1948, the same year the Genocide Convention was The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
offered for ratification (the latter came into force in is overseen by the Human Rights Committee, an eighteen-
1951). The Universal Declaration has come to be member body based in Geneva, Switzerland, with mem-
respected as an authoritative listing of rights, and its pro- bers elected by the countries that have ratified the treaty.
visions are now widely regarded as customary interna- Ratifying nations provide regular reports regarding their
tional law. human rights record to the committee, and individuals