A stimulating, theoretically driven examination of the relationship between human rights and the globalizing process. In scrutinising the impacts of different aspects of globalization on the language and structure of human rights, the book gives readers a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the issues and questions key to the topic.

How were human rights invented, and what is their turbulent history? Human rights is a concept that only came to the forefront during the eighteenth century. When the American Declaration of Independence declared "all men are created equal" and the French proclaimed the Declaration of the Rights of Man during their revolution, they were bringing a new guarantee into the world. But why then? How did such a revelation come to pass? In this extraordinary work of cultural and intellectual history, Professor Lynn Hunt grounds the creation of human rights in the changes that authors brought to literature, the rejection of torture as a means of finding out truth, and the spread of empathy. Hunt traces the amazing rise of rights, their momentous eclipse in the nineteenth century, and their culmination as a principle with the United Nations's proclamation in 1948. She finishes this work for our time with a diagnosis of the state of human rights today.

Elgar Research Agendas outline the future of research in a given area. Leading scholars are given the space to explore their subject in provocative ways, and map out the potential directions of travel. They are relevant but also visionary. This Research Agenda maps thought-provoking research trends for the next generation of interdisciplinary human rights scholars in this particularly troubled time. It charts the historic trajectory of scholarship on the international rights regime, looking ahead to emerging areas of inquiry and suggesting alternative methods and perspectives for studying the pursuit of human dignity.   Chapters written by international experts cover a broad range of topics including humanitarianism, transitional justice, economic rights, academic freedom, women's rights, environmental justice, and business responsibility for human rights. The book highlights the importance of contemporary research agendas for human rights being centred on questions of governance and fulfilment, shifting responsibilities, rights interdependence and global inequality.   This is a critical read for students and scholars of human rights law, politics and international relations. The strong forward-looking agenda and coverage of a large number of fields within human rights studies will be helpful for advanced students looking for new areas of study for research projects.

Designed for educational use in international relations, law, political science, economics, and philosophy classes, Human Rights in the World Community treats the fall range of human rights issues, including implementation problems and processes involving international, national, and nongovernmental action. Now with online appendices. Book jacket.

Between the Second World War and the early 1970s, political leaders, activists, citizens, protestors. and freedom fighters triggered a human rights revolution in world affairs. Stimulated particularly by the horrors of the crimes against humanity in the 1940s, the human rights revolution grewrapidly to subsume claims from minorities, women, the politically oppressed, and marginal communities across the globe. The human rights revolution began with a disarmingly simple idea: that every individual, whatever his or her nationality, political beliefs, or ethnic and religious heritage,possesses an inviolable right to be treated with dignity. From this basic claim grew many more, and ever since, the cascading effect of these initial rights claims has dramatically shaped world history down to our own times.The contributors to this volume look at the wave of human rights legislation emerging out of World War II, including the UN Declaration of Human Rights, the Nuremberg trial, and the Geneva Conventions, and the expansion of human rights activity in the 1970s and beyond, including the anti-torturecampaigns of Amnesty International, human rights politics in Indonesia and East Timor, the emergence of a human rights agenda among international scientists, and the global campaign female genital mutilation. The book concludes with a look at the UN Declaration at its 60th anniversary. Bringingtogether renowned senior scholars with a new generation of international historians, these essays set an ambitious agenda for the history of human rights.

The Power of Human Rights (published in 1999) was an innovative and influential contribution to the study of international human rights. At its center was a 'spiral model' of human rights change which described the various socialization processes through which international norms were internalized into the domestic practices of various authoritarian states during the Cold War years. The Persistent Power of Human Rights builds on these insights, extending its reach and analysis. It updates our understanding of the various causal mechanisms and conditions which produce behavioural compliance, and expands the range of rights-violating actors examined to include democratic and authoritarian Great Powers, corporations, guerrilla groups, and private actors. Using a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research and theory, this book yields not only important new academic insights but also a host of useful lessons for policy-makers and practitioners.

The global importance of human rights issues has sparked an ongoing need to develop a universal language for human rights and the procedures for remedying violations, where remedies are, in fact, available. Giving the broadest scope to the terms human rights and freedoms, this reference encompasses constitutional rights and freedoms as well as those addressed in international and regional agreements.''''Through entries that define and describe concepts and terms, to text excerpts of documents, charts depicting global comparisons, essays on organizations, and biographies of activists and theorists, this reference will serve the research and information needs of students, scholars, activists, and interested citizens.''''As the title suggests, International Encyclopedia of Human Rights: Freedoms, Abuses, and Remedies goes beyond the abstract to include practical information on remedies for violations of a person's rights and freedoms by a national government, and on the private and government rights organizations that assist in reporting on or enforcing human rights.''''All around the world, there is a growing interest in developing a universal language for human rights and the procedures for remedying violations. International Encyclopedia of Human Rights: Freedoms, Abuses, and Remedies is written for both students of the subject and those who are actively working in the field. This reference work points readers in the right direction for enforcing their rights rather than merely setting them forth in the abstract.''

The Encyclopedia is a four-volume set discussing women’s concerns and global feminism theory and practice. Only volume one includes a list of articles organized into categories included in all volumes. Categories covered include but are not limited to: arts and literature, ecology and environment, education, reproduction, history of philosophy of feminism, violence and peace and women’s studies. Entries on individuals and specific nations are included within entries on topics.

An authoritative guide to human rights for teachers, students and researchers. It presents an increasingly complex field in a straightforward and accessible manner. Each chapter has a similar user-friendly format. The chapter summary is followed by a general introduction to the theme. International legal standards are set out in a selection of key documents. The relevant human rights organizations are described: UN, regional-governmental and non-governmental (NGO). Because the handbook does not claim to be exhaustive, each chapter concludes with a brief selection of additional resources for further reading and research.

The Oxford Handbook of International Human Rights Law provides a comprehensive and original overview of one of the fundamental topics within international law. It contains substantial new essays by over forty leading experts in the field, giving students, scholars, and practitioners a completeoverview of the issues that inform research and a "map" of the debates that animate the field. Each chapter features critical and up-to-date analysis of the current state of debate and discussion, assessing recent work, and advancing the understanding of all aspects of this developing area ofinternational law.Addressing all aspects of international human rights law, the Handbook consists of over forty chapters, divided into seven parts. The first two sections explore the foundational theories and the historical antecedents of human rights law from a diverse set of disciplines, including thephilosophical, religious, biological, and psychological origins of moral development and altruism, and sociological findings about cooperation and conflict. They also trace the historical sources of human rights through comparative and international law by conducting a case study of the anti-slaverymovement. Section III focuses on the law-making process and certain categories of rights. Sections IV and V examine the normative and institutional evolution of human rights, and discuss its impact on various doctrines of general international law. The final two sections are more speculative,examining whether there is an advantage to considering major social problems from a human rights perspective and, if so, how that might be done. Section VI analyses several current problems that are being addressed by governments both domestically and through international organizations, and issuesthat have been placed on the human rights agenda of the United Nations, such as state responsibility for human rights violations and economic sanctions to enforce human rights. The final section then evaluates the impact of international human rights law over the past six decades from a variety ofperspectives.The Handbook will be an invaluable resource for scholars, students, and practitioners of international human rights law. It provides the reader with new perspectives on international human rights law that are both multidisciplinary and geographically and culturally diverse. It should become the newstandard reference work in this area.

Historically, at English common law, the death penalty was mandatory for the crime of murder and other violent felonies. Over the last three decades, however, many former British colonies have reformed their capital punishment regimes to permit judicial sentencing discretion, including consideration of mitigating factors. Applying a comparative analysis to the law of capital punishment, Novak examines the constitutional jurisprudence and resulting legislative reform in the Caribbean, Sub-Saharan Africa, and South and Southeast Asia, focusing on the rapid retreat of the mandatory death penalty in the Commonwealth over the last thirty years. The coordinated mandatory death penalty challenges - which have had the consequence of greatly reducing the world's death row population - represent a case study of how a small group of lawyers can sponsor human rights litigation that incorporates international human rights law into domestic constitutional jurisprudence, ultimately harmonizing criminal justice regimes across borders. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the study and development of human rights and capital punishment, as well as those exploring the contours of comparative criminal justice.

Featuring experts from Europe, Australia, Japan, China, and the United States, this collection of essays follows changes in the theory and policy of China's death penalty from the Mao era (1949-1979) through the Deng era (1980-1997) up to the present day. Using empirical data, such as capital offender and offense profiles, temporal and regional variations in capital punishment, and the impact of social media on public opinion and reform, contributors relay both the character of China's death penalty practices and the incremental changes that indicate reform. They then compare the Chinese experience to other countries throughout Asia and the world, showing how change can be implemented even within a non-democratic and rigid political system, but also the dangers of promoting policies that society may not be ready to embrace.

Of all the issues on the human rights agenda, torture offered Americans the moral high ground . . . until this year. With the abuses at Abu Ghraib that led to accusations of torture within the domestic criminal justice system, the question of cruel and unusual treatment has taken on new urgency in the United States and elsewhere. In Torture, twelve newly written essays by leading thinkers and experts range over history and continents, offering a nuanced, up-to-the-minute exploration of this wrenching but timely topic, including, among others, Reed Brody on the road to Abu Ghraib and "ghost detainees"; Eitan Felner on the Israeli experience; Tom Malinowski on violations of State Department "forbidden practices" at Abu Ghraib and in Afghanistan; Kenneth Roth on the U.S. government's shift from cover-up to justification; and Minky Worden on a global survey of torturing countries. Intended for a general audience, some of the key questions addressed include how to define torture, whether torture is ever effective, and whether it is ever acceptable.

Torture is indisputably abhorrent; Why, you might ask, would you even want to think or read about torture? That is a very good question, and one this book addresses in a compelling and enlightening way. Torture is a very important issue, not least because millions of people around the world have been subjected to this odious practice--and many are enduring torture right now as you read these words.

In The Signature of Evil, the notion of torture in international law is explored with the intention of discovering the precise meaning of this most infamous, and yet still very prevalent, practice. By digesting a wealth of international legal sources - and combining this with personal field research and a look at the historical, philosophical, cultural, political, and social background of torture's use and abolition - this book's first ambition is to define the term. This leads to an extensive and impressive overview in which torture's constituent elements are carefully identified, thoroughly and meticulously scrutinized, and critically evaluated. On the basis of this synthesis and analysis - in which all possible uncertainties, problems, and evolutions are highlighted and discussed - a redefinition is proposed, which does not shy away from setting foot on new terrain and trying what might be revolutionary roads. Some thought provoking ideas are suggested - and at times controversial choices are made - but all this is done in order to attain one all-important goal: enhancing torture's absolute and non-derogable prohibition, as well as strengthening the international legal framework against unlawful abuse. On May 4, 2012 the Prof. Giuseppe Ciardi Foundation awarded its 2012 scientific prize to Steven Dewulf for his book The Signature of Evil. The Ciardi Prize is awarded annually to a substantial and original study dealing with military law, law of war or any matter connected with or related to the aforementioned.

Set up in 1989, specialist members of the Committee, including doctors and lawyers, have visited places of detention, prison and psychiatric hospitals throughout Europe to monitor the living conditions of those being detained. Following these visits, the committee has published reports suggesting improvements and laying down standards. This book provides a clear and comprehensive insight into the work carried out by one of the Council of Europe's highly influential non-judicial committees. Issues discussed include: the framework of the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and the mandate of the Committee; the key terms used and the safeguards the Committee has recommended to be adopted by states; the impact of the Committee's work and possible options for the future. The book also contains the text of the Convention, the Protocols, and explanatory notes.

Torture is perhaps the most unequivocally banned practice in the world today. Yet within six weeks after September 11, articles began appearing suggesting that torture might be "required" in order to interrogate suspected terrorists about future possibilities of violence. The United States andsome of its allies are using methods of questioning relating to the war on terrorism that could be described as torture or, at the very least, as inhuman and degrading. It is known that the United States sent some suspected terrorists to allied countries that are well known to engage in torture. Andin terror's wake, the use of such methods, at least under some conditions, has gained some prominent defenders.Torture: A Collection brings together leading lawyers, political theorists, social scientists, and public intellectuals to debate the advisability of maintaining the absolute ban on torture and to reflect on what it says about our societies if we do--or do not--adhere to it in all circumstances.One important question is how we define torture at all. Are "cruel and inhumane" practices that result in profound physical or mental discomfort tolerable so long as they do not meet some definition of "torture"? And how much "transparency" do we really want with regard to interrogation practices?Is "don't ask, don't tell" an acceptable response to those who concern themselves about these practices? Addressing these questions and more, this book tackles one of the most controversial issues that we face today.The noted contributors include Ariel Dorfman, Elaine Scarry, Alan Dershowitz, Judge Richard Posner, Michael Walzer, Jean Bethke Elshtain, and other lawyers from both the United States and abroad.

Torture is the most widespread human rights crime in the modern world, practiced in more than one hundred countries, including the United States. How could something so brutal, almost unthinkable, be so prevalent? The Phenomenon of Torture: Readings and Commentary is designed to answer that question and many others. Beginning with a sweeping view of torture in Western history, the book examines questions such as these: Can anyone be turned into a torturer? What exactly is the psychological relationship between a torturer and his victim? Are certain societies more prone to use torture? Are there any circumstances under which torture is justified--to procure critical information in order to save innocent lives, for example? How can torture be stopped or at least its incidence be reduced?Edited and with an introduction by the former Executive Director of Amnesty International USA, The Phenomenon of Torture draws on the writings of torture victims themselves, such as the Argentinian journalist Jacobo Timerman, as well as leading scholars like Elaine Scarry, author of The Body in Pain, It includes classical works by Voltaire, Jeremy Bentham, Hannah Arendt, and Stanley Milgram, as well as recent works by historian Adam Hochschild and psychotherapist Joan Golston. And it addresses new developments in efforts to combat torture, such as the designation of rape as a war crime and the use of the doctrine of universal jurisdiction to prosecute perpetrators. Designed for the student and scholar alike, it is, in sum, an anthology of the best and most insightful writing about this most curious and common form of abuse. Juan E. M?ndez, Special Advisor to the United Nations Secretary General onthe Prevention of Genocide and himself a victim of torture, provides a foreword.

The families of the disappeared have long struggled to uncover the truth about their missing relatives. In so doing, their mobilization has shaped central transitional justice norms and institutions, as this ground-breaking work demonstrates. Kovras combines a new global database with the systematic analysis of four challenging case studies - Lebanon, Cyprus, South Africa and Chile - each representative of a different approach to transitional justice. These studies reveal how variations in transitional justice policies addressing the disappeared occur: explaining why victims' groups in some countries are caught in silence, while others bring perpetrators to account. Conceiving of transitional justice as a dynamic process, Kovras traces the different phases of truth recovery in post-transitional societies, giving substance not only to the 'why' but also the 'when' and 'how' of this kind of campaign against impunity. This book is essential reading for all those interested in the development of transitional justice and human rights.

It was from Argentina, in the years 1976 to 1983 that the world first heard the cries of the families of los desaparecidos, the disappeared - 20,000 to 30,000 people made to vanish forever by official sleight of hand. In the years since, the scope and range of governmentally sanctioned kidnappings has spread exponentially, making enforced disappearances a truly global problem. This volume provides an in-depth legal investigation of involuntary disappearances as defined by national and international law. Beginning with a detailed discussion of what constitutes an enforced disappearance, it goes on to consider how various international organizations such as the United Nations view this problem. Using the Multiple Rights Approach, enforced disappearances are examined as a violation of internationally defined basic rights such as the right to personal freedom, the right to protection against torture and the right to a judicial remedy. Viewpoints of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the European System of Protection are scrutinized with special consideration regarding the international laws applicable to the problem. The availability (or lack thereof) of restitution and compensation for material damage, mental and physical anguish, and loss of opportunity is also addressed. Finally, the work considers the need for a comprehensive and coherent framework when dealing with enforced disappearances.

Who Do You Think You Are? is a powerful and startling look at our ideas of human identity as seen through the example of a generation of lost children born under Argentina's military dictatorship from 1976 to 1983. As Andrew Graham-Yooll explains, the killings during the dictatorship were enacted under a particularly chilling and conniving plan: A group of senior military officers drew up a policy of disappearing guerrilla rivals and subsequently forcing the adoption of their now orphaned children into the supposedly more suitable families of the ruling class. The goal of this practice was annihilation and cultural domination, the cancellation of unwanted and threatening family identities. Equally shocking, Graham-Yooll argues, is that this practice of murder and adoption was carried out in a country with one of the highest levels of education and the largest middle class in Latin America at the time. Though we may want to believe that such atrocities cannot happen again in enlightened societies, the Argentine example proves otherwise. With Who Do You Think You Are?, Graham-Yooll weaves together ideas from literary texts and studies of childhood in order to define what exactly we mean when we speak of identity--who we are, where we come from, and where we belong.

Mourning Remains examines the attempts to find, recover, and identify the bodies of Peruvians who were disappeared during the 1980s and 1990s counterinsurgency campaign in Peru's central southern Andes. Isaias Rojas-Perez explores the lives and political engagement of elderly Quechua mothers as they attempt to mourn and seek recognition for their kin. Of the estimated 16,000 Peruvians disappeared during the conflict, only the bodies of 3,202 victims have been located, and only 1,833 identified. The rest remain unknown or unfound, scattered across the country and often shattered beyond recognition. Rojas-Perez examines how, in the face of the state's failure to account for their missing dead, the mothers rearrange senses of community, belonging, authority, and the human to bring the disappeared back into being through everyday practices of mourning and memorialization. Mourning Remains reveals how collective mourning becomes a political escape from the state's project of governing past death and how the dead can help secure the future of the body politic.

In the course of hostilities between Greek and Turkish Cypriots between 1963 and 1974, over 2000 persons, both Greek and Turkish Cypriots, went "missing" in Cyprus, an island in the Mediterranean with a population distribution of 80% Greeks and 18% Turks. This represents a significant number for a population of only 600,000. Few bodies have been recovered; most will probably not be. All are still mourned by their surviving friends and relatives. The conflict has still not been resolved and the memories are still alive.

"Approximately 300 Kenyans were forcibly disappeared in Kenya's Mt. Elgon region between 2006 and 2008, after being either arrested by Kenyan security forces or abducted by the militia group Sabaot Land Defence Force (SLDF). Over three years after a military operation was launched to flush out the militia--an operation that was accompanied by serious human rights abuses, including summary executions, enforced disappearance, and torture--the government has not provided any information on the plight of the disappeared, and their families are yet to have access to justice. "Hold Your Heart": Waiting for Justice in Kenya's Mt. Elgon Region documents the attempts of families of those forcibly disappeared by the Kenyan army and the SLDF to seek truth and justice. Human Rights Watch calls on the Kenyan government to open an inquiry into the fate of the missing persons. The International Criminal Court should also extend its Kenyan investigation to Mt. Elgon, the site of the highest concentration of pre- and post-election violence in the country."--P. [4] of cover.

Missing Lives tells the stories of fifteen missing individuals, documenting the efforts of the organizations and professionals who work to release the bereaved from the anguish of their uncertainty by locating burial grounds, exhuming bodies and piecing together scattered skeletons. It aims to give a voice to the silenced victims and pay tribute to the tragedy of so many families.

Latin America sits at the centre of the third wave of democratisation beginning in the early 1980s. It has advanced farther than any other region of the world in its accountability processes for past human rights violations perpetrated during authoritarian regimes and armed conflicts. Despite these human rights achievements, Latin America is known as the most violent global region. In the last two decades since the transitions, serious human rights violations, especially disappearances, have increased exponentially in several countries in the region. This volume seeks to understand these post-transition disappearances. It does so by examining four different countries and the dynamics that play out there. It considers a variety of voices and points of view: those expressing the experiences from the perspectives of victims and relatives; those of activists, advocates, and public officials seeking truth and justice; and those from scholars attempting to draw out the specificities in each case and the patterns across cases. The underlying objective behind the project to gain knowledge and to draw on deep commitment to change within the region is to overcome this tragedy. After reading this volume, readers will not only have an overview of the practice of disappearances in the region, but will also be able to gauge how, despite the differences, the social and political logics that make disappearances possible are similar. The disappearances of the past and those of present are not the same, and it would be a mistake to consider them that way, but the social practices that make them possible are similar. These practices are what we call the logics of disappearance.

In Kashmir's frigid winter a woman leaves her door cracked open, waiting for the return of her only son. Every month in a public park in Srinagar, a child remembers her father as she joins her mother in collective mourning. The activist women who form the Association of the Parents of the Disappeared Persons (APDP) keep public attention focused on the 8,000 to 10,000 Kashmiri men disappeared by the Indian government forces since 1989. Surrounded by Indian troops, international photojournalists, and curious onlookers, the APDP activists cry, lament, and sing while holding photos and files documenting the lives of their disappeared loved ones. In this radical departure from traditionally private rituals of mourning, they create a spectacle of mourning that combats the government's threatening silence about the fates of their sons, husbands, and fathers. Drawn from Ather Zia's ten years of engagement with the APDP as an anthropologist and fellow Kashmiri activist, Resisting Disappearance follows mothers and ?half-widows? as they step boldly into courts, military camps, and morgues in search of their disappeared kin. Through an amalgam of ethnography, poetry, and photography, Zia illuminates how dynamics of gender and trauma in Kashmir have been transformed in the face of South Asia's longest-running conflict, providing profound insight into how Kashmiri women and men nurture a politics of resistance while facing increasing military violence under India.

Stories of the missing offer profound insights into the tension between how political systems see us and how we see each other. The search for people who go missing as a result of war, political violence, genocide, or natural disaster reveals how forms of governance that objectify the person are challenged. Contemporary political systems treat persons instrumentally, as objects to be administered rather than as singular beings: the apparatus of government recognizes categories, not people. In contrast, relatives of the missing demand that authorities focus on a particular person: families and friends are looking for someone who to them is unique and irreplaceable. In Missing, Jenny Edkins highlights stories from a range of circumstances that shed light on this critical tension: the aftermath of World War II, when millions in Europe were displaced; the period following the fall of the World Trade Center towers in Manhattan in 2001 and the bombings in London in 2005; searches for military personnel missing in action; the thousands of political "disappearances" in Latin America; and in more quotidian circumstances where people walk out on their families and disappear of their own volition. When someone goes missing we often find that we didn't know them as well as we thought: there is a sense in which we are "missing" even to our nearest and dearest and even when we are present, not absent. In this thought-provoking book, Edkins investigates what this more profound "missingness" might mean in political terms.

This book explores the meaning and implementation of international children's rights law, as laid down in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and related international and regional human rights instruments. It considers the application of international children's rights at the national level and addresses key procedural and institutional matters concerning children's rights implementation, including monitoring, complaints mechanisms, effective remedies, advocacy and international agenda-setting. The book breaks new ground by analysing a wide range of international children's rights issues from a legal perspective. It incorporates a comparative perspective on children's rights law at the international, regional and domestic level and contains information on evidence-based strategies towards the implementation and enforcement of international children's rights law. The book is targeted at academics, legal and other professionals, and advanced students. It analyses children's rights law in the following areas: implementation and enforcement; advocacy and standard setting; complaints and remedies; the child and the family; adoption; alternative care; protection from violence; civil rights of the child; economic, social and cultural rights; education; health; migration and refugees; children and the justice system; children with disabilities; deprivation of liberty; children's rights and digital technologies; war and disaster; sustainable development goals and further contemporary issues.

In Africa, children and young people face crisis. Child death rates are rising and educational enrolment is falling. Children are victims in every war. Millions of young Africans are contracting HIV and AIDS. Neglected by society, Africa's youth are attracted to militarism and militant religion. YOUNG AFRICA pioneers new thinking on the rights of children and young people in Africa, and offers new approaches to tackling the violation of the rights of young Africans, and arguing that the world will benefit from investing in Africa's children.

Sexual violence and exploitation occur in many conflict zones, and the children born of such acts face discrimination, stigma, and infanticide. Yet the massive transnational network of organizations working to protect war-affected children has, for two decades, remained curiously silent on the needs of this vulnerable population. Focusing specifically on the case of Bosnia-Herzegovina, R. Charli Carpenter questions the framing of atrocity by human rights organizations and the limitations these narratives impose on their response. She finds that human rights groups set their agendas according to certain grievances-the claims of female rape victims or the complaints of aggrieved minorities, for example-and that these concerns can overshadow the needs of others. Incorporating her research into a host of other conflict zones, Carpenter shows that the social construction of rights claims is contingent upon the social construction of wrongs. According to Carpenter, this pathology prevents the full protection of children born of war.

Building on recent human rights scholarship, childhood studies and child rights programming, this conceptual framework on children's rights proposes three key-notions: living rights, or the lived experiences in which rights take shape; social justice, or the shared normative beliefs that make rights appear legitimate for those who struggle to get them recognised; and translations, or the complex flux between different beliefs and perspectives on rights and their codification. By exploring the relationships between these three concepts, the realities and complexities of children's rights are highlighted. The framework is critical of approaches to children as passive targets of good intentions and aims to disclose how children craft their own conceptions and practices of rights. The contributions offer important insights into new ways of thinking and research within this emerging field.

Does competitive sport respect children's human rights? Is intensive training child labour? Is competitive stress a form of child abuse? The human rights of children have been recognized in the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and ratified by 192 countries. Paulo David's work makes it clear, however, that too often competitive sport fails to recognize the value of respect for international child rights norms and standards. Human Rights in Youth Sport offers critical analysis of some very real problems within youth sport and argues that the future development of sport depends on the creation of a child-centred sport system. Areas of particular concern include issues of: over-training physical, emotional and sexual abuse doping and medical ethics education child labour accountability of governments, sports federations, coaches and parents. The text will be essential reading for anybody with an interest in the ethics of sport, youth sport, coaching and sports development.

India has the largest number of child labourers in the world, and has been the subject of intense media and political campaigns in the North aimed at addressing the abuse of childrenâs rights. This book explores childrenâs rights as a site of power and reveals how the rights discourse has been used by international actors, national elites, and local NGOs in the child labour debate in India. While discussing the childrenâs rights in the contemporary world, the author analyses human rights and power along with insights from postcolonial theorists. He provides empirical accounts of how three Indian NGOs-Bonded Labour Liberation Front, Butterflies, and South Asian Coalition on Child Servitude-are using the discourse of childrenâs rights to challenge child labour practices. Combining global and local perspectives to arrive at a comprehensive picture, the book locates the struggle for child rights on two fronts: critiquing neo-liberal globalization and challenging rights violations in India.

Over twenty years after the 1989 UN General Assembly vote to open the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) for signature and ratification by UN member states, the United States remains one of only two UN members not to have ratified it. The other is Somalia. Child Rights: The Movement, International Law, and Opposition explores the reasons for this resistance. It details the objections that have arisen to accepting this legally binding international instrument, which presupposes indivisible universal civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights, and gives children special protection due to their vulnerability. The resistance ranges from isolationist attitudes toward international law and concerns over the fiscal impact of implementation, to the value attached to education in a faith tradition and fears about the academic deterioration of public education. The contributors to the book reveal the significant positive influence that the CRC has had, despite not being ratified, on subjects such as educational research, child psychology, development ethics, normative ethics, and anthropology. The book also explores the growing homeschooling trend, which is often evangelically led in the US, but which is at loggerheads with an equally growing social science-based movement of experts and ethicists pressing for greater autonomy and freedom of expression for children. Looking beyond the US, the book also addresses some of the practical obstacles that have emerged to implementing the CRC in both developed countries (for example, Canada and the United Kingdom) and in poorer nations. This book, polemical and yet balanced, helps the reader evaluate both positive and the negative implications of this influential piece of international legislation from a variety of ethical, legal, and social science perspectives.

Rights and Wrongs of Children's Work, authored by an interdisciplinary team of experts, incorporates recent theoretical advances and experiences to explore the place of labor in children's lives and development. This groundbreaking book considers international policies governing children's work and the complexity of assessing the various effects of their work. The authors question current child labor policies and interventions, which, even though pursued with the best intentions, too often fail to protect children against harm or promote their access to education and other opportunities for decent futures. They argue for the need to re-think the assumptions that underlie current policies on the basis of empirical evidence, and they recommend new approaches to advance working children's well-being and guarantee their human rights. Rights and Wrongs of Children's Work condemns the exploitation and abuse of child workers and supports the right of all children to the best quality, free education that society can afford. At the same time, the authors recognize the value, and sometimes the necessity, of work in growing up, and the reality that a "workless" childhood, without responsibilities, is not good preparation for adult life in any environment.

How can international human rights law be used to help protect children at risk for sexual abuse? Should the definition of sexual abuse be allowed to differ among cultures? Should a country intervene in the internal workings of another with whom they disagree about approaches to the issue? What do notions of rights and law mean, and how could they be developed without placing more children at risk for abuse? This book begins the process of addressing these and other issues as it considers how human rights law can help detail what could and should be done to protect children from sexual maltreatment. Roger Levesque places particular emphasis on the ways in which abusive activities in different countries and societies are linked with one another and the way diverse societal views of children place them at risk. Throughout, Levesque brings together several intersecting debates in social science and law, as he pragmatically considers human rights law as a tool for combatting child sexual maltreatment.

Advocates within the growing field of children's rights have designed dynamic campaigns to protect and promote children's rights. This expanding body of international law and jurisprudence, however, lacks a core text that provides an up-to-date look at current children's rights issues, the evolution of children's rights law, and the efficacy of efforts to protect children. Campaigning for Children focuses on contemporary children's rights, identifying the range of abuses that affect children today, including early marriage, female genital mutilation, child labor, child sex tourism, corporal punishment, the impact of armed conflict, and access to education. Jo Becker traces the last 25 years of the children's rights movement, including the evolution of international laws and standards to protect children from abuse and exploitation. From a practitioner's perspective, Becker provides readers with careful case studies of the organizations and campaigns that are making a difference in the lives of children, and the relevant strategies that have been successful--or not. By presenting a variety of approaches to deal with each issue, this book carefully teases out broader lessons for effective social change in the field of children's rights.