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While there are many possible perspectives – political, moral, philosophical – with which a discussion of human rights can begin, the legal is perhaps the most useful from a practical standpoint. The modern structure of human rights first emerged in the aftermath to World War II, when the countries of the world united to build a framework for international cooperation that would prevent the horrors of the past from ever recurring.
For more on international law more generally, consult Is International Law Really ‘Law?’.
Charter of the United Nations
In 1945, leaders from around the globe convened in San Francisco to establish the United Nations (UN).1 The UN was designed to be an improved version of the defunct League of Nations, an association of states founded in the wake of World War I that had proven ineffective in preventing another catastrophic global conflict.
The Charter of the United Nations, which laid out the mission and structure of the body, notably contained an important reference to human rights as one of the guiding principles of this new collective endeavor. The second statement in the preamble reaffirms “faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.”2
Chapter 10, Article 68 of the Charter outlined provisions for the eventual creation of a Commission on Human Rights through the UN’s Economic and Social Council. The clause gives the Commission somewhat unique status among the UN’s many constituent branches, for it “is one of the very few bodies to draw its authority directly from the Charter of the United Nations.”3
For more information on International Humans Rights Law, please refer to the International Law and Organizations Issue in Depth.
** Please note that the picture above is the United Nations Headquarters in New York, Source: http://www.un.org/av/photo/