'Human rights are based on the notion of the inherent dignity of every individual. They cannot be given or withdrawn by any ruler or legal system.' (Ravindran 1998) Out of this principle, a body of international, regional and local laws has grown in the past 50 years.

The human rights declarations, covenants, and conventions together constitute an arm of law called international human rights law which recognises the rights of individuals and collective or community rights rather than the rights of states.

Chronology of human rights

For many hundreds of years the idea of the sovereign state was paramount. A sovereign state had total power within its own territory. It could take any action to deal with its own citizens within its own territory. In the 19th century certain states with powerful armies used their armies to intervene in other states in order to protect their own citizens who were living in these other states.

Gradually limits were placed on the absolute sovereignty of states. One of the first indications of the need to protect human rights emerged in the treaty signed after the Napoleonic wars of 1815, which included a clause against the slave trade in an attempt to protect the principle of dignity.

After the First World War, the League of Nations was established. The main objectives of the league were to prevent war, oversee peace and organise for international cooperation amongst member states.

A history of human rights

Move your mouse pointer over each date in the picture below.

League of Nations

Immediately after the First World War the League of Nations adopted the Minority Treaties, which provided some protection of the basic rights of minorities such as the right to life, freedom of religion and conscience, equality before the law, non-discrimination and use of language. In this way, certain minimum standards for treating aliens became part of customary law governing the relationships between states.

Slavery convention and ILO

In 1926, the first human rights treaty, the Slavery Convention, was adopted by the League of Nations. The International Labour Office was also established during this period to protect the rights of workers.

Despite all these efforts it was still clear that 'international law covered relations between states and not the relation of the citizens to the state.' (Ravindran 1998)

After the Second World War (1945) the reaction to the atrocities committed by the Nazis and other states during the war became the driving force behind the formation of the United Nations, with the promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms as one of the principal purposes of the organisation. This period saw the real emergence of international human rights law.

President Roosevelt of the United States made a famous speech where he referred to four freedoms that should be protected throughout the world in the future. What do you think these four freedoms were?

Important freedoms

Write down the four freedoms that you think would have been seen as most important at that time.

The four freedoms referred to by President Roosevelt of the United States after the Second World War were:

• freedom of speech and expression;
• freedom to worship 'god' in your own way;
• freedom from want;
• freedom from fear (no wars between states).

United Nations

In 1945 the United Nations was established (which took over from the League of Nations). The United Nations took responsibility for setting the standards of international human rights law. In its founding charter it recognised the rights of individuals and reinforced the need for recognition and promotion of fundamental human rights, including the right to dignity and equality for men and women regardless of race, sex, language and religion.

ECOSOC and Human Rights Commission

The Economic Social Council (ECOSOC) was established under the founding charter of the United Nations. Its task was to set up commissions in economic and social fields for purposes of promoting human rights. ECOSOC set up the Human Rights Commission, which proposed drafting an international bill of rights. Out of this proposal came the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948.

European and American conventions

Subsequent to this came the regional interest in human rights and the creation of special regional mechanisms: the European Convention on Human Rights (adopted in 1950), the American Convention on Human Rights (entered into force in1978) and more recently, the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights (came into force in 1986).

African Charter

In 1979 the OAU began the process of establishing a regional commission on human rights. Two years later, in 1981, the OAU Assembly adopted the African Charter. The African Charter was a reflection of discussions held at conferences in the 1960s and 1970s.

These discussions reflected the frustration felt by many Africans about the OAU, which loudly condemned human rights violations by white-ruled governments in Africa but was virtually silent about similar abuses committed in other parts of the continent.

This frustration was expressed by Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni at an OAU summit meeting in the 1980s: 'While Ugandans perished ... the rest of the world kept largely silent... Ugandans felt a deep sense of betrayal that most of Africa kept silent.'

He said that the lack of reaction by African states to human rights violations by other African states 'tends to undermine our moral authority to condemn the excesses of others, especially South Africa's racist regime. Tyranny is colour-blind and should be no less reprehensible because it is perpetrated by one of our kind.'

(Source: Amnesty International (1991) A guide to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights)

The African Charter has developed certain rights that reflect the needs of Africa. It aims to combine the specific needs and values of African cultures with standards that have been universally accepted. So for example, it recognises the right to national self-determination and the right to development.

African Union

In July 2002 the African Union, which replaced the OAU, became fully operative. The AU talks about promoting and ensuring peace, security and stability in Africa and while it has identified the different institutions for this, it has not identified the specific powers and duties of these institutions. The AU will abide by the African Charter, the African Commission on People and Human Rights, the UN Charter and UDHR. However, how these will be integrated into the AU is unclear.

NEPAD

The New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad) is a broad policy framework for Africa's development programme drafted by several African heads of states, which was finalised during 2000 and launched in October 2001.

Unfortunately, Nepad does very little in the way of strengthening human rights. It also disregards international human rights laws and is silent on international mechanisms protecting women's rights.

Nepad's African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), intended to hold governments and elected leaders to account, provides for an external peer review to assess member countries' democracy and good governance status.

The mechanism allows African states to appraise each other's adherence to good political, economic and corporate governance according to compliance with political and economic standards prescribed by the African Union (AU). Peer review reports will be assessed and will determine member countries' access to trade with America and Europe, for example.

However, the peer review mechanism has been the subject of much debate and controversy, with critics pointing to the long-standing denial and abuse of human rights in many African countries, in the context of scant references to human rights in the Nepad document. This is supported by the fact that only 15 of the 53 African Union member states have so far signed up to the peer review programme.

In addition, while it has grandstanded at various global meetings, the design of Nepad does not include processes or mechanisms for consultation.

Subsequently, Nepad has been severely criticised by civil society organisations, who have complained that they were not part of its formulation and have been kept poorly informed about its progress.

Given that Nepad was drafted by heads of state, some of whom have poor human rights records in their own countries, and given that no African country has ever laid a complaint to the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights against another African country for human rights violations, the success of APRM is left to be seen.

There has also been much confusion over the relationship between the AU and Nepad. It now appears as if Nepad will be integrated into the African Union in an attempt to synchronize and harmonize all the structures of the continental body. But there are still areas that remain hazy: What, for example, will be the relationship between the APRM and the African Commission on People and Human Rights?

Whatever the weakness in these regional systems, NGOs should advocate, lobby and campaign to have them strengthened and made effective and efficient.