Edited by Akira Iriye, Petra Goedde, and William I. Hitchcock
- Part of the National History Center's Reinterpreting History series.
- Original case studies of human rights history from mid-20th century to the present.
- Includes work by a range of junior and senior scholars.
The third volume for the OUP/National History Center series, Reinterpreting History, this book offers a critical look at the political movement encompassed by human rights, a term rarely used before the 1940s. An agenda for human rights, with particular attention to international justice in the wake of crimes against humanity, women's rights, indigenous rights, the right to health care, all developed in the second half of the 20th century. Drawing on the work of legal scholars, political scientists, journalists, activists, and historians, human rights as a field of research has been characterized by analysis of natural rights, study of key documents like the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, discussion of activism and NGOs, and analysis of rhetoric. This volume will take a case study approach that will shed light on different perspectives, methodologies, and conceptualizations for the study of human rights history.
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 flowering of human rights activity in the 1970s and beyond, including anti-torture campaigns and Amnesty International, Indonesia and East Timor, international scientists and human rights, and female genital mutilation. The book concludes with a look at the UN Declaration at its 60th anniversary. Together the group of renowned senior and junior scholars create a volume that can introduce students from a range of disciplines to this topic, as well as offer new perspectives for scholars.
Readership: Historians, politics, and legal scholars interested in human rights; 20th century history; foreign relations.
Editiors: Edited by Akira Iriye, Professor of History Emeritus, Harvard University, Petra Goedde, Associate Professor of History, Temple University, and William I. Hitchcock, Professor of History, University of Virginia Charles Warren Research Professor of American History, Emeritus, Harvard University. Author of China and Japan in the Global Setting (1992), The Globalizing of America (1993), and Cultural Internationalism and World Order (1997), among other titles.
Contributors: Allida Black- National Democratic Institute for International Affairs and George Washington University.; Carl J. Bon Tempo- University at Albany, SUNY.; Elizabeth Borgwardt- Washington University in St Louis.; Mark Philip Bradley- University of Chicago.; Kenneth Cmiel- University of Iowa (deceased).; G. Daniel Cohen- Rice University.; Alexis Dudden- University of Connecticut.; Petra Goedde-Temple University.; Atina Grossmann-Cooper Union.; William I. Hitchcock- University of Virginia.; Akira Iriye- Harvard University.; Barbara Keys- University of Melbourne.; Samuel Moyn- Columbia University.; Paul Rubinson-Bridgewater State University.; Brad Simpson- Princeton University.; Kelly J. Shannon- University of Alaska, Anchorage.; Sarah B. Snyder- University College London.
Table of Contents:
Contributors
Introduction:
Human Rights as History, by Akira Iriye and Petra Goedde
Part I: The Human Rights Revolution
1. Kenneth J. Cmiel, The Recent History of Human Rights
2. G. Daniel Cohen, The Holocaust and the "Human Rights Revolution": A Reassessment
3. Elizabeth Borgwardt, "Constitutionalizing" Human Rights: The Rise of the Nuremberg Principles
4. William I. Hitchcock: Human Rights and the Laws of War: The Geneva Conventions of 1949
5. Atina Grossmann, Grams, Calories, and Food: Languages of Victimization, Entitlement, and Human Rights in Occupied Germany 1945-1949
6. Allida Black, Are Women 'Human'? The U.N. and the Struggle to Recognize Women's Rights as Human Rights
II. The Globalization of Human Rights History
7. Samuel Moyn, Imperialism, Self-Determination, and the Rise of Human Rights
8. Brad Simpson, 'The First Right':The Carter Administration, Indonesia and the Transnational Human Rights Politics of the 1970s
9. Barbara Keys, Anti-Torture Politics: Amnesty International, the Greek Junta, and the Origins of the Human Rights 'Boom' in the United States
10. Carl J. Bon Tempo, From the Center-Right: Freedom House and Human Rights in the 1970s and 1980s
11. Paul Rubinson, "For Our Soviet Colleagues": Scientific Internationalism, Human Rights and the Cold War
12. Sarah B. Snyder, "Principles Overwhelming Tanks": Human Rights and the End of the Cold War
13. Kelly J. Shannon, The Right to Bodily Integrity: Women's Rights as Human Rights and the International Movement to End Female Genital Mutilation, 1970s-1990s
14. Alexis Dudden, Is History a Human Right? Japan and Korea's Troubles with the Past
15. Mark Philip Bradley, Approaching the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Index
