NGOs and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

NGOs and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a study of the historic and unique role played by NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) in helping to bring about compliance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. When the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted fifty years ago, Eleanor Roosevelt, its principal architect, predicted that "a curious grapevine" would carry its message behind barbed wire and stone walls.

This volume tells the extraordinary story of how NGOs became that "grapevine" - sensitizing mankind's conscience about violations of human rights, "shaming" the most notorious abusers, creating the international machinery and mechanisms to bring about implementation of the Declaration, laying the groundwork for the destruction of the Soviet empire and South Africa's apartheid system, and establishing the principle of accountability for crimes against humanity.