Human Rights International NGOs: A Critical Evaluation

NGOs AND HUMAN RIGHTS: PROMISE AND PERFORMANCE, Claude E. Welch, Jr., ed., 2001

Buffalo Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2010-004

16 Pages Posted: 26 Dec 2009 Last revised: 27 Dec 2013

Date Written: 2001

Abstract

The Human rights movement can be seen in a variety of guises. It can be seen as a movement for international justice or as a cultural project for “civilizing savage” cultures. In this chapter, I discuss a part of that movement as a crusade for a political project. International nongovernmental human rights organizations (INGOs), the small and elite collection of human rights groups based in the most powerful cultural and political capitals of the West, have arguably been the most influential component of the human rights movement. They have led the human rights movement, as they have sought to enforce the application of human rights norms internationally, particularly toward repressive states in the South in areas formerly colonized by the West. This chapter calls INGOs conventional doctrinalists because they are marked by a heavy and almost exclusive reliance on positive law in treaties and other sources of international law. Only after conceding that INGOs indeed have a specific political agenda can discussions be had about the wisdom, problems, and implications for the advocacy of such values. And only then can conversations about the post liberal society start in earnest.

Keywords: Human rights, NGOs, West, Movement, Conventional, Liberal, International Law

Suggested Citation

Mutua, Makau, Human Rights International NGOs: A Critical Evaluation (2001). NGOs AND HUMAN RIGHTS: PROMISE AND PERFORMANCE, Claude E. Welch, Jr., ed., 2001 , Buffalo Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2010-004, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1527213

Makau Mutua (Contact Author)

SUNY Buffalo Law School ( email )

626 O'Brian Hall
Buffalo, NY 14260-1100
United States
716 645-2311 (Phone)

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