The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Armed Conflicts: From Fragmentation to Complexity

Anuário Brasileiro de Direito Internacional, Vol. 2, pp. 48-67, 2009

20 Pages Posted: 11 Dec 2009

See all articles by Xavier Aurey

Xavier Aurey

University of Essex - School of Law; Université Paris II - Panthéon-Assas; Université de Caen

Date Written: June 18, 2009

Abstract

Born out of the horror of war, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights seems to leave outside any traces of its bellicose ancestry. As a figure of the intimate relationship between the State and its citizens, Human Rights Law reports to the sole domestic sphere of States. Between a Law of War as the perfect expression of States’ sovereignty and an international community still in its infancy, the UDHR seemed to be able to “guide” men and nations only in those periods when the law of armed conflict would not apply. However, the Tadic case shows us that the Declaration has, in practice, played a much more comprehensive role, including the development of the law of armed conflict. The pre-war mainly bilateral scheme was gradually supplanted by a multilateralism which tends to fragmentation, even complexity. Therefore, during the XXth century, the gradual replacement of the “State-sovereignty-oriented approach” by a “human-being-oriented approach” has highlighted the existence of a revolution, a paradigm shift. This new vision of the relationship between human rights and the law of armed conflict enable us to show the existence of a common goal between these two normative corpuses. Therefore we would demonstrate that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was the anchor of this revolution.

Keywords: Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Humanitarian Law, Human Rights, Fragmentation, Complexity

Suggested Citation

Aurey, Xavier, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Armed Conflicts: From Fragmentation to Complexity (June 18, 2009). Anuário Brasileiro de Direito Internacional, Vol. 2, pp. 48-67, 2009 , Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1521111

Xavier Aurey (Contact Author)

University of Essex - School of Law ( email )

Colchester, Essex CO43SQ
United Kingdom

Université Paris II - Panthéon-Assas ( email )

12 place du Pantheon
Paris cedex 06, 75231
France

Université de Caen ( email )

F-14032 Caen Cedex
France

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