human rights

Much of the current framework for the multilateral protection of human rights can be traced back to the 1990s and early 2000s. At that time, the most serious challenge for human rights advocates seemed to be finding a way for international actors to intervene when ethnic violence within a state led to mass atrocities. Against a background of the dominance of the Western liberal democratic powers in international politics, the pressing questions were about political will and the legitimacy and mechanisms of international action.

Forthcoming South Africa’s national elections, which will be held on the 8th of May 2019, will be one of the most contested elections in the country’s history. Forty-seven political parties will challenge the ruling African National Congress (ANC) – who held 62% of the vote in the last general elections – for control of the National Parliament.  As the various electoral candidates canvass the villages, townships and suburbs ahead of these important elections, the media has revisited the contested subject of xenophobic violence.

Abstract

Abstract

Introductory Note

This Report is based on the International Workshop with academia, think tanks and media representatives entitled ‘Promoting Religious Freedom and Peaceful Coexistence’ held on 11 February 2013 at the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Rome. The authors have not provided a simple summary of the proceedings but have constructed the report as a critical engagement and reflection of the workshop’s discussion in the context of the growing international attention given to the so-called international religious freedom agenda. As such the report reflects the authors’ personal and selective interpretations of the proceedings. It is offered for the consideration of policy-makers and various stake-holders as a contribution to the conceptual and policy debate on what is such a crucial issue for the future of a peaceful and multicultural international society. (...)

Beijing would vote for Angela Merkel in Germany’s upcoming general elections. 

The forms of international intervention have deeply changed since the end of the Cold War. They have assumed a democratic character: recent cases of intervention are mainly carried out by democracies and are justified by democratic principles as the protection of human rights or the promotion of human dignity. Moreover, they are aimed at the democratization of the target-country. This unprecedented democratic attitude has given birth to a new kind of relationship between international intervention and democratization - which in the past was understood only as a domestic political process.

Recent scholarship has shown that the likelihood that American sponsored military interventions will bring about democracy over the long term is very low, even when democracy is a stated goal of the intervention. This research paper will extend this body of research to investigate when, and under what conditions, US interventions that are focused on

bringing about democratization are likely to result in better human rights conditions.