Negotiating Sovereignty and Human Rights

Providing an overview of institutional developments and innovations in human rights politics, this volume discusses some of the most important current and emerging human rights issues. It takes stock of the initiatives, policy responses and innovations of past years to identify some of the challenges that will likely require bold and innovative solutions. The contributors focus on actors and/or issues that are outside the mainstream of international human rights politics; the chapters address issues that have only emerged as an important part of the international human rights agenda and generated much advocacy, diplomacy and negotiations since the end of the Cold War. These issues include: the International Criminal Court, the norm of Responsibility to Protect (R2P), the proliferation of small arms and light weapons and its human rights impact, truth commissions, and the rights of persons with disabilities. The contributions offer a direct challenge to entrenched notions of state sovereignty and represent a departure from established ways of policy making. Introduction, Noha Shawki, Michaelene Cox; Part I Actors, Institutions, and Institutional Innovations; Chapter 1 Redefining Sovereignty: Humanitarianism’s Challenge to Sovereign Immunity, Anne L. Clunan; Chapter 2 Sovereignty Transformed? The Role of National Human Rights Institutions, Sonia Cardenas; Chapter 3 A New Actor in Human Rights Politics? Transgovernmental Networks of National Human Rights Institutions, Noha Shawki; Chapter 4 Universalism Meets Sovereignty at the International Criminal Court, Benjamin N. Schiff; Chapter 5 The Responsibility to Protect: Embracing Sovereignty and Human Rights, Cristina G. Badescu; Chapter 6 Human Rights and Soft Law: Alternative Paths for New Challenges, Daniel B. Braaten; Chapter 7 Judging Truth: The Contributions of Truth Commissions in Post-Conflict Environments, Eric Brahm; Part II Current Issues in International Human Rights; Chapter 8 Documenting Human Rights Abuses Among the Diaspora: Lessons Learned from the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Patricia B. Minikon, Susan Shepler; Chapter 9 Viewing the Millennium Development Goals through Prisms of IR Theory: An Intersection of Human Rights and State Interests, Michaelene Cox; Chapter 10 Human Rights, Glocal Ecopolitics, and Contested Landscapes of Sovereignty, Peter J. Stoett; Chapter 11 The Transnational Effort for Disability Rights: The Marriage of Disability Rights to Human Rights, Kenneth R. Rutherford; Chapter 12 Small Arms, Sovereign States and Human Rights, Suzette R. Grillot;