Protecting Human Rights and Building Peace in Post-Violence Societies

Description

This book critically examines the relationship between protecting human rights and building peace in post-violence societies. It explores the conditions that must be present, and strategies that should be adopted, for the former to contribute to the latter. The author argues that human rights can aid peacebuilding efforts by helping victims of past violence to articulate their grievance, and by encouraging the state to respond to and provide them with a meaningful remedy. This usually happens either through a process of adjudication, whereby human rights can offer guidance to the judiciary as to the best way to address such grievances, or through the passing and implementation of human rights laws and policies that seek to promote peace. However, this positive relationship between human rights and peace is both qualified and context specific. Through an interdisciplinary and comparative analysis of four case studies, the book identifies the conditions that can support the effective use of human rights as peacebuilding tools. Developing these, the book recommends a series of strategies that peacebuilders should adopt and rely on. Acknowledgements Contents List of Abbreviations Table of Cases Table of Legislation 1. Introduction I. Introduction II. The Central Question III. An Anatomy of the Relationship between Human Rights and Peace IV. The Methodology V. Conclusion 2. Clarifying the End: A Workable Definition of Peace I. Introduction II. Rejecting the Current Accounts of Peace III. Forging a New Definition of Peace IV. Conclusion 3. The Means and the End Connected: A Frameworkfor the Relationship between Human Rights and Peace I. Introduction II. Defining the Means III. The Means and the End Unconnected IV. Resolving Conflicts and Building Peace V. Human Rights as Tools in the Conflict Resolution Process VI. Conclusion 4. Promoting Objective Peace through Human Rights Adjudication I. Introduction II. The Nature of the Conflict Being Adjudicated III. The Type of Court Adjudicating the Conflict IV. The Impact of Timing on the Successful Adjudication of the Conflict V. Conclusion 5. Promoting Objective Peace through Human Rights Implementation I. Introduction II. The Importance of Political Willingness to Implement Human Rights III. The Devil is in the Detail: The Importance of Careful Drafting IV. Looking beyond the Wording of the Statute: Human Rights Bodies and Their Powers V. Strategies for Better Human Rights Implementation VI. Conclusion 6. Protecting Human Rights and Promoting Subjective Peace I. Introduction II. Protecting Human Rights and Inducing Social and Psychological Change III. The Gap between the Legal and the Real: Making a Meaningful Change in People's Lives IV. Peace must be Built and be Seen to be Built V. Strategies for Promoting Subjective Feelings of Peace VI. Conclusion 7. Conclusion I. Introduction II. Informing the Liberal Peacebuilding Critique III. Getting from Peace in the Books to Peace on the Ground IV. The Need for Further Research Bibliography Index