17 November 2008
About This Issue
Sixty years ago, in the aftermath of the most horrific armed conflict ever witnessed, the nations of the world produced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Even as men and women continued to clear the battlefields, count the dead, and rebuild their cities, their representatives meeting at the United Nations in New York crafted a work of optimism and hope, a work that some have called the 20th century’s greatest achievement.
The mandate for the Universal Declaration is found in the U.N. Charter: “We the peoples of the United Nations determined … to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights,” it began, “in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, ...”
This issue of eJournal USA celebrates the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration by explaining how this powerful statement of humanity’s common inheritance came to be, how it draws upon an intellectual heritage that transcends political boundaries, and how — with room always for improvement — it has bettered the lives of individuals in every corner of the globe.
Six feature essays explore these themes. In a work of broad scope, Claude Welch surveys why the Universal Declaration matters, what it says, and the results it has produced. Paul Gordon Lauren explains the significant political obstacles that had to be surmounted in order to make the Declaration a reality. Susan Waltz explores how the Declaration’s language was crafted. Her cutting-edge scholarship reveals that the final document was no great-power imposition, but rather one that reflects the input of many nations.
The two essays that follow place the Universal Declaration within rich intellectual and historical traditions. Lynn Hunt traces the emergence of human rights as we know it to developments in the arts that spurred a new understanding of the individual. Jack Donnelly addresses charges that human rights is an imposition of Western, or wealthy, or imperialist nations. He illustrates how despite differences over details, a broad cross-cultural consensus accepts the universality of core human rights concepts.
This issue also features short profiles of the Universal Declaration’s principal draftsmen. Their diversity reflects the Declaration’s most significant achievement: Its principles truly are universal, a joint inheritance of every man and every woman.
— The Editors
