Human Rights Syllabi: Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley
Autumn 2000
Course Number 205/305
Tues/Thurs: 10.30-11.50, Room: HGS 184
This course offers an overview of the current international human rights regime, its evolution since World War II, and the major institutions and processes by which human rights are established and enforced. Following the Holocaust and the establishment of the United Nations in 1945, human rights became firmly established in international politics, thus challenging the norm of state sovereignty. As a result of an increasingly well-defined human rights regime and improved monitoring capabilities, violations of universally accepted human rights norms are being transformed into concrete issues of international and transnational politics. The course will focus on processes of norm creation, evolution, and effectiveness by evaluating the role of inter-state coercion (realism), institutional design and domestic interests (liberalism), and principled, non-governmental mobilization of public opinion/the media (idealism). The course will also address the persistent occurrence of repression and gross human rights violations in many countries of the world and discuss possible explanations, drawing mainly from studies in political science, sociology, history, and psychology.
The minimum requirements for successful completion of this class are:
Students will be assigned to one of eight groups. Each week, one group will be responsible for leading the Thursday discussion; this group should meet with the instructor the Monday before with an outline for their discussion. Each week the members of one other group will be responsible for preparing a 2-3 page paper in response to the readings. This paper should be distributed to the instructor and the group presenting by the Tuesday before the discussion. Presentation and short paper count to 25 per cent of the grade, overall attendance and participation another 25 per cent. The final paper accounts for 50 per cent of the final grade.
*Buergenthal, 1-20.
*Schmitz, Hans Peter/Sikkink, Kathryn forthcoming: Human Rights and International Relations Theory, in: Carlsnaes, Walter/Risse, Thomas/Simmons, Beth (eds.), Handbook of International Relations, London: Sage.
*Donnelly, 3-35.
*Steiner, Henry J./Alston, Philip 1996: International Human Rights in Context: Law, Politics, Morals, Oxford, 3-21.
*Williams, 17-20 (Sane).
Gordon, Paul Lauren: The Evolution of Human Rights: Visions Seen, Philadelphia.
Gutman, Roy/David Rieff (eds.) 1999: Crimes of War. What the Public should Know, New York: W. W. Norton.
Scharf, Michael P. 1997: Balkan Justice. The Story Behind the First War Crimes Trial since Nuremberg, Durham: Duke University Press, 3-17.
*Fein, Helen 1995: More Murder in the Middle: Life Integrity Violations and Democracy in the World, 1987, in: Human Rights Quarterly 17 (1), 170-191.
*Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah 1996: The People's Holocaust, in: The New York Times, March 17, 1996.
*Poe, Steven, C. Neal Tate, and Linda Camp Keith 1999: Repression of the Human Right to Personal Integrity Revisited: A Global Crossnational Study Covering the Years 1976-1993, in: International Studies Quarterly 43, 291-315.
*Sen, Amartya. 1994. An Argument for the Primacy of Political Rights: Freedoms and Needs, The New Republic, January 10 and 17, 31-38.
*Smith, Jackie/Melissa Bolyard/Anna Ippolito 1999: Human Rights and the Global Economy, in: Human Rights Quarterly 21 (1), 207-19.
*Smith, Roger W. 1999: State Power and Genocidal Intent: On the Uses of Genocide in the Twentieth Century, in: Levon Chorbajian/George Shirinian (eds.): Studies in Comparative Genocide, Houndmills: MacMillan, 3-14.
Campbell, Bruce B./Arthur D. Brenner (eds.) 2000: Death Squads in Global Perspective. Murder with Deniability, New York: St. Martin's Press.
Conroy, John 2000: Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary People: The Dynamics of Torture, New York: Knopf.
Davenport, Christian (ed.) 2000: Paths to State Repression. Human Rights Violations and Contentious Politics, Lanham: Rowman&Littlefield.
Ron, James 1997: Varying Methods of State Violence, in International Organization 51 (2), 275-300.
*Donnelly, 18-35.
*Krasner, Stephen D. 1993: Sovereignty, Regimes, and Human Rights, in: Rittberger, Volker (ed.), Regime Theory and International Relations, Oxford, 139-167.
*Moravcsik, Andrew 2000. The Origins of Human Rights Regimes: Democratic Delegation in Postwar Europe, International Organization 54 (2), 217-252.
Donnelly, Jack 1986: International Human Rights. A Regime Analysis, International Organization 40 (3), 599-642.
Morgenthau, Hans J. 1960: Politics Among Nations. The Struggle for Power and Peace, 328-347.
Steiner/Alston 1996, 148-165.
*Risse/Ropp/Sikkink, 1-38.
*Sikkink, Kathryn 1998: Transnational Politics, International Relations Theory, and Human Rights, Political Science and Politics, 31 (3), 516-523.
*Finnemore, Martha/Sikkink, Kathryn 1998: International Norm Dynamics and Political Change, in: International Organization 52 (4), 887-917.
Burgers, Jan H. 1992: The Road to San Francisco: The Revival of the Human Rights Idea in the 20th Century, Human Rights Quarterly 14 (4), 447-477.
Morsink, Johannes 1999: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Origins, Drafting, and Intent, Philadelphia.
*Buergenthal, 21-78.
*Donnelly, 51-68 and 82-85.
*Williams, 164-172 (Carter, Fein).
Steiner/Alston 1996, 500-562.
Alston, Philip/James Crawford (eds.) 2000: The Future of UN Human Rights Treaty Monitoring, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Alston, Philip (ed.) 1992: The United Nations and Human Rights: A Critical Appraisal, Oxford, 1-21.
Weiss, Thomas/Forsythe, David P./Coate, Roger 1997: The United Nations and Changing World Politics, Boulder.
*Buergenthal, 78-101.
*Forsythe, David P. 1991: The Internationalization of Human Rights, Lexington, 55-86.
*Rodley, Nigel S. 1997: The Evolution of United Nations Chartered Based Machinery for the Protection of Human Rights, in: European Human Rights Law Review 3 (1), 4-10.
Steiner/Alston 1996, 347-448.
Van Boven, Theodor 1991: The Role of the United Nations Secretariat in the Area of Human Rights, New York Univ. Journ. of Int. Law and Politics 24 (1), 69-107.
Weissbrodt, David/Farley, Rose 1994: The UNESCO Human Rights Procedure: An Evaluation, Human Rights Quarterly, 16 (2), 391-414.
*Buergenthal, 102-227.
*Cassel, Douglass 1999: Peru Withdraws from the Court: Will the Inter-American Human Rights System meet the Challenge?, in: Human Rights Law Journal 20 (4-6), 167-70.
Forsythe, David P. 1991: The Internationalization of Human Rights, Lexington, 87-118.
Frost, Lynda E. 1992: The Evolution of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights - Reflections of Present and Former Judges, Human Rights Quarterly, 14 (2), 171-205.
Harris, David J./Stephen Livingstone (eds.) 1998: The Inter-American System of Human Rights, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Harris, David J./Michael O'Boyle/C. Warbrick 1999: Law of the European Convention on Human Rights 2nd ed, London: Butterworths.
Medina Quiroga, Cecilia 1988: The Battle for Human Rights. Gross, Systematic Violations and the Inter-American System, Dordrecht.
Steiner/Alston 1996, 563-598 and 640-689.
*Buergenthal, 228-247.
*Mugwanya, George William 1999: Realizing Universal Human Rights Norms Through Regional Human Rights Mechanisms: Reinvigorating the African System, in: Indiana International and Comparative Law Review 10 (1), 38-50.
*Williams, 21-43 (Kausikan, Weil, Li).
Steiner/Alston 1996, 689-706.
Carver, Richard 1990: Called to Account: How African Governments Investigate Human Rights Violations, African Affairs 89, 391-416.
Murray, Rachel 1999: Serious or Massive Violations under the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights: A comparison with the Inter-American and European Mechanisms, in: Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights 17 (2), 109-133.
*Buergenthal, 298-317.
*Donnelly, 86-135.
*Forsythe, David P. 2000: Chapters 1 and 2, 1-48, in: Human Rights and Comparative Foreign Policy, Tokyo: United Nations University Press.
Morgenthau, Hans J. 1979: Essay on Human Rights and Foreign Policy, New York.
*Apodaca, Clair/Michael Stohl 1999: United States Human Rights Policy and Foreign Assistance, in: International Studies Quarterly 43, 185-98.
*Neier, Aryeh 1997: The New Double Standard and Garten, Jeffrey, The Need for Pragmatism, in: Foreign Policy 105: 91-106.
*Williams, 149-161 (Dorn, Wu)
Steiner/Alston 1996, 811-869.
*Buergenthal, 318-321 and 327-329.
*Korey, William 1998: NGOs and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. A Curious Grapevine, London, 77-94 and 139-158.
Cohen, C. P. 1990: The Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in the Drafting of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, in: Human Rights Quarterly 12 (1): 137-147.
Steiner/Alston 1996, 456-499.
*Buergenthal, 321-326.
*Cook, Helena 1996: Amnesty International and the United Nations, in: Willetts, Peter (ed.) The Conscience of the World. The Influence of Non-Governmental Organizations in the UN System, London, 181-213.
*Korey, 249-272.
Clapham, Andrew 1994: Creating the High Commissioner for Human Rights. The Outside Story, in: European Journal of International Law 5 (4): 556-568.
Gaer, Felice D. 1996: Reality-Check. Human Rights NGOs confront Governments in the United Nations, in: Gordenker, Leon/Weiss, Thomas G. (eds.), NGOs, the United Nations, and Global Governance, Boulder, 51-66.
Van Boven, Theodor 1989: The Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in International Human Rights Standard Setting, California Western International Law Journal 20 (2), 207-225.
*Keck, Margaret/Sikkink, Kathryn 1998: Activists beyond Borders. Advocacy Networks in International Politics, Ithaca, 1-38 and 199-217.
*Risse/Ropp/Sikkink, 234-278, and one other chapter of your choice.
Koh, Harold Hongju 1999: How is International Human Rights Law Enforced?, in: Indiana Law Journal 74 (4), 1397-1417.
Korey, 159-180.
*Williams, 59-87 (Shattuck, Decter, Weiner, Alam).
*Williams, 127-148 (McCarthy, Benjamin, Pollitt, Lutton).
*Williams, 187-200 (Gyatso, China Internet Information Center).
*Cohen, Stanley 1996: Witnessing the Truth, Index on Censorship 1, 36-45.
*Korey, 338-367.
*Williams, 118-126 (Cockburn).
De Waal, Alex 1997: Becoming Shameless. The Failure of Human Rights Organizations in Rwanda, The Times Literary Supplement, 21 February 1997.
Moorehead, Caroline/Owen, Ursula 1996: Time to think again, Index on Censorship 1, 52-55.
*Williams, 173-186 (Ignatieff, Katz).
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