understanding in formal international organizations like the UN, the pattern of intervention we
see in the late 20
th
century would be hard to predict or explain.
Changed expectations for government performance. Also changed are internationally-
shared views about what governments owe their citizens. At a minimum, governments are
expected to refrain from abuse; more generally, governments are expected to guarantee and
provide a bundle of rights and services. This change in expectations, and concomitant rise in
standards for government performance are clearly bound up in the rising power of human rights
norms over the past several decades. The international human rights network has been hugely
successful at mobilizing publics and institutionalizing standards for acceptable treatment of
people in a wide range of states, especially powerful states, over the past 30 years.
underestimate the effects of this change. Because there are still so many human rights violations
going on all over the world, it is tempting to conclude that respect for human rights must still be
marginal in world politics. This mode of thinking misses crucial changes, however. While it is
certainly true that there continue to be violations, the way people react to violations has changed
markedly. The amount of mobilization and pressure brought to bear on governments over
human rights abuses is much great than it was in the 1960s.
The expansion and institutionalization of human rights claims constitute a major
qualitative change in the normative and ethical fabric of world politics. Specifically, human
rights compromise basic features of state sovereignty since human rights are claims that states
7
For a detailed examination of this process see, Thomas Risse, Steven Ropp, and Kathryn
Sikkink, The Power of Human Rights (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999); Margaret
Keck and Kathryn Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998)
chs. 1-3; Daniel Thomas, The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the
Demise of Communism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001.
8
Margaret Keck and Kathryn Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press) chs. 1-3; Thomas, The Helsinki Effect; Kathryn Sikkink Mixed Signals: U.S.
Human Rights Policy and Latin America (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2004).
Revised June 2006
9
Convention