THE HUMAN RIGHTS INDUSTRY

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The promotion and protection of human rights is a pillar of the United Nations, enshrined in the Charter, the international bill of rights,  General Assembly resolutions and declarations, and buttressed by monitoring mechanisms, expert committees and regional human rights courts. Drawing on more than four decades of working in the field of human rights as UN staff member, rapporteur, consultant, member of UN expert panels, professor and NGO president, Alfred de Zayas examines how the tools of implementation of human rights serve to entrench political narratives promoted by the “industry”.

“Alfred de Zayas offers us an invaluable insider’s account of how the global system created after World War II to protect human rights is brazenly manipulated by the United States Government and others for geopolitical ends.  De Zayas is a human rights leader of remarkable insight, experience, wisdom, and integrity, whose account is both searing and hugely constructive.  He makes vividly clear why we must, and how we can, truly champion peace and human rights.”   JEFFREY D. SACHS, University Professor at Columbia University

“Alfred de Zayas is an experienced human rights scholar, knowledgeable and straightforward.  Worth reading in depth.”
PROFESSOR MARC BOSSUYT, former President of the Belgian Constitutional Court and member of the UN Sub-Commission on Promotion and Protection of Human Rights

“Alfred de Zayas provides a candid view of the ‘human rights industry’ from the perspective of someone who has been inside the system for almost five decades. Like the whistleblowers he cites in the book’s dedication, Alfred is willing to provide a glimpse into the good and bad of the UN’s growing human rights industry.”
CURTIS DOEBBLER, Research Professor of Law at the University of Makeni (Sierra Leone), representative of the NGO International-Lawyers.org to UN Headquarters

“This book is a long-overdue critique of the human rights system by someone who truly values human rights and who has a unique and valuable perspective as a human rights practitioner for 50 years… I highly recommend this book for experts, practitioners, and lay readers alike.”
DANIEL KOVALIK, professor of International Human Rights at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, and author, No More War: How the West Violates International Law by Using “Humanitarian” Intervention to Advance Economic and Strategic Interests

” Professor de Zayas raises important issues about the politicization of the UN Human Rights Office and the Human Rights Council. He formulates pragmatic proposals for the reform of UN human rights institutions in the spirit of the UN Charter. The book is supported by hundreds of credible sources and calls for serious debate.” PROFESSOR TIAN LI, Director of the Center for Human Rights and Peaceful Development & Associate Professor of School of Law, Shandong University, China

       

 

Description

The promotion and protection of human rights is a pillar of the United Nations, enshrined in the Charter, the international bill of rights,  General Assembly resolutions and declarations, and buttressed by monitoring mechanisms, expert committees and regional human rights courts. After WWII the world demanded respect for collective and individual rights and freedoms, including the right to live in peace, i.e. freedom from fear and want, the right to food, water, health, shelter, belief and expression. Human dignity was understood as an inalienable entitlement of every member of the human family, rights that were juridical. justiciable and enforceable.

It did not take long for these noble goals to be politicized. Many States systematically weaponize human rights for geopolitics. A “human rights industry” operates at all levels and instrumentalizes values with the complicity of diplomats, politicians, non-governmental organizations, academics, journalists, «independent experts», rapporteurs, secretariat members and media conglomerates.

This book addresses the decisive role played by major governmental and private agencies such as the National Endowment for Democracy, USAID, elite think tanks, Council on Foreign Relations, Trilateral Commission, World Economic Forum and others in shaping a “perception” of human rights that primarily serves geopolitical interests. Major non-governmental organizations that once were truly independent, including Amnesty and HRW, today belong to the leading narrative managers.

The voting record in the General Assembly and Human Rights Council by China, Russia, the United States, Canada, UK, EU, OIC, Group of 77, Non-aligned movement, etc. documents who supports and who subverts human rights. Why do the Council and NGOs practice double-standards and allow States to brazenly lie, blackmail and bully weaker States? Under the pretext of providing humanitarian assistance, lethal military interventions are conducted, e.g. in Libya, emblematic example of how the noble idea of the “responsibility to protect” was corrupted. Propagandistic use of the words “human rights”, “democracy”, “rule of law”, « freedom » demean them and subvert rational discourse.

Drawing on more than four decades of working in the field of human rights as UN staff member, rapporteur, consultant, member of UN expert panels, professor and NGO president, Alfred de Zayas examines how the tools of implementation of human rights serve to entrench political narratives promoted by the “industry”.

Book Details

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EBOOK – Epub and Kindle, paper, PDF

ISBN:

78-1-949762-52-5

EBOOK ISBN:

978-1-949762-53-2

Publication Date

2023

Author

Alfred de Zayas

Reviews

3 reviews for THE HUMAN RIGHTS INDUSTRY

  1. GUY METTAN

    In a book just published in the United States (The Human Rights Industry, Clarity Press), the Geneva expert Alfred de Zayas dissects, analyzes and highlights the behaviors and, too often, the biases and biases that these organizations show despite their impartiality and proclaimed independence. From the International Criminal Court (budget: €150 million) entirely financed by Western countries and NATO members, to information agencies funded by intelligence services and defence ministers (such as the Bellingcat website very popular with the major European media) and the myriad of NGOs and more or less official bodies that gravitate around the United Nations, It paints a contrasting picture of their activities, to say the least. GUY METTAN, AGEFI (French, machine translation.)

  2. DR HANS KOCHLER, IPO

    The Human Rights Industry is the most comprehensive and honest assessment and critique to date of the performance of institutions the international community has set up to monitor respect of those principles that underlie justice and the rule of law at the global level. Whether domestically or in relations between sovereign states, politics must conform to human dignity, and the authority of the state must only be used to enforce the law, but not to subvert it just for the sake of mere power. This is the rationale of all international instruments and institutions established under the Charter of the United Nations and particularly in response to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the organization’s General Assembly in 1948. …” DR HANS KOCHLER, International Progress Organization, Vienna

  3. Midwest Book Review

    “A timely, informative, insightful, and thought-provoking study, “The Human Rights Industry” by Aldred de Zayas is a seminal work that is unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, community, college, and university library Contemporary Political Science collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted for students, academia, political activists, and governmental policy makers that “The Human Rights Industry” is also available in a digital book format (Kindle, $22.00, http://www.amazon.com).” CHRIS TRAVIS, Midwest Book Review

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