UN Core Human Rights Treaties: With dates and treaty monitoring bodies
Status of Ratification Interactive Dashboard: Status of ratification of the 18 international human rights treaties by country, with declarations.
UN Universal Human Rights Instruments: Longer list of treaties and documents, arranged by topic
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Treaties
Council of Europe Treaties: Includes the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
OAU/AU Treaties, Conventions, Protocols & Charters: African Union treaties with dates and status lists
GlobaLex Research Guide on Transboundary Freshwater Treaties and Other Resources: Freshwater treaties and resources, with links to agreements, IGOs, NGOs, international water commissions, and secondary sources.
Multilateral Treaties Deposited with the Secretary-General. Find UN treaties by subject area, including Environment (Chapter XXVII), with status, citation in UNTS, and participants.
FAOLEX: National legislation, regulations, and international agreements on food, agriculture, and natural resources management. One of the topic areas is Water.
International Freshwater Treaties Database: Searchable database of summaries or full-text of more than 600 international freshwater agreements from 1820 to 2007, but with an ongoing update to 2019. Find by basin, countries, date signed, and treaty topic.
International Water Law Project: Treaties and international agreements, including regional. Also has UN Declarations and Resolutions, International Law Association documents, cases from the Permanent Court of International Justice, ICJ, and PCA, links to IGOs and Transboundary Water Management Organizations, and a bibliography.
WaterLex: Archive website 2010-2020. Water law and policy frameworks, legislation, and treaties on the right to water and sanitation.
World Bank Development Information on Water: Includes projects, news, data
World Bank Fact Sheet: Information on the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 with links
Defining Effective Transboundary Water Cooperation by
This book establishes a framework for defining transboundary water cooperation and a methodology for evaluating its effectiveness, which will contribute to more effective and therefore successful cooperation processes. With the increasing focus on transboundary cooperation as a part of the Sustainable Development Goal Framework, there is global recognition of transboundary water cooperation as a tool for improved governance and management of transboundary surface and groundwaters. However, there is not an agreed upon definition of transboundary water cooperation in the literature or in practice. This book develops the Four Frames of Transboundary Water Cooperation, which is a neutral modular framework for developing context-specific explanatory definitions of transboundary water cooperation in basins and aquifers. The Four Frames of Cooperation are legal, institutional, relational, and outcome. However, we need to move beyond defining cooperation to understand better measures of the quality and effectiveness of cooperative processes. The Weighted Model of Effective Cooperation presents a first step in qualitatively evaluating the effectiveness of transboundary water cooperation. This model defines effective transboundary water cooperation and operationalizes a method to evaluate the effectiveness of cooperative processes over internationally shared waters. Effective cooperation emphasizes the relational and outcome frames of cooperation while working towards equitability and sustainability. Together, the Four Frames of Cooperation and the Weighted Model of Effective Cooperation will improve the understanding of cooperation and encourage a detailed evaluation of the quality, success, and effectiveness of cooperative processes.
Cooperation in the Law of Transboundary Water Resources by
Climate change, population growth and the increasing demand for water are all capable of leading to disputes over transboundary water systems. Dealing with these challenges will require the enhancing of adaptive capacity, the improving of the quality of water-resources management and a reduction in the risk of conflict between riparian states. Such changes can only be brought about through significant international cooperation. Christina Leb's analysis of the duty to cooperate and the related rights and obligations highlights the interlinkages between this duty and the principles of equitable and reasonable utilisation and the prevention of transboundary harm. In doing so, she considers the law applicable to both international watercourses and transboundary aquifers, and explores the complementarities and interaction between the rules of international water law and the related obligations of climate change and human rights law.
Contested Waters: India's Transboundary River Water Disputes in South Asia by
This book examines India's transboundary river water disputes with its South Asian riparian neighbours -- Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. It explores the history of disputes and cooperation over the transboundary river water in this region as well as discusses current disputes and future concerns. It analyses how and why existing transboundary river water sharing treaties between India and its South Asian riparian neighbours are confronted with challenges. The book indicates that India's transboundary river water disputes with its South Asian riparian neighbours are likely to escalate in coming years due to the widening of the demand¬-supply gap in the respective countries. It further shows the impact of bilateral relations on the resolution of transboundary river water disputes.
Oxford Reports on International Law includes full-text international decisionson human rights and international criminal law, from international courts, domestic courts, and the UN human rights tribunals. Browse options include subject (with a long list of subtopics), jurisdiction, and state party. The Oxford Law Citator provides citations to documents and related citing cases and documents.
Oxford International Organizations: Key primary documents of international organizations with commentary. Includes judgments and rules of international courts. Articles include links to journal articles and materials cited and the Oxford Law Citator.
International Justice Resource Center: News, court calendars, reports, and documents of cases currently before the UN tribunals.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has decisions, judgments, advisory opinions, and pending cases available in pdf and as Word documents. Most are available only in Spanish, some in English, Portuguese, or French. The site also has Rules of Procedure and international human rights instruments.
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights: Cases before the Court, and Petition and Case System Procedure
The International Criminal Court has judgments and pending case information from the ICC. The Resource Library section has the text of the Rome Statute and the court's Rules of Procedure and Evidence, Elements of Crimes, and Chambers' Practice Manual.
The ICC's Legal Tools Database has ICC documents, legal instruments, national legislation, national cases, human rights decisions, and other international legal decisions.
HUDOC is the searchable database of caselaw of the European Court of Human Rights. Search by treaty article, state, or keyword.
Global Health and Human Rights Database: Judgments by health and human rights topic, country, or international body, plus international instruments.
State Department Country Reports on Human Rights: Retrieve individual country reports or build reports on issues across countries.
UNHCR Refworld (UN Refugee Agency): Reports and policy documents from the UN, governmental organizations, NGOs, and academic institutions on human rights and humanitarian law topics. Refworld includes national caselaw and legislation related to refugees and asylum, and country profiles and reports. Search, or browse by country, author organization, or topic.
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights: Annual reports, plus reports and publications by country or theme. Thematic reports including on rights of indigenous peoples, rights of migrants, human rights defenders, and memory truth and justice.
European Country of Origin Information Network: Human rights reports from multiple countries and organizations, country profiles, and other documents for supporting asylum claims. Search by terms, filter by country, source, document type, or date.
ICTJ International Center for Transitional Justice: Documents and publications related to work pursuing accountability for past human rights abuses.
Human Rights First: News, FactSheets, and Reports on topics including Human Rights Defenders, Immigration Detention, and Refugee Protection.
Human Rights Watch: Browse the topics list to find news and reports.
Amnesty International: Human rights news and research reports by topic and region or country.
World Justice Project: Rule of Law Index and Country Profiles on the country’s adherence to the rule of law, including rankings on Fundamental Rights.
ILGA (International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Intersex Association): Entries by country with summaries and citations of laws related to sexual orientation. The site also has the Annual State-Sponsored Homophobia Report with world laws on criminalization and discrimination.
SOWIP (State of the World's Indigenous Peoples): A publication of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. Focus on issues including poverty and well-being, environment, health, human rights, and rights to lands and territories.
OHCHR (Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights): Who is a Defender
OHCHR Communication Report and Search: Search for reports by mandate (human rights defenders), session, region or state, date
Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders: Press releases, latest developments, publications, resolutions, annual reports and country visits
The Advocates for Human Rights: Resources for Human Rights Defenders including monitoring tools and a report of tools including an appendix listing grant sources, manuals and guides, and IGOs
Business & Human Rights Resource Centre: Issue guide to COVID-19: Human Rights Defenders & Civic Freedoms. Links to trackers monitoring the impact of COVID-19 on civic freedoms and on journalism, a Front Line Defenders Guide, and a campaign page listing detained and released human rights defenders.
International Service for Human Rights: News and topic articles on human rights defenders
United Nations:
Key Documents and Conventions:
Research Guides:
Books and Treatises:
Pursuing Justice by
Pursuing Justice, Third Edition, examines the issue of justice by considering the origins of the idea, formal systems of justice, current global issues of justice, and ways in which justice might be achieved by individuals, organizations, and the global community. Part I demonstrates how the idea of justice has emerged over time, starting with religion and philosophy, and then to the concept of social justice. Part II outlines the very different mechanisms used by various nations for achieving state justice, including systems based on common law, civil law, and Islamic law, with a separate discussion of the US justice system. Part III focuses on six contemporary issues of justice: war, immigration, domestic terrorism, genocide, slavery, and the environment. Finally, Part IV shows how individuals and organizations can go about pursuing justice, and describes the rise of global justice. This updated timely book helps students understand the complexities and nuances of a society's pursuit of justice. It provides students with the foundations of global justice systems, integrating Greek philosophies and major religious perspectives into a justice perspective, and contributes to undergraduate understanding of international justice bodies, NGOs, and institutions. New to the third edition is a complete chapter on immigration, with a focus on historical and global patterns as they relate to justice, as well as new material on the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements, the genocide of the Rohingya of Myanmar, and the sovereign citizens movement in relation to domestic terrorism.
Human Rights in Our Own Backyard by
Most Americans assume that the United States provides a gold standard for human rights--a 2007 survey found that 80 percent of U.S. adults believed that "the U.S. does a better job than most countries when it comes to protecting human rights." As well, discussions among scholars and public officials in the United States frame human rights issues as concerning people, policies, or practices "over there." By contrast, the contributors to this volume argue that many of the greatest immediate and structural threats to human rights, and some of the most significant efforts to realize human rights in practice, can be found in our own backyard. Human Rights in Our Own Backyard examines the state of human rights and responses to human rights issues, drawing on sociological literature and perspectives to interrogate assumptions of American exceptionalism. How do people in the U.S. address human rights issues? What strategies have they adopted, and how successful have these strategies been? Essays are organized around key conventions of human rights, focusing on the relationships between human rights and justice, the state and the individual, civil rights and human rights, and group rights versus individual rights. The contributors are united by a common conception of the human rights enterprise as a process involving not only state-defined and implemented rights but also human rights from below as promoted by activists.
Race, Ethnicity, Crime, and Justice by
Race, Ethnicity, Crime, and Justice: An International Dilemma, Second Edition, takes a unique comparative approach to the exploration of race- and ethnicity-related justice issues in five countries around the world. Using the colonial model as a theoretical lens, Owusu-Bempah and Gabbidon analyse data from Great Britain, the United States, Canada, Australia, and South Africa. These international case studies help students contextualize race and justice issues within and across nations. Concise historical framing illuminates today's racial dynamics in these diverse justice systems, and accessible theory grounds the comparison of crime and justice data from the early 21st century with current statistics. A new concluding chapter revisits the question of where these nations fit in the global context of state and non-state actors and of ethnic and racial justice issues. This new edition is suitable for use as a core or supplemental text for advanced undergraduates and early graduate courses on race and crime, minorities and criminal justice, diversity in criminal justice, and comparative justice systems. It is also appropriate for use in sociology and ethnic studies courses that focus on race and crime.
Empire, Race and Global Justice by
The status of boundaries and borders, questions of global poverty and inequality, criteria for the legitimate uses of force, the value of international law, human rights, nationality, sovereignty, migration, territory, and citizenship: debates over these critical issues are central to contemporary understandings of world politics. Bringing together an interdisciplinary range of contributors, including historians, political theorists, lawyers, and international relations scholars, this is the first volume of its kind to explore the racial and imperial dimensions of normative debates over global justice.
Race and Human Rights by
The terrorist attacks against U.S. targets on September 11, 2001, and the subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, sparked an intense debate about "human rights." According to contributors to this provocative book, the discussion of human rights to date has been far too narrow. They argue that any conversation about human rights in the United States must include equal rights for all residents. Essays examine the historical and intellectual context for the modern debate about human rights, the racial implications of the war on terrorism, the intersection of racial oppression, and the national security state. Others look at the Pinkerton detective agency as a forerunner of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the role of Africa in post-World War II American attempts at empire-building, and the role of immigration as a human rights issue.
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