Role of NGOs in protecting human rights

Tonight is my second class in the politics of human rights at Columbia. The first class went well, although I must admit it is a little unnerving going back into academia, even if this is just one summer graduate course.

In my reading thus far one of the points I took particular notice of regarded the role of NGOs in protecting human rights. In an article from Human Rights Quarterly back in 1995, Rolf Kunnemann writes: "The United Nations is an organization of States. Although these States principally recognize human rights, many of them are not willing to have their own freedom of action restricted by precise obligations. Therefore, the United Nations can only be expected to do something in favor of implementing human rights if nongovernmental organizations do the necessary political preparatory work."

Part of the reason this resonated with me if because it makes very clear how valuable the work of NGOs is in the process of protecting rights. Kunnemann goes on to write that without NGOs there will never be any implementation of human rights.

So human rights depend on the vigilance of the people. But perhaps in my over-idealism I have to think that there is something bigger to our work that being perpetual watch dogs. While documenting abuses, rallying the public, and other public education efforts are all important, and serving your clients is humane and central to your mission, the end goal is to ultimately change the political environment so that, one day, you can go out of business because your work is done.

Maybe that day will never come, maybe you will always have to be vigilant, but the big goal is to no longer have a need for your work because the rights you seek to protect and the wrongs you seek to address are taken care of. I think we often get so caught up in the day to day listing of abuses, the logistics of keeping our heads above water and watching our funding, that it's easy to lose perspective of the ultimate goal of really building a better world.

I don't think that Kunnemann is wrong in stating the role of NGOs. But I also don't think we need to be limited by it.