Humanitarisierung der internationalen Beziehungen? Menschenrechtspolitik in den 1970er Jahren.

The article attempts to explain the rise of international human rights politics in the 1970s and to assess what difference they made in the international relations of that era. The author argues that in order to understand the reasons for the surge of human rights a polycentric approach is needed, focusing on the changed moral and political attitudes of civil activists, the distinct foreign policy needs of Western governments and the new experiences of oppression among victims of state terror. He further demonstrates how initiatives in the name of human rights notably transformed international politics. They narrowed the space of action of repressive regimes, albeit slightly and indirectly, and gave individual suffering an unprecedented salience in the international realm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]