Human rights movement

Human rights movement refers to a nongovernmental social movement engaged in activism related to the issues of human rights. The foundations of the global human rights movement involve resistance to: colonialism, imperialism, slavery, racism, apartheid, patriarchy, and oppression of indigenous peoples.

A key principle of the human rights movement is its appeal to universality: the idea that all human beings should struggle in solidarity for a common set of basic conditions.

Human rights activism predates the 20th century, and includes, for example, the anti-slavery movement. Historical movements were usually concerned with a limited set of issues, and they were more local than global. One account identifies the 1899 Hague Convention as a starting point for the idea that humans have rights independent of the states that control them.

The activities of the International Federation for Human Rights (originally the International Labor Organization)—founded in France by the international labor movement in the 1920s—can be seen as a precursor to the modern movements. This organization was quickly embraced by the United States and European powers, perhaps as a way to counteract the Bolshevik call for global solidarity among workers.

Another major global human rights movement grew out of resistance to colonialism. The Congo Reform Association, founded in 1904, has also been described as a foundational modern human rights movement. This group used photographs to document terror wrought by Belgians in the course of demanding rubber production in the Congo. These photographs were passed among sympathetic Europeans and Americans, including Edmund Morel, Joseph Conrad, and Mark Twain—who wrote satirically as King Leopold:

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