A Bridge to the Future
A Bridge to the Future
Links to Contemporary International Human Rights Law
This chapter explores the pre-World War II history of international law as a mechanism for the protection of human rights, and the anti-slave trade movement as a central part of that missing picture. Legal actions against the slave trade introduced into modern international legal discourse the idea that human rights violations were offenses of concern to humankind and not just matters between the people and their sovereign. It is this blending of individual human rights with broader ideas of humanity and humanitarianism that led to the development of international legal institutions like the International Criminal Court. Meanwhile, discussions of international criminal law, both immediately before and after the Nuremberg trials, focused on crimes against peace, or crimes that threatened peace.
Keywords: international law, anti-slave trade, human rights violation, International Criminal Court, Nuremberg trials
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