The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s: The European Community and International Relations

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During the 1970s human rights took the front stage in international relations; fuelling political debates, social activism and a reconceptualising of both East-West and North-South relations. Nowhere was the debate on human rights more intense than in Western Europe, where human rights discourses intertwined the Cold War and the European Convention on Human Rights, the legacies of European empires, and the construction of national welfare systems. Over time, the European Community (EC) began incorporating human rights into its international activity, with the ambitious political will to prove that the Community was a global civilian power. This book brings together the growing scholarship on human rights during the 1970s, the history of European integration and the study of Western European supranational cooperation. Examining the role of human rights in EC activities in Latin America, Africa, the Mediterranean, Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s seeks to verify whether a specifically European approach to human rights existed, and asks whether there was a distinctive European voice in the human rights surge of the 1970s.

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The Human Rights Breakthrough of the 1970s is an impressive work which makes a valuable contribution to our understanding of human rights diplomacy, European integration, EC/EU foreign policy, and modern European identity. * Joe Renouard, Resident Professor of History and American Studies, Johns Hopkins University, USA *

Author Bio

Sara Lorenzini is Professor of Contemporary History and Jean Monnet Chair in History of European Integration at the University of Trento, Italy. Umberto Tulli is a Postdoctoral fellow in Contemporary History and Adjunct Professor at the University of Trento, Italy Ilaria Zamburlini is a fellow of the University of Udine, Italy, where she teaches human rights in Europe.