Human Rights and Development

* Links development and human rights theory with practice
* Written by an award-winning author and expert in the human rights and development fields
* Highly readable, passionate, and powerfully argued

In Human Rights and Development, award-winning author Peter Uvin extends the examination of development aid and human rights violations that he presented in his book on the Rwandan genocide, Aiding Violence. Whereas that book is diagnostic, Human Rights and Development is prescriptive—a response to requests from development and human rights organizations to help them effect strategies for reducing conflict and improving human rights outcomes.

By advocating a rights-based approach to development, Uvin shows how practitioners can surmount the tough ethical and human rights obstacles encountered in their endeavors. But Human Rights and Development is much more than a "how to" book for practitioners. It is also a major scholar’s profound, passionate, and clearly written analysis of the need to effect principled social change throughout the global arena that solidifies rather than fragments our common humanity.

Uvin (international humanitarian studies, Tufts University) examines the relationship between development aid and human rights violations and prescribes strategies for reducing conflict and improving outcomes. He specifically advances an analysis of the need to effect social change at a global level and advocates a rights-based approach to economic development. Chapters address legal challenges, political conditionality, positive support, remaining questions, and related topics. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Peter Uvin is the Henry J. Leir Professor of International Humanitarian Studies at the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He received his doctorate in international relations from the Institut Universitaire de Hautes Etudes Internationales, University of Geneva. He has been a Research Associate Professor at the Watson Institute of International Affairs, Brown University, and has taught at New Hampshire College and the Graduate School of Development Studies, Geneva. For the last 20 years, he has worked periodically in Africa as a development practitioner and consultant, recently collaborating with UNDP, the OECD, and Belgian, Dutch, Danish, and British bilateral agencies. His book, Aiding Violence: The Development Enterprise in Rwanda, won the 1999 African Studies Association Herskovits Award for the most outstanding book on Africa.