Human rights institutions are indispensable if human rights are to be effectively protected. This collection of chapters addresses examples of new institution building in the human rights field at international, regional, and national levels. The United Nations Human Rights Council — a new intergovernmental body created in 2006 by the General Assembly to replace the UN Commission on Human Rights — is examined in several chapters. The Human Rights Council was designed to avoid the shortcomings of its predecessor including its politicization. Has it succeeded? Several contributions to the book d ... More

Human rights institutions are indispensable if human rights are to be effectively protected. This collection of chapters addresses examples of new institution building in the human rights field at international, regional, and national levels. The United Nations Human Rights Council — a new intergovernmental body created in 2006 by the General Assembly to replace the UN Commission on Human Rights — is examined in several chapters. The Human Rights Council was designed to avoid the shortcomings of its predecessor including its politicization. Has it succeeded? Several contributions to the book discuss the Council's novel monitoring mechanism: Universal Periodic Review, whereby all states will submit to a regular scrutiny of their human rights record. The relationship between the Human Rights Council and its mechanisms with the other limbs of the UN protection system, the treaty bodies, and the High Commissioner for Human Rights are also critically considered. Another new human rights institution, the Fundamental Rights Agency of the European Union, has begun operating. One chapter examines in detail the different pressures which have shaped its formal legal mandate, in particular, the concerns of the Council of Europe over its potential encroachment on its human rights mission. Other chapters critically examine the development of national equality bodies working to eliminate racial discrimination in Europe, and the norms and institutions which have been built to defend the rights of minorities.