The virtual human rights library brings together resources from multiple libraries and information services, both internal and external, to create an online hub dedicated to the study of human rights. This curation is unique in its interdisciplinary concerns and focuses on writings and research from social sciences, humanities, and law.
The virtual library is continually updated with the latest academic research in issue areas, as well as with relevant films, recorded conversations, and other forms of media.
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Michael Burawoy "A Public Sociology for Human Rights." introduction to J Blau and K Lyall Smith (eds), Public Sociologies Reader (2006).
A public sociology that will tackle the public issues of today requires the transformation of sociology as we know it. This is the stirring message of this volume—at the heart of sociology must lie a concern for society as such...
Elizabeth Boyle, Minzee Kim, Wesley Longhofer "Abortion liberalization in world society, 1960–2009." American Journal of Sociology 121, no. 3 (2015): 882-913.
Controversy sets abortion apart from other issues studied by world society theorists, who consider the tendency for policies institutionalized at the global level to diffuse across very different countries. The authors conduct an event history analysis of the spread (however...
Mary Bernstein, Nancy Naples "Altared states: Legal structuring and relationship recognition in the United States, Canada, and Australia." American Sociological Review 80, no. 6 (2015): 1226-1249.
In this article, we use comparative historical analysis to explain agenda-setting and the timing of policy outcomes on same-sex marriage in the United States, Canada, and Australia. Unlike the United States and Canada, Australia does not have a bill of...
William D. Irvine Between Justice and Politics: The Ligue Des Droits De L'homme, 1898-1945 (Stanford University Press, 2007)
Between Justice and Politics is a history of the first fifty years of the Ligue des droits de l'Homme—the League of the Rights of Man. This is the first book-length study of the Ligue in any language, and it is...
Jackie Smith "Bridging global divides? Strategic framing and solidarity in transnational social movement organizations." International Sociology 17, no. 4 (2002): 505-528.
A growing body of research has revealed a rapid expansion in transnational organizing and activism, but we know relatively little about the qualitative changes these transnational ties represent. Using surveys of transnational social movement organizations (TSMOs) and additional case study...
Wade Cole, Francisco Ramirez "Conditional decoupling: Assessing the impact of national human rights institutions, 1981 to 2004." American Sociological Review 78, no. 4 (2013): 702-725.
National human rights institutions, defined as domestic but globally legitimated agencies charged with promoting and protecting human rights, have emerged worldwide. This article examines the effect of these organizations on two kinds of human rights outcomes: physical integrity rights and...
Robert Gildea Empires of the Mind: The Colonial Past and the Politics of the Present (Cambridge University Press, 2019)
"The empires of the future would be the empires of the mind" declared Churchill in 1943, envisaging universal empires living in peaceful harmony. Robert Gildea exposes instead the brutal realities of decolonisation and neo-colonialism which have shaped the postwar world. Even...
Philip Allott Eunomia: New Order for a New World (Oxford University Press, 2001)
The end of the Cold War has brought a new form of world disorder. The systems and strategies imposed by the global balance of power of the Cold War have evaporated. The international system is seeking a new equilibrium between...
Mikael Rask Madsen "From Cold War Instrument to Supreme European Court: The European Court of Human Rights at the Crossroads of International and National Law and Politics." Law & Social Inquiry 32, no. 1 (2007): 137-159.
The history of the genesis and institutionalization of the European Convention on Human Rights offers a striking account of the innovation of a new legal subject and practice—European human rights—that went along with, but also beyond, the political and legal...
Abigail Weitzman, Jeffrey Swindle, Gilbert Brenes-Camacho "Gendered Family Violence among Migrants Seeking International Protection: A Life Course Perspective." Social Forces (2023): soad111.
Although family and migration scholars recognize that intimate partner violence (IPV) can motivate women’s movement between countries, little research considers IPV or other gendered family violence further back in women migrants’ life histories or explores the legacy of gendered family...
Please Note:
While the Virtual Library is now live for use, we are still working to update its contents and improve its functionality.
It is usable by all visitors, but the hyperlinks to materials listed are for UChicago community members with a CNet ID and password.
Please direct feedback and suggestions to Kathleen Cavanaugh.
For technical assistance, email pozenhumanrights @ uchicago.edu.