Mobilizing for Human Rights: International Law in Domestic Politics

Winner of the 2010 Best Book of the Year Award, International Studies Association! Beth Simmons argues that international human rights law has made a positive contribution to the realization of human rights in much of the world. Although governments sometimes ratify human rights treaties, gambling that they will experience little pressure to comply with them, this is not typically the case. Focusing on rights stakeholders rather than the United Nations or state pressure, Beth Simmons demonstrates through a combination of statistical analyses and case studies that the ratification of treaties leads to better rights practices on average. By several measures, civil and political rights, women's rights, a right not to be tortured in government detention, and children's rights improve, especially in the very large heterogeneous set of countries that are neither stable autocracies nor stable democracies. Simmons argues that international human rights law should get more practical and rhetorical support from the international community as a supplement to broader efforts to address conflict, development, and democratization.

• Activists Beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics
• After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton Classic Editions)
• The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History
• Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice
• Evidence for Hope: Making Human Rights Work in the 21st Century (Human Rights and Crimes against Humanity)
• Theory of International Politics
• Human Rights and their Limits
• "Lost" Causes: Agenda Vetting in Global Issue Networks and the Shaping of Human Security
• The Endtimes of Human Rights
• The Power of Human Rights: International Norms and Domestic Change (Cambridge Studies in International Relations)