Partindo da perspectiva de que a política externa é uma política pública, o presente artigo pretende verificar a hipótese de fortalecimento da atuação da Comissão de Direitos Humanos e Minorias da Câmara dos Deputados (CDHM-CD) no exercício de suas prerrogativas de controle da política externa brasileira ao integrar o Comitê Brasileiro de Direitos Humanos e Política Externa (CBDHPE), coalizão de advocacy que agrega organizações da sociedade civil e entes estatais em prol do objetivo comum de fortalecer a participação cidadã e o controle democrático da política externa brasileira em direitos humanos. Com esse propósito, analisamos quantitativamente as atividades de interface internacional realizadas pela Comissão entre os anos de 1995 e 2015, esperando verificar aumento relativo daquelas que pretenderam monitorar e avaliar a atuação externa estatal a partir de 2006, ano de constituição do Comitê. Os resultados obtidos apontaram para a realização periódica pela CDHM-CD, de 2005 em diante, de eventos de monitoramento da política externa brasileira em direitos humanos, que contaram com a participação da sociedade civil e de autoridades de Estado, investigados no trabalho. Concluímos que, embora a análise quantitativa realizada não corrobore nossa hipótese inicial, não podemos descartar a importância do Comitê na instituição e continuidade da iniciativa acima mencionada, que representou inovação no rol das atividades desempenhadas pela Comissão. Além disso, a evolução das atividades da CDHM-CD a partir da constituição do CBDHPE sugere que a atuação da primeira passou a refletir, em maior medida, o potencial da política externa como instrumento para o avanço dos direitos humanos e, em consequência, o próprio caráter transnacional desses direitos, em diálogo com a hipótese teórica de aprendizado político entre membros de uma mesma coalizão proposta pelo referencial Advocacy Coalition Framework. / From the perspective of foreign policy as a public policy, the article herein intends to verify the hypothesis that the Commission on Human Rights and Minorities of the Brazilian House of Representatives (CHRM-HR) has intensified its efforts in monitoring the performance of the Executive Branch of the Brazilian government with regards to the State\'s foreign policy when it became a member of the Brazilian Committee on Human Rights and Foreign Policy (BCHRFP), advocacy coalition that brings together civil society organizations and state entities to strengthen civic participation and democratic control over the Brazilian Foreign Policy on Human Rights. For this purpose, we quantitatively analyzed the activities performed by the Commission between 1995 and 2015 that presented an international interface. In this respect, we expected to note a relative increase of those aiming at monitoring and evaluating State\'s external actions from the creation of the Committee in 2006. The results obtained pointed that from 2005 on periodic events have taken place in the CHRM-HR with the specific purpose of controlling Brazilian foreign policy, with the participation of civil society and State authorities. We concluded that, although the quantitative analysis did not corroborate our initial hypothesis, we cannot rule out the importance of the Committee in the institution and continuity of the initiative above, which represented an innovation among the activities carried out by the CHRM-HR. In addition, the evolution of the Commission\'s activities in scope since the constitution of BCHRFP could suggest that the actions of the first have begun to reflect the power of foreign policy in advancing human rights and the very transnational character of these rights, in accordance with the theoretical hypothesis of policy-oriented learning among members of the same coalition proposed by The Advocacy Coalition Framework.

This study involves a critical appraisal of the legal implications of South Africa’s withdrawal from the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the context of its international and regional human rights obligations. The dissertation also investigates the history and formation of the ICC, South Africa’s involvement and its role as a guardian of international and regional human rights obligations in Africa. The study reviews the circumstances leading to South Africa’s notice of withdrawal from the ICC, including the legal implications and international human rights obligations. This inquiry considers South Africa’s proposed withdrawal from the ICC which is supported by points of departure and a comprehensive literature review. The decision to withdraw from the ICC is considered to be a political one. However, this study raises questions about the executive’s withdrawal in regard to its domestic, regional and international human rights obligations, irrespective of whether it is a member of the ICC. The study surveys the background to South Africa’s participation in the ICC, its membership of the African Union and the implications of ICC membership including the obligations imposed on member states. / Criminal and Procedural Law / LL. M.

At the United Nations Conference on International Organization in April 1945 South Africa affirmed the principle of respect for human rights in a Preamble it proposed for inclusion in the Charter of the United Nations. The proposal was approved and the Preamble was accorded binding force. While South Africa participated in the earliest attempts of the United Nations to draft a bill of rights, it abstained on the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights because its municipal legislation was incompatible with some articles. Similarly, South Africa did not become a party to the international human rights instruments the declaration inspired, and avoided an active role in their elaboration. Subsidiary organs of the General Assembly undertook several studies on discrimination in the field of human rights. They provided evidence that racial discrimination in South Africa intensified after the National Party came to power in May 1948 on the platform of apartheid and diverged from global trends in humanitarian law. The gap between the Union and the United Nations widened. At the first General Assembly in 1946, India successfully asked that the treatment of persons of Indian origin in South Africa be inscribed on the agenda. The Indian question was later subsumed in the charge that South Africa's racial policies violated the Charter and in 1952 the General Assembly began to discuss apartheid. South Africa protested that these actions contravened Charter Article 2(7), which prohibited intervention in matters of domestic jurisdiction, and were ultra vires. Criticism of the Union increased in intensity, until in 1960 it culminated in calls for economic and diplomatic sanctions. Research shows that South Africa was the main architect of its growing isolation, since it refused to modify domestic policies that alienated even its potential allies. Moreover, it maintained a low profile in United Nations debates on human rights issues, abstaining on all substantive clauses in the two draft covenants on human rights. These actions were interpreted as lack of interest in global humanitarian affairs. South Africa had little influence on the development of customary international law in the field of human rights but was a catalyst in the evolution of international machinery to protect them. / Jurisprudence / (LL.D)

Partindo da perspectiva de que a política externa é uma política pública, o presente artigo pretende verificar a hipótese de fortalecimento da atuação da Comissão de Direitos Humanos e Minorias da Câmara dos Deputados (CDHM-CD) no exercício de suas prerrogativas de controle da política externa brasileira ao integrar o Comitê Brasileiro de Direitos Humanos e Política Externa (CBDHPE), coalizão de advocacy que agrega organizações da sociedade civil e entes estatais em prol do objetivo comum de fortalecer a participação cidadã e o controle democrático da política externa brasileira em direitos humanos. Com esse propósito, analisamos quantitativamente as atividades de interface internacional realizadas pela Comissão entre os anos de 1995 e 2015, esperando verificar aumento relativo daquelas que pretenderam monitorar e avaliar a atuação externa estatal a partir de 2006, ano de constituição do Comitê. Os resultados obtidos apontaram para a realização periódica pela CDHM-CD, de 2005 em diante, de eventos de monitoramento da política externa brasileira em direitos humanos, que contaram com a participação da sociedade civil e de autoridades de Estado, investigados no trabalho. Concluímos que, embora a análise quantitativa realizada não corrobore nossa hipótese inicial, não podemos descartar a importância do Comitê na instituição e continuidade da iniciativa acima mencionada, que representou inovação no rol das atividades desempenhadas pela Comissão. Além disso, a evolução das atividades da CDHM-CD a partir da constituição do CBDHPE sugere que a atuação da primeira passou a refletir, em maior medida, o potencial da política externa como instrumento para o avanço dos direitos humanos e, em consequência, o próprio caráter transnacional desses direitos, em diálogo com a hipótese teórica de aprendizado político entre membros de uma mesma coalizão proposta pelo referencial Advocacy Coalition Framework. / From the perspective of foreign policy as a public policy, the article herein intends to verify the hypothesis that the Commission on Human Rights and Minorities of the Brazilian House of Representatives (CHRM-HR) has intensified its efforts in monitoring the performance of the Executive Branch of the Brazilian government with regards to the State\'s foreign policy when it became a member of the Brazilian Committee on Human Rights and Foreign Policy (BCHRFP), advocacy coalition that brings together civil society organizations and state entities to strengthen civic participation and democratic control over the Brazilian Foreign Policy on Human Rights. For this purpose, we quantitatively analyzed the activities performed by the Commission between 1995 and 2015 that presented an international interface. In this respect, we expected to note a relative increase of those aiming at monitoring and evaluating State\'s external actions from the creation of the Committee in 2006. The results obtained pointed that from 2005 on periodic events have taken place in the CHRM-HR with the specific purpose of controlling Brazilian foreign policy, with the participation of civil society and State authorities. We concluded that, although the quantitative analysis did not corroborate our initial hypothesis, we cannot rule out the importance of the Committee in the institution and continuity of the initiative above, which represented an innovation among the activities carried out by the CHRM-HR. In addition, the evolution of the Commission\'s activities in scope since the constitution of BCHRFP could suggest that the actions of the first have begun to reflect the power of foreign policy in advancing human rights and the very transnational character of these rights, in accordance with the theoretical hypothesis of policy-oriented learning among members of the same coalition proposed by The Advocacy Coalition Framework.

The protection of Indigenous women in the context of Inter-American Human Rights System Abstract The aim of the thesis is to identify the means of protection of Indigenous women's rights. The author rises the subsequent questions: (i) which documents of this regional system offers protection to Indigenous women and based on what reason; (ii) what bodies operate in the Inter-American framework and Indigenous women can turn on them; (iii) what violations of rights have been addressed in the jurisprudency of the Inter-American Court of Human rights and what meaning does it have regarding to protection of Indigenous women? The first part contains the crucial documents in the topic of protection of indigenous women's rights. The author refers to the role and relation of both basic regional catalogues of human rights, American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Men and American Convention on Human Rights. She also refers to a quite recent document, American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that offers expressis verbis some protection to Indigenous women. Apart from that, other documents providing special protection to certain groups are analysed: Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women, Inter-American Convention on Forced Dissappearence...

Le statut juridique de la Déclaration universelle des droits de l'Homme, qui a fait l'objet de controverses lors de son adoption, a évolué depuis. Sur le plan international, la Déclaration universelle fait désormais partie du corpus juridique du droit interne de l'ONU et a été reconnue comme un instrument obligatoire par la doctrine et les organes judiciaires et quasi-judiciaires. Sur le plan national, elle a été incorporée dans de nombreux ordres internes en suivant des dynamiques propres à quatre espaces transrégionaux (Common Law, Amérique Latine, Europe et Afrique). Cette double évolution a modifié le statut intrinsèque de la DUDH, qui fait désormais partie des sources non-conventionnelles du droit obligatoire, bien que certains ordres juridiques refusent d'admettre sa force contraignante. Son applicabilité repose ainsi sur la formulation des droits qu'elle énonce. / The legal status of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was subject to controversy at the time it was adopted, has evolved since then. At the international level, the Universal Declaration has become part of the United Nations legal corpus and has been recognized as a binding instrument by publicists and judicial and quasi-judicial bodies. At the national level, it has been incorporated into many domestic legal systems following dynamics related to four trans-regional areas (Common Law, Latin America, Europe and Africa). This double evolution has changed the intrinsic status of the UDHR, which is now part of the non-conventional sources of mandatory law, though some legal systems deny its binding force. Its applicability is therefore based on the formulation of the rights it contains.