Full Description
This volume is a comprehensive treatment of the African human rights system in terms of the laws, practice, and institutions of the system. The volume discusses, analyzes, and evaluates normative instruments of the African system: the Charter of the Organization of the African Unity (OAU), and the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, presenting article-by-article analysis of its provisions and those of the Protocol on the Establishment of the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights. Similarly the OAU (now the African Union), the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, and the proposed African Court on Human Rights, as institutions of the system, are discussed. The book emphasizes a comparative approach and presents a summary of the UN, the European and the Inter-American human rights mechanisms with regard to their impact on the African system. The role of NGOs in the African system is also considered, as well as the controversial issue of human rights in pre-colonial and colonial Africa.
Contents
Foreword. Summary of Contents. Acknowledgments. Abbreviations. Legal Instruments and Documents. List of Cases. Introduction. 1. Background to Human Rights in Africa. 2. Normative Instruments of the African Human Rights System. 3. Institutional Structure of the African Human System. 4. Procedures of the African Commission. 5. Reforming the African Human Rights System. 6. The Protocol on the Establishment of the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights. 7. Non-Governmental Human Rights Organizations and the African Human Rights System. Conclusions. Select Bibliography. Appendices. I: The Charter of the OAU. II: The Constitutive Act of the African Union. III: The African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights. IV: The Rules of Procedure of the African Commission. V: The Protocol on the Establishment of an African Court for Human and Peoples' Rights. Index.
