1 - Introduction

Summary

In this chapter, I present an introduction to modern human rights treaty law discussing the increased creation and commitment to treaties over time. I introduce the four types of commitment focused on in this book – signature, ratification, accession, and succession. I introduce the argument of examining each commitment type separately from ratification and argue that with each commitment type comes unique circumstances and contexts that prove important in understanding how the commitment type can influence changes in human rights behavior. I graphically depict the different commitment types to demonstrate that the majority of treaty commitment does not, in fact come from ratification, despite the focus of scholars, policy makers, and activists on ratification.