Introduces the motivating questions of the book and discusses the concept of human rights as an international practice. What is the relationship of care to justice; how did human rights advocates develop important practices to advance justice; and why did anti-povery groups adopt rights-based language in development practice? My working hypothesis is that human rights advocates have developed a lasting set of tools for pursuing justice, amounting to a justice-seeking practice. Offers an overview of the book.

Considers how rights have been used to address economic and social justice. Social and economic justice advocates turned toward what is commonly called a rights-based approach to development, beginning in the 1990s. The case study in this chapter traces how and why Oxfam recast its goals as a set of what it called “basic rights.” Incorporated original interviews and archival research to outline Oxfam’s adoption of human rights language in its aid and economic justice advocacy work. Rights-based advocacy by development groups was taken up at the same time that traditional human rights NGOs hotly debated how and whether to take up economic, social, and cultural rights more directly. Argues that the emergence of rights arguments in development work demonstrate the potential flexibility of human rights tools in justice-seeking.

Incorporates first-person interviews with people who invented and implemented Amnesty International’s Urgent Action approach to demonstrate how early human rights advocacy implemented three tools of the justice of neighborhood - active care, habit, and appeals - and became a bridge to further political realization of justice. The chapter begins with a focus on a critical period in the early 1970s, when Amnesty International transitioned from working only for people imprisoned for nonviolent speech or beliefs, protected as “human rights” in articles 18 and 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to fighting to protect all people from torture and other forms of ill-treatment. Discusses the development of the Urgent Action approach in the USA and Germany. Discusses Amnesty International’s present-day Urgent Action approaches and questions related to effectiveness.

Discusses the book’s findings and sums up lessons of the study for the conduct of international politics. Argues that human rights work has contributed significant, politically embedded global resources for justice-seeking. The resources as they now exist support active transnational concern for individuals in diverse circumstances, offer a language of appeals for issues related to justice, and inspire the search for more justice in global politics.

Theorizes three facets of global justice that were introduced in the preceding chapter. Each is addressed in different aspects of human rights practice, and each has its own repertoire, or set of tools, for justice seeking. Although they overlap, they are also time-ordered and somewhat cumulative. The first aspect of justice is the development of Samaritan-like care and concern for the conditions that prevent people from living free and full lives. Human rights actors linked human rights action to a notion of care that broadens the appropriate subject of care to a global neighborhood. The second aspect pertains to an institutional structure in which legal norms offer independent standards of justice. Human rights actors generated arguments based on law and concern that transformed rights into a language of legal justice and accountability that can be employed in appeals to power holders. The third aspect calls for the integration of social justice into politics as human rights standards upholding economic, social, and cultural equity, including gender and racial inclusion.

Discusses the links between human rights and selected treatments of justice in the scholarly literature. Discusses ideal vs. non-ideal theories of justice. Drawing on this literature, identifies three elements of the search for justice in international politics that are illuminated when we observe the dynamics of human rights work: (1) a justice of care extended to a global neighborhood; (2) a culture of argument incorporating law in appeals to political authority; and (3) social justice.

Explores the contents of the thousands of Urgent Action alerts issued by Amnesty International from 1975-2007 on behalf of individuals at risk from human rights violations. The chapter references to care, law, and justice as part of a distinctive culture of human rights argument. By analyzing references to law and aspects of justice in the thousands of UAs, the chapter charts change and continuity in human rights appeals over many years. Throughout the time period, the alerts give voice to the active care found in the justice of neighborhood by expressing, for example, fear for a person’s safety, and by inquiring about alleged ill-treatment of people by authorities or their agents. Appeals to global human rights norms in the documents indicate the emerging importance of law as a tool for the political realization of justice at the global level.