Up until the end of World War II it was almost universally accepted by the major powers that how a state treated its citizens and those of its colonies was a matter for itself and not a legitimate concern of states outside its frontiers. The widespread persecution and extermination of minorities culminating in the industrial scale slaughter of the Holocaust, along with the wholesale targeting of civilian populations in bombing and reprisal attacks during that War, led to a complete reappraisal of this. In the aftermath of World War II, the demand arose for a new international body that would help resolve future disputes between nation-states and prevent tensions developing into war. There was also a contemporaneous demand to establish a set of universally accepted and respected human rights which would be the same for all human beings and based on universality. Linked to this was a view that the international community has responsibility to ensure that such rights are protected, particularly for vulnerable people and minorities living within states. Thus, an international human rights oversight framework was demanded that could police and enforce agreed rights. A transnational consensus appeared to be emerging that such a body could underpin a new world order and address the causes of armed conflict.

The idea of an international human rights body was not new of course. Attempts had been made after World War I to establish the League of Nations. However, this failed to get the necessary political support from world powers and eventually collapsed with the growth of fascism. While attempts were made to develop some form of international human rights framework, via the International Labour Organization (ILO) set up after the Treaty of Versailles (1919), this lacked international oversight. Workers’ rights, where granted, were provided by governments for their own citizens and in their own interests, often to provide for the needs of their economies or for reasons of political expediency, to placate workers’ demands and to stall the growth of socialism (Clapham, 2007; Mishra, 1981).

The Treaty of Versailles did lead to some limited international commitment to the right of national self-determination, but this mainly applied to those peoples formerly ruled by the Austro-Hungarian, Germany and Ottoman Empires that had lost the war. The colonies of the victorious powers – Britain, France and Belgium – were not compromised (Throntveit, 2011: 445– 450).