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This study looks at the historic and unique role played by NGOs (non-governmental organizations) in helping to bring about compliance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. When the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted 50 years ago, Eleanor Roosevelt, its principal architect, predicted that a "curious grapevine" would carry its message behind barbed wire and stone walls.;This volume tells the story of how NGOs became the "grapevine" Eleanor Roosevelt anticipated: sensitizing mankind's conscience about violations of human rights, "shaming" the most notorious abusers, creating the international machinery and mechanisms to bring about implementation of the Declaration, laying the groundwork for the destruction of the Soviet empire, as well as of the apartheid system in South Africa, and establishing the principle of accountability for crimes against humanity. The notion of human rights has progressed from being a marginal part of international relations in the mid-20th century to stand in the late 1990s as a critical element in diplomatic discourse.