On Dec. 10, 1948, the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in what is considered a groundbreaking moment for rights around the world. It recognized that everyone has the same basic inalienable rights, regardless of national origin, language, race, religion or sex.
It isn’t legally binding but serves as a goal for governments worldwide and a baseline against which states’ actions can be assessed. Like our own Declaration of Independence, it didn’t reflect the world as it was at the time, but rather the world we hoped to make.
The seven decades since have seen much progress in human rights, with the end of colonialism, the U.S. civil rights movement, the dramatic expansion of both democracy and health care access across the globe and mass reduction of poverty in China, to name a few.
