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Detention without Trial, Hunger Strikes and Medical Ethics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 April 2021

S. R. Benatar
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Extract

Racism, which has pervaded and debased life in many countries, was given little attention by the international community before the Second World War when international law only governed relationships between states; the way in which individuals were treated within their own states was considered to be a purely domestic affair. The revulsion engendered by the Nazi atrocities however had a profound effect on world opinion, and in 1945 the “United Nations” grew out of the League of Nations with the hope that this body could contribute to the maintenance of international peace and encourage worldwide respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. Three years later, in 1948, the Nationalist Party came into power in South Africa and the racial attitudes of the time were committed to the statute books in this country.

Type
Article
Information
Law, Medicine and Healthcare , Volume 18 , Issue 1-2 , Summer 1990 , pp. 140 - 145
Copyright
Copyright © 1990 American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics

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