Cui Zhiyuan
Cui also published an paper on Zhang Pengchun’s role in drafting United Nations’ the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Zhang Pengchun (1892-1957) studied with John Dewey and got his Ph.D. from Columbia University and was the first Provost of Tsinghua University in 1923. He was the only Vice Chairman of the Commission on Human Rights (with Eleanor Roosevelt as the Chairman) in drafting the Universal Declaration, especially in inserting the Chinese concept “Ren” (, two men). Zhang initially translated “Ren” as two men mindedness, because “two men mindedness” is considered as too awkward, thus “conscience” was used in the final text of the Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Cui's article discusses the important implications of this discovery in the UN archive about Zhang's key role for the current Chinese political and cultural debates—transcending the dichotomy of “Western Centralism” and “Cultural Particularism”— and has been translated into French and published (, Multitudes 2013/3)
Human rights education
The emphasis on Human Rights Education began in 1995 with the beginning of the UN Decade for Human Rights Education, though previously addressed in 1953 with the UNESCO Associated Schools Program, which served as an “initial attempt to teach human rights in formal school settings”. The first formal request for the need to educate students about human rights came about in UNESCO’s 1974 article Recommendation concerning Education for International Understanding, Cooperation and Peace, and Education Relating to Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The participants of the International Congress on the Teaching of Humans Rights eventually met in 1978 to form a specific definition of what would be required application of the education in formal curricula. The aims at which the Congress agreed upon including the encouragement of tolerant attitudes with focus on respect, providing knowledge of human rights in the context of national and international dimensions as well as their implementations, and finally developing awareness of human rights translating into reality whether social or political on national and international levels.