The most crucial issue facing the international community is that of human rights. Human rights are an issue that can no longer be ignored. Some discourses claim that the lack of definition and agreement constitutes an obstacle to the protection of human rights. While these things may be obstacles, they are not the fundamental problem, if people cared enough about others all over the world, governments would respond to the pressure. Human rights are not implemented due to the state's self-interest. This must change. There are three key areas that undermine human rights: state weakness, state sovereignty, and lack of international authority. The first area that undermines human rights is state weakness. We speak of state weakness when the state regime does not have a central government or a strong legal system (Englehart, 2009). These states have little control over their populations and are therefore more likely to resort to alternative methods to exert this control. Governments do not have the support of the people. Thus, governments begin to mistreat people in an attempt to gain control (Englehart, 2009). Abuses often take the form of human rights violations, such as massacres or disappearances of people who speak out against the government. Strong states with strong central governments and fairer legal systems. These governments are much less likely to resort to abuse of their populations to exert control (Englehart, 2009). Personal control is exercised only against those who have broken clearly specified laws and they are dealt with within a predefined response. Weak states do not have clear laws or sanctions (Englehart, 2009). So people can be abused much more easily with little or no protection from their own state. There is an argument that states should be... middle of paper ...... when it comes to human rights violations, states can have the best of both worlds. This means that they are both protected against unwarranted intrusions by other states and citizens can still be protected against state abuse. Protecting others from human rights violations must be a global concern because most people would want to be protected from state abuse. Works Cited Englehart, NA (2009). Capacity, state failure and human rights. Journal of Peace Research, 46 (2), 163-180. Garcia, F. J. (2002). Trade, constitutionalism and human rights: an overview. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (American Society of International Law), 132-134.OHCHR. (2012). United Nations Human Rights Council. Accessed April 25, 2013 from United Nations Human Rights: Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/AboutCouncil.aspx