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Cogesoa Reeac Service
Updated April 16, 2021
Global Human Rights: The Department of State's Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices
Introduction
The State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices are an annual U.S. government account of human
rights conditions in countries around the globe. The reports
characterize countries on the basis of their adherence to
internationally recognized human rights, which generally
refer to the civil, political, and worker rights set forth in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (adopted by the
United Nations General Assembly in 1948) and other
international human rights agreements.
The most recent reports cover calendar year 2020 and were
issued on March 30, 2021. They provide individual
narratives on countries and territories worldwide and are
available on the Department of State website. As with prior
reports, the 2020 reports do not compare countries or rank
them based on the severity of human rights abuses
documented. Although the reports describe human rights
violations in many countries, in remarks introducing the
reports and in a written preface, Secretary of State Antony
Blinken specifically noted violations in a number of
countries, including China, Ethiopia, Russia, Syria, Uganda,
Venezuela, and Yemen, among others. Blinken described
Coronavirus Disease 2019 as a negative factor affecting
respect for human rights globally, stating that autocratic
governments have used [the pandemic] as a pretext to target
their critics and further repress human rights.
Categories Covered in the 2020 Reports
Integrity of the Person
Civil Liberties
Political Participation
Corruption and Government Transparency
Governmental Attitude toward Human Rights Investigations
Discrimination and Societal Abuses
Worker Rights
Legislative Mandate
The statutory requirement for the human rights reports is
found in Sections 116 and 502B of the Foreign Assistance
Act (FAA) of 1961 (P.L. 87-195), as amended. Both of
these provisions were first enacted via congressional
amendments in the mid-1970s and have been broadened
and strengthened over time through additional amendments.
The 1970s was a formative period for human rights-related
legislation as Congress sought to enshrine human rights as a
priority in U.S. foreign policy. In 1974, Section 502B of the
FAA (22 U.S.C. 2304) was enacted to withhold U.S.
security assistance from governments that engage in a
consistent pattern of gross violations of internationally
recognized human rights. The following year, Section 116
(22 U.S.C. 2151n) was added, introducing similar
restrictions for recipients of U.S. development assistance.
Accompanying these provisions was language requiring
that the Secretary of State transmit to Congress each year a
full and complete report concerning the human rights
conditions of recipient countries; this language thus served
as the legislative basis for the annual human rights reports.
An amendment in 1979 further broadened the reporting
requirement to cover all foreign country U.N. member
states. Despite the legislative origin of the reports in
connection with U.S. foreign assistance, the role that the
reports should play with regard to foreign assistance
decisions or in U.S. foreign policy generally has been the
subject of debate (see Relationship to U.S. Foreign Policy
below).
Evolution of the Reports
In the early reports, there was concern within the State
Department about publicly characterizing the human rights
conditions in other countries, particularly U.S. allies. The
first reports were criticized for being biased and thin on
substance. Over time, with improvements in the breadth,
quality, and accuracy of the reports, many observers have
come to recognize them as authoritative (countries whose
human rights conditions are criticized in the reports,
however, often publicly defend their record and/or dismiss
the reports as biased). The modern reports are cited by
lawmakers, foreign governments, human rights
organizations, scholars, and others. The State Department
has gradually broadened the scope of the reports to add or
expand coverage of certain topics, sometimes due to
congressional amendments to the statutory requirements.
Topics that now receive increased coverage include, for
example, press and internet freedoms, corruption and
government transparency, and human rights abuses based
on sexual orientation and gender identity. In addition, the
reports now reference separate congressionally mandated
reports on international religious freedom (IRF) and
trafficking in persons (TIP). In introducing the 2020
reports, Secretary Blinken indicated that the State
Department would release an addendum to the reports later
in the year with additional information on issues related to
reproductive rights, which he stated had been removed from
the reports during the prior Administration.
The joint explanatory statement for the FY2021 State
Department, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs
Appropriations Act (Division K of P.L. 116-260) directed
the Secretary of State to include within the reports
information on the intimidation of, and attacks against,
civil society activists and journalists, as well as the response
of the foreign government. Some bills introduced so far in
the 117th Congress would amend the FAA to mandate
coverage of other specific human rights issues.
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