Nationalist China took an active part in the setting up of the UN, and was also quite supportive of the incorporation of human rights statements in the new international body’s statutes and other instruments. When the Human Rights Commission in charge of drafting the UDHR was set up in 1946, headed by Eleanor Roosevelt, one of its two vice-chairs was the Chinese representative P.C. Chang (Zhang Pengjun, 1892–1957). The first drafts were collaborative efforts done by the drafting committee based upon suggestions and drafts submitted by a wide range of individuals, states, and NGOs, which then were passed on to the Commission and back a number of times, before finally landing on the table of the General Assembly for a general discussion. When the UDHR was put to a vote on December 10, 1948, China without hesitating voted in favor. This positive view of international human rights work on the part of the GMD is somewhat surprising in view of its earlier skepticism of human rights, as manifested in the writings of Sun Yatsen and Zhou Fohai (see Texts 18 and 20), and its own violations of human rights on the mainland before 1949 (see Texts 21 and 26) and on Taiwan after 1947 (see Text 36). Its changing view might simply have been due to pragmatic considerations, including the fact that it needed the help and recognition of the Western powers in its struggle against the Communists. Be that as it may, while the GMD earlier had argued that human rights were inappropriate to China, it was now prepared to stress their universality and work toward establishing an international legal framework. In addition, P.C. Chang and other Chinese representatives were also eager to quote Chinese sources in order to show that Chinese traditional philosophy and the concept of human rights had much in common. In view of the fact that many contemporary scholars, as well as the PRC government, seem to believe that economic and social rights would be more acceptable and important to the Chinese, it is interesting to note that Chang and the other Chinese representatives to the UN did not focus on these rights, and at times even seemed reluctant to include them in the UDHR. At a later stage in the drafting process, however, China defended the inclusion of rights to food and clothing, but these rights were not originally proposed by China. We reprint below several of Chang’s comments in the drafting process, together with brief, contextual introductions.
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