The Human Rights Logo has its origin in the international "Logo for Human Rights" initiative, which was started in 2010. Its goal was to create an internationally recognized

logo A logo (abbreviation of logotype; ) is a graphic mark, emblem, or symbol used to aid and promote public identification and recognition. It may be of an abstract or figurative design or include the text of the name it represents as in a wo ...

to support the global human rights movement. The winning logo was created by Predrag Stakić from

Serbia Serbia (, ; Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin and the Balkans. It shares land borders with Hungar ...

The winning logo

The Human Rights Logo combines the silhouette of a hand with that of a bird, and a white thumb grabbing the bird. It is intended as a peaceful contribution towards strengthening human rights and as such is meant to be used across cultural and language borders. The logo is now available to everyone at no cost as an open source product. It is free from rights and can be used worldwide by everyone without paying fees or obtaining licenses.

The competition

The goal of the Logo for Human Rights initiative was to create an internationally recognized symbol for human rights. To this end, an international online design competition starting on 3 May 2011 (

World Press Freedom Day The United Nations General Assembly declared May 3 to be World Press Freedom Day or just World Press Day, observed to raise awareness of the importance of freedom of the press and remind governments of their duty to respect and uphold the righ ...

) launched a global appeal for submissions of logo designs and put them to a vote. The competition is known as one of the largest, most complex creative crowdsourcing projects ever conducted. From the more than 15,300 suggestions from over 190 countries a collective decision by all participants selected the top hundred logos, after which an international jury decided on the top ten logos. From these 10 logos, the internet community selected a winner within a three-week voting period. The competition officially ended on 23 September with the presentation of the universal logo for human rights during

UN General Assembly The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA or GA; french: link=no, Assemblée générale, AG) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations (UN), serving as the main deliberative, policymaking, and representative organ of the UN. Cur ...

week in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

Cinema for Peace The Cinema for Peace Foundation is a registered, non-profit organization based in Berlin, Germany. It supports film-based projects dealing with global humanitarian and environmental issues, and coordinates the Cinema for Peace awards. History The ...

Presentation of the winning logo

The presentation of the winning logo took place on 23 September 2011 in New York, in an event organised by

with former editor-in-chief of ''

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Ma ...

'' Michael Elliott hosting the event. In speeches, television journalist

Ann Curry Ann Curry (born November 19, 1956) is an American journalist and photojournalist, who has been a reporter for more than 30 years, focused on human suffering in war zones and natural disasters. Curry has reported from the wars in Kosovo, Iraq, S ...

and German Federal Foreign Minister

Guido Westerwelle Guido Westerwelle (; 27 December 1961 – 18 March 2016) was a German politician who served as Foreign Minister in the second cabinet of Chancellor Angela Merkel and Vice-Chancellor of Germany from 2009 to 2011, being the first openly gay person ...

, as well as human rights activists Carolyn Gomes from

Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of His ...

and Angelina Atyam from

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa. The country is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the south by Tanzania. The sou ...

, emphasized the importance of a universal symbol in the worldwide struggle for human rights. The musical highlight of the evening was a performance by soprano

Jessye Norman Jessye Mae Norman (September 15, 1945 – September 30, 2019) was an American opera singer and recitalist. She was able to perform dramatic soprano roles, but refused to be limited to that voice type. A commanding presence on operatic, concert ...

The jury

The initiative is supported by a jury of renowned and high-ranking personalities, who have worked to further the cause of human rights. These include: *

Ai Weiwei Ai Weiwei (, ; born 28 August 1957) is a Chinese contemporary artist, documentarian, and activist. Ai grew up in the far northwest of China, where he lived under harsh conditions due to his father's exile. As an activist, he has been openly c ...

(artist and human rights activist) * Angelina Acheng Atyam (human rights activist, winner of the

United Nations Human Rights Award The United Nations Prizes in the Field of Human Rights were instituted by United Nations General Assembly in 1966. They are intended to "honour and commend people and organizations which have made an outstanding contribution to the promotion and pr ...

) *

Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as the 76th governor of Georgia from 1 ...

(

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Swedish industrialist, inventor and armaments (military weapons and equipment) manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Chemistry, Physics, Physiolog ...

laureate) *

Aung San Suu Kyi Aung San Suu Kyi (; ; born 19 June 1945) is a Burmese politician, diplomat, author, and a 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate who served as State Counsellor of Myanmar (equivalent to a prime minister) and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2 ...

(Nobel Peace Prize laureate) *

Waris Dirie Waris may refer to: People *Abdul Majeed Waris (born 1991), Ghanaian footballer *Manmohan Waris (born 1967), Indian Punjabi folk/pop singer *Ruqaiyyah Waris Maqsood (born 1942), British author *Syed Mohammad Waris Hasan Naqvi (died 2008), Indian ...

(model and human rights activist) *

Shirin Ebadi Shirin Ebadi ( fa, شيرين عبادى, Širin Ebādi; born 21 June 1947) is an Iranian political activist, lawyer, a former judge and human rights activist and founder of Defenders of Human Rights Center in Iran. On 10 October 2003, Ebadi was ...

(Nobel Peace Prize laureate) *

Roland Emmerich Roland Emmerich (; born 10 November 1955) is a German film director, screenwriter, and producer. He is widely known for his science fiction and disaster films and has been called a "master of disaster" within the industry. His films, most of wh ...

(film director and producer) * Guillermo Fariñas (human rights activist) * Carolyn Gomes (human rights activist) * Mikhail Gorbachev (Nobel Peace Prize laureate) * Mukhtar Mai (human rights activist) * Somaly Mam (human rights activist) * Juanes (singer and peace activist) *

Navanethem Pillay Navanethem "Navi" Pillay (born 23 September 1941) is a South African jurist who served as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights from 2008 to 2014. A South African of Indian Tamil origin, she was the first non-white woman judge o ...

(

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, commonly known as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) or the United Nations Human Rights Office, is a department of the Secretariat of the United Nati ...

) *

Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu ( ta, பாக்கியசோதி சரவணமுத்து, si, පාකියසොති සර්වනමූත්තු; 26 October 1892 – 28 May 1950; also known as P. Sara) was a Ceylonese civi ...

(winner of the 2010 Citizens Peace Award of the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka) * Jimmy Wales (co-founder of Wikipedia) *

George Yeo George Yeo Yong-Boon ( zh, s=杨荣文, p=Yáng Róngwén; born 13 September 1954) is a Singaporean former politician and brigadier-general who served as Minister for Foreign Affairs between 2004 and 2011. Yeo served in the Singapore Army and ...

(former Singaporean Minister for Foreign Affairs and visiting scholar at the

Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy The Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKY School) is an autonomous postgraduate school of the National University of Singapore (NUS), named after the late former Prime Minister of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew. History The Lee Kuan Yew School of ...

) *

Muhammad Yunus Muhammad Yunus (born 28 June 1940) is a Bangladeshi social entrepreneur, banker, economist and civil society leader who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for founding the Grameen Bank and pioneering the concepts of microcredit and microfinance ...

(Nobel Peace Prize laureate) In addition to the jury members, the foreign ministers of the founding countries (

Bosnia and Herzegovina Bosnia and Herzegovina ( sh, / , ), abbreviated BiH () or B&H, sometimes called Bosnia–Herzegovina and often known informally as Bosnia, is a country at the crossroads of south and southeast Europe, located in the Balkans. Bosnia and H ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

, the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Mauritius Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label= Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It ...

Senegal Senegal,; Wolof: ''Senegaal''; Pulaar: 𞤅𞤫𞤲𞤫𞤺𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭 (Senegaali); Arabic: السنغال ''As-Sinighal'') officially the Republic of Senegal,; Wolof: ''Réewum Senegaal''; Pulaar : 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

and

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

) are partners to the initiative.

References

External links

* * * *{{cite web , url=http://www.jovoto.com/ , title=Crowdsourcing start-up, which enabled the online competition Logos Symbols introduced in 2011 Works about human rights