Introduction

This chapter describes the history of the SRHR discourse and the notion of aggregate rights. In 2012, of 3,937 NGOs accredited to the United Nation's (UN) Economic and Social Council, 339 were religious or faith-based, the majority coming from Christian traditions. The chapter shows that the positions adopted by religious NGOs (RNGO) at the Court vary depending on the context and policy field concerned and are promoted in a non-confrontational way. It describes the study of RNGOs within the broader debate about religion, global governance, and post-secularism. The chapter shows that how the analyses build on and develops existing research on RNGOs at the UN. The contributors identify the situations in which RNGOs promote agreement on contested issues and those in which they hamper it – and the factors that determine which course of action they follow. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.