ABSTRACT
The new striving to overcome the division of Europe has added impetus to the struggle for human rights in Moscow, Prague, Warsaw, Sofia, Budapest, and Vilnius. The increased saliency of human rights may be a mixed blessing for East-West relations. The link between security and human rights has never been as crucial, when popular upheavals dismantle the communist system of power and a new shape of Europe is in the making for the first time since World War II. The human rights struggle in Eastern Europe has become--and will increasingly be--a struggle for democracy. These rights have chiefly been tied to humanitarian issues, such as family reunification, travel, and the right to emigration. The human rights campaign is no longer fought merely by a tiny group of individual dissidents in Eastern Europe. It is supported by a developed network of independent associations, trade unions, ethnic movements, churches of many denominations, political clubs, and even political parties.
