Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explains networks within international organizations; how they adapt their structures to permanent changes in outer environment. It starts with the theoretical debate on the actor agency that emerges within international organizations. The book describes how the institutional setting of the UN Human Rights Council involves states into complex networks of the UN. It explores the most visible coalitions of states—diplomatic networks, their cohesiveness in light of recent political developments, their most important members—main leaders and network brokers, and the networks’ subgroups. The chapter also investigates the networks of non-state stakeholders that are part of the complex networks of the UN Human Rights Council—NGOs and corporate actors. It presents the evolution of the UN prevention agenda, which has preceded the inclusion of the prevention clause in the mandate of the Human Rights Council in 2006.