Human rights have been one of the most powerful normative concepts of the past half century. They have been championed by groups and individuals disgusted by the oppression of which some governments have shown themselves capable. They have been supported by governments genuinely eager to set a pro-rights example as well as by cynical governments for purposes of international posturing. Cynical ratification was theorized to be rational only under certain narrow conditions – for instance, when information is thin and autocratic leaders' time horizons are short. Much of the evidence presented in the previous chapter followed patterns consistent with these expectations. Democracies have tended to be at the forefront in the process of ratification, while nondemocratic regimes have fairly consistently lagged behind. There is also evidence of strategic ratification in the form of social camouflage, but really only during the Cold War years, where the news media were under the governments' tight control, and in regions with wider dispersions in actual rights practices.