Whois & Analysis for opensocietyfoundations.org

Open Society Foundations (OSF), formerly the Open Society Institute, is an international grantmaking network founded by business magnate George Soros.

Open Society Foundations financially support civil society groups around the world, with a stated aim of advancing justice, education, public health and independent media.

Human rights are moral principles or norms, which describe certain standards of human behaviour, and are regularly protected as legal rights in municipal and international law.

They are commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights "to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being," and which are "inherent in all human beings" regardless of their nation, location, language, religion, ethnic origin or any other status.

They are applicable everywhere and at every time in the sense of being universal, and they are egalitarian in the sense of being the same for everyone.

They require empathy and the rule of law and impose an obligation on persons to respect the human rights of others.

They should not be taken away except as a result of due process based on specific circumstances; for example, human rights may include freedom from unlawful imprisonment, torture, and execution.

Democracy (' literally "rule of the commoners"), in modern usage, is a system of government in which the citizens exercise power directly or elect representatives from among themselves to form a governing body, such as a parliament.

Democracy is sometimes referred to as "rule of the majority".

Democracy was originally conceived in Classical Greece, where political representatives were chosen by a jury from amongst the male citizens: rich and poor.

The English word dates to the 16th century, from the older Middle French and Middle Latin equivalents.

Political freedom (also known as a political autonomy or political agency) is a central concept in history and political thought and one of the most important features of democratic societies.

Political freedom was described as freedom from oppression or coercion, the absence of disabling conditions for an individual and the fulfillment of enabling conditions, or the absence of life conditions of compulsion, e.g. economic compulsion, in a society.

Although political freedom is often interpreted negatively as the freedom from unreasonable external constraints on action, it can also refer to the positive exercise of rights, capacities and possibilities for action, and the exercise of social or group rights.

The concept can also include freedom from "internal" constraints on political action or speech (e.g. social conformity, consistency, or "inauthentic" behaviour).

The concept of political freedom is closely connected with the concepts of civil liberties and human rights, which in democratic societies are usually afforded legal protection from the state.