In practice, these documents and treaties, sometimes collectively known as the rules-based order, have always described how the world ought to work, not how it actually works. The UN Genocide Convention did not prevent genocide in Rwanda. The Geneva Conventions did not stop the Vietnamese from torturing American prisoners of war and did not prevent Americans from torturing Iraqi prisoners of war. Signatories of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights include known violators of human rights, among them China, Cuba, Iran, and Venezuela.
