A human rights group, or human rights organization, is a non-governmental organization which advocates for human rights through identification of their violation, collecting incident data, its analysis and publication, promotion of public awareness while conducting institutional advocacy, and lobbying to halt these violations.
[2] Unlike political groups which seek to advance their own discrete interests or programs a human rights group attempts to keep the political process open to all legitimate participants in the societal conflicts where such human rights violations occur.
This generally independent focus distinguishes human rights groups from sectarian and partisan groups such as for example trades unions, whose primary goal is to protect the interests of the members of unions.
Human rights groups are sometimes confused with humanitarian organizations and groups representing lobbies focused on specific issue lobbies, while most seek to distinguishing themselves from political movements involved in the conflicts that are often causes of the human rights abuses.
Often human rights groups claim expert knowledge on the issue or issues it surveys through human rights observers as field researchers.