The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on the 10th of December, 1948 is regarded as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and nations in order to protect the fundamental rights and freedoms of global citizens.  

All 191 member states ratified this document, yet 4 decades after its ratification the universal state of education remained unsatisfactory. A 100 million children had no access to primary education (of which at least 60 million were girls), about 960 million adults; 2/3 of whom were women, were illiterate and over a 100 million children failed to complete basic education programmes- clearly the education system had left a lot to be desired. (World Conference on Education for All, 1990)