Education is very often seen as a means of attaining other objectives (such as a better job or increased earnings) and that education as a human right in and of itself is often lost sight of.

Few groups and social movements, including the NGOs defending the oppressed and the neediest, have acquired a thorough mastery of the international human rights instruments and their potential use at the national level. The present brochure is intended to accompany them in their daily struggle of demanding that the right to a quality education be respected.

Thus, the brochure deals with:
- the definition, purpose and content of the right to education (Chapter I);
- the constitutive elements of this right, including human rights education (Chapter II);
- the pertinent norms at the regional and international levels (Chapter III);
- the obstacles to the realization of the right to education (Chapter IV);
- the obligations of governments and examples of the implementation of the right to education at the national level (Chapter V);
- the monitoring mechanisms at the regional and international levels available to victims when their right to education is violated (Chapter VI).