Armoured Cars and Archbishops: Human Rights, Religious Pressure Groups, and Arms for El Salvador, 1977–8.

This article examines the integration of human rights considerations into British foreign policy during David Owen’s tenure as Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary (1977–1979), focusing on the cancellation of a British arms contract with El Salvador’s repressive regime in 1978. It highlights the influential lobbying campaign led by the Catholic Institute for International Relations (CIIR), which mobilized journalists, parliamentarians, civil servants, and the Catholic Church to pressure the government, revealing the growing impact of Britain’s emerging human rights network on policymaking. The case illustrates tensions within the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) between economic and strategic interests and ethical concerns, as well as the role of political advisers and NGOs in subverting traditional hierarchical policy processes. Although this episode marked a momentary advance for rights-based foreign policy under the Labour government, the article notes that these developments were largely reversed following Margaret Thatcher’s election in 1979, underscoring the contingent and contested nature of Britain’s human rights diplomacy in the 1970s.