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In June 1946 ECOSOC empowered the Commission on Human Rights to establish sub-commissions to advise it on the protection of minorities and the prevention of discrimination. The Commission set up just one sub-commission, the Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and the Protection of Minorities. Made up of twelve members serving in their individual capacity as experts, the first meeting was held in November 1947. The Sub-Commission was mandated to undertake studies and make recommendations to the Commission.

The Economic and Social Council, at its ninth session, instructed the Secretary-General to appoint an Ad Hoc Committee of experts to survey the field of slavery and other institutions or customs resembling slavery. The Ad Hoc Committee prepared a questionnaire that was sent to governments in order to secure official information on the present situation of slavery and servitude. This questionnaire was followed by a request for additional information as many governments failed to submit information on territories under their control, or based their responses entirely on the legal status of various forms of servitude, while others submitted information in ambiguous terms that required further clarification. The government responses to both these communications form part of the records of this series.

Within the Division of Human Rights, a working group on slavery and servitude was formed in 1951 to examine the material received by the Ad Hoc Committee from governments, non-governmental organizations and other sources in order to draft a report based on this new information.

In 1946, at the first session of the Commission on Human Rights, the Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities was created. The Commission appointed twelve members in their individual capacity as experts in the fields. The Sub-Commission was charged with undertaking studies and making recommendations with regard to the prevention of discrimination and the protection of minorities.

In September 1951 ECOSOC decided that other existing organs of the United Nations could do the Sub-Commission's work and that it should not be called into session until 1954. The General Assembly reversed this decision and in 1952 the Sub-Commission was reconvened.

From 1952 on the work of the Sub-Commission became more focused with the initiation of a series of studies of discrimination in particular and limited fields: education, employment, politics, religious practices. Each study was completed by a special rapporteur.

The Commission on the Status of Women adopted at its fourth session in 1950 a resolution calling attention to the plight of women survivors of concentration camps who were subjected to medical experiments. At the subsequent session of the Economic and Social Council, the report from the Commission was examined, the view being expressed that the United Nations should lend its support to negotiations between the Allied High Commission and the Federal German Government for compensation legislation in Germany for these victims and to this end the Council adopted resolution 305 (XI) on 14 July 1950.

Under the terms of ECOSOC resolution 305 the Secretary-General was requested to consider, with the competent authorities and institutions, the means for alleviating the plight of survivors of concentration camps who, under the Nazi regime, were the victims of the so-called "scientific experiments".

This series is continued under the sub-series SOA 417/3 Compensation for Injuries.

The records consist of correspondence, memoranda and papers related to the implications for international human rights law of the material arising from the war crimes trials.