The UNESCO Associated Schools Project emphasizes world community, human rights, and international understanding. This article investigates the emergence and global diffusion of the project from 1953 to 2001, estimating the influence of national, regional, and world characteristics on the likelihood of a country adopting a UNESCO school. It also addresses the effects of national linkages to the international human rights regime. The results reveal that adoption rates are positively influenced by stronger national links to the human rights regime throughout the period and that various measures of the density of global society influence adoption, particularly "after" the institutionalization of human rights. Finally, the results demonstrate that democratic countries and nations with more expanded educational systems tend to adopt a UNESCO school "before" the period of human rights institutionalization. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to the literature on the global environment and the diffusion of innovations in education. (Contains 1 figure, 4 tables and 11 notes.)