International Attention and the Protection of Human Rights Defenders

International Attention and the Protection of Human Rights Defenders PDF

Author: Janika Spannagel

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-06-16

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13: 1000893448

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This book uses a practice-driven and empirically founded approach to address the question of whether and how international attention can protect and enable domestic human rights activists in authoritarian settings. It examines the untold origin story of the ‘human rights defender’ term and its uptake among international advocacy organizations, which coalesced with the rise of a theory of human rights change centered around the support for local actors. Rich with analyses of original qualitative and quantitative data, the author spells out this theory of change and tests its assumptions in two case studies: the individual casework of the UN special procedures, and the case of Tunisia under Ben Ali. This book is of key interest to scholars and students of human rights, of the United Nations, and more broadly of international relations and politics in general, and to practitioners working with human rights defenders at risk.

Protecting Human Rights Defenders at Risk

Protecting Human Rights Defenders at Risk PDF

Author: Alice M. Nah

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-11-22

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 0429688008

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This book assesses the construction, operation and effects of the international protection regime for human rights defenders, which has evolved significantly over the last twenty years in response to the risks people face as they promote and protect human rights. Drawing upon the experiences of human rights defenders who continue to persevere in their activism in Indonesia, Egypt, Kenya, Mexico and Colombia, this edited collection examines the ways in which formal protection mechanisms by state and civil society actors intersect with self-protection measures and informal protection initiatives by families and friends. It highlights that protection practices are most effective when they are designed to address the specific risks that human rights defenders face (which are gendered and intersectional); reflect how defenders understand ‘risk’, ‘security’ and ‘protection’; and are appropriate for the dynamic sociopolitical and legal contexts in which defenders operate. This book proposes ways in which the protection of human rights defenders at risk should be reimagined and practised. This book will be a thought-provoking guide for students and scholars of politics, international relations, law and human rights, as well as to practitioners engaged in the protection of human rights defenders at risk.

Promotion and Protection of Human Rights

Promotion and Protection of Human Rights PDF

Author:

Publisher:

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 26

ISBN-13:

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The Special Representative's 2nd report to the Commission on Human Rights, covering her activities during 2001; identifies trends based on communications to Governments, and draws attention to the situation of women human rights defenders and to the impact on human rights defenders of the 11 September terrorist attack in the United States.

Critical Perspectives on the Security and Protection of Human Rights Defenders

Critical Perspectives on the Security and Protection of Human Rights Defenders PDF

Author: Karen Bennett

Publisher:

Published: 2017-08-30

Total Pages: 120

ISBN-13: 9781138105607

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Human rights defenders - who by peaceful means advocate, mobilise and often put their lives at risk to defend the most fundamental freedoms of their fellow citizens - are key agents of change in their own societies and make a significant contribution to the international community's efforts to support democracy and human rights. Defenders often face serious threats and can experience harm by state and non-state actors. Since the United Nations General Assembly's adoption of the Declaration on Human Rights Defenders in 1998, there has been considerable effort to recognise and protect the right of individuals, groups and communities to promote and protect their own rights and the rights of others. Over time, a multi-level, multi-actor international protection regime for the rights of human rights defenders has emerged, which is based on existing rights derived from the international human rights regime. The authors in this book reflect on the positive developments that have emerged over time to strengthen the protection of defenders, as well as the debates, tensions and contestations in such practices. This collection provides a critical appraisal of the construction, function, ethical boundaries, and evolution of this protection regime, as well as its multi-scalar social and political effects. In particular, the authors consider the effectiveness of particular international and regional protection mechanisms for the protection of defenders, and examine the relationship between repression, activism, and tactics for managing risks in the face of danger. This book was originally published as a special issue of the International Journal of Human Rights.

Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights

Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights PDF

Author: United Nations. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

Publisher:

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9789211542011

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"This publication contains the 'Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations Protect, Respect and Remedy Framework', which were developed by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises. The Special Representative annexed the Guiding Principles to his final report to the Human Rights Council (A/HRC/17/31), which also includes an introduction to the Guiding Principles and an overview of the process that led to their development. The Human Rights Council endorsed the Guiding Principles in its resolution 17/4 of 16 June 2011."--P. iv.

Human Rights as Politics and Idolatry

Human Rights as Politics and Idolatry PDF

Author: Michael Ignatieff

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2011-12-28

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 1400842840

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Michael Ignatieff draws on his extensive experience as a writer and commentator on world affairs to present a penetrating account of the successes, failures, and prospects of the human rights revolution. Since the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, this revolution has brought the world moral progress and broken the nation-state's monopoly on the conduct of international affairs. But it has also faced challenges. Ignatieff argues that human rights activists have rightly drawn criticism from Asia, the Islamic world, and within the West itself for being overambitious and unwilling to accept limits. It is now time, he writes, for activists to embrace a more modest agenda and to reestablish the balance between the rights of states and the rights of citizens. Ignatieff begins by examining the politics of human rights, assessing when it is appropriate to use the fact of human rights abuse to justify intervention in other countries. He then explores the ideas that underpin human rights, warning that human rights must not become an idolatry. In the spirit of Isaiah Berlin, he argues that human rights can command universal assent only if they are designed to protect and enhance the capacity of individuals to lead the lives they wish. By embracing this approach and recognizing that state sovereignty is the best guarantee against chaos, Ignatieff concludes, Western nations will have a better chance of extending the real progress of the past fifty years. Throughout, Ignatieff balances idealism with a sure sense of practical reality earned from his years of travel in zones of war and political turmoil around the globe. Based on the Tanner Lectures that Ignatieff delivered at Princeton University's Center for Human Values in 2000, the book includes two chapters by Ignatieff, an introduction by Amy Gutmann, comments by four leading scholars--K. Anthony Appiah, David A. Hollinger, Thomas W. Laqueur, and Diane F. Orentlicher--and a response by Ignatieff.

The Effectiveness of Approach

The Effectiveness of Approach PDF

Author: Karen Bennett (Writer on human rights)

Publisher:

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 172

ISBN-13:

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"This commentary statement accompanies the research outputs (listed in Annex 1) submitted for the award of Ph.D. by Prior Output at London Metropolitan University. The commentary describes the genesis of the work presented, and brings coherence and context to the submission. The nine outputs in the submission (Outputs A-I) address the nature of approaches to interventions for the protection of human rights defenders. My premise holds that mobilising human rights-based approaches to interventions for the protection of human rights defenders in countries with oppressive regimes has significant potential for altering the nature and practice of human rights defence, improving security for human rights defenders, and impacting human rights implementation. This submission presents an original contribution of research work conducted over an eight year period (2009-2016). Situated in the academic discourse, there are three distinct strands within the research submission, each strand contributing to a coherent body of work. The first strand is concerned with the effective implementation of the European Union Guidelines on Human Rights Defenders; the second strand is concerned with the development of a research agenda engaging practitioners and academics in multiple research activities investigating the human rights defender protection regime; and the third strand is concerned with enabling environments for human rights defenders through projects in Central Asia and Darfur, Sudan. The work is derived from an agentic constructivist and human rights-based approach perspective. Through incorporating multiple, and also innovative methodologies, the research activities investigate defender protection situated in subjective meanings and multiple contexts, and the three strands of work together capture the eclectic perspectives of both the enablers of defenders, and defenders themselves. In this way the submission articulates pathways for a research agenda that informs and reveals problems in intervention approaches, encompassing local, regional and international engagement and support to human rights defenders. The commentary and the research outputs consider approaches of social and political mechanisms necessary for the mobilisation of improved security in defender communities, studied in multiple regions of the world to advance empirical knowledge and normative argument. The work contributes to academic rigour and scholarship in the fields of human rights and international relations, and also other social science fields, including sociology, social policy, politics, law, international development and security and conflict studies." -- Abstract.

Not Enough

Not Enough PDF

Author: Samuel Moyn

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2018-04-10

Total Pages: 276

ISBN-13: 067498482X

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The age of human rights has been kindest to the rich. Even as state violations of political rights garnered unprecedented attention due to human rights campaigns, a commitment to material equality disappeared. In its place, market fundamentalism has emerged as the dominant force in national and global economies. In this provocative book, Samuel Moyn analyzes how and why we chose to make human rights our highest ideals while simultaneously neglecting the demands of a broader social and economic justice. In a pioneering history of rights stretching back to the Bible, Not Enough charts how twentieth-century welfare states, concerned about both abject poverty and soaring wealth, resolved to fulfill their citizens’ most basic needs without forgetting to contain how much the rich could tower over the rest. In the wake of two world wars and the collapse of empires, new states tried to take welfare beyond its original European and American homelands and went so far as to challenge inequality on a global scale. But their plans were foiled as a neoliberal faith in markets triumphed instead. Moyn places the career of the human rights movement in relation to this disturbing shift from the egalitarian politics of yesterday to the neoliberal globalization of today. Exploring why the rise of human rights has occurred alongside enduring and exploding inequality, and why activists came to seek remedies for indigence without challenging wealth, Not Enough calls for more ambitious ideals and movements to achieve a humane and equitable world.

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