Human Rights Law Commons^™

A Human Rights Crisis Under Our Roof, Aglae Eufracio

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

Abstract forthcoming.

National Security Policymaking In The Shadow Of International Law, Laura T. Dickinson

Utah Law Review

Scholars have long debated whether and how international law impacts governmental behavior, even in the absence of coercive sanction. But this literature does not sufficiently address the possible impact of international law in the area of national security policymaking. Yet, policies that the executive branch purports to adopt as a wholly discretionary matter may still be heavily influenced by international legal norms, regardless of whether or not those norms are formally recognized as legally binding. And those policies can be surprisingly resilient, even in subsequent administrations. Moreover, because they are only seen as discretionary policies, they may be more easily …

Racism As A Human Rights Risk: Reconsidering The Corporate 'Responsibility To Respect' Rights, Erika George

Faculty Scholarship

Darnella Frazer, a teenage witness to a fatal police encounter, used social media to share her cell phone video footage capturing a white police officer casually kneeling on the neck of a handcuffed Black man named George Floyd for nearly nine minutes. Her video rapidly went viral, sparking civil unrest across the United States (US) and protests around the world.¹ Independent experts of the Special Procedures of the United Nations Human Rights Council came together to issue a joint statement condemning 'systemic racism' and 'state sponsored racial violence' in the US.² George Floyd was not the first unarmed …

Towards A Governance Model Of Ungovernable Prisons: How Recognition Of Inmate Organizations, Dialogue, And Mutual Respect Can Transform Violent Prisons In Latin America, José Luis Pérez Guadalupe, James Cavallaro, Lucia Nuñovero

Catholic University Law Review

Study of informal organizations in prisons in Latin America focuses on the exercise of control over daily life inside detention centers, including the extreme example of ‘self-government’ of and by those incarcerated. In Latin America, self-government occurs in the dangerous context of severe overcrowding, limited resources and poor services, aggravated by high levels of violence and illicit markets within prisons. The combination is highly volatile and poses grave dangers to the lives and wellbeing of detainees, authorities and often the larger society beyond prisons. This article considers one pioneering effort to overcome the unfettered control of prison by detainees: the …

Law, Criminalisation And Hiv In The World: Have Countries That Criminalise Achieved More Or Less Successful Pandemic Response?, Matthew M. Kavanagh, Schadrac C. Agbla, Marissa Joy, Kashish Aneja, Mara Pillinger, Alaina Case, Ngozi A. Erondu, Taavi Erkkola, Ellie Graeden

O'Neill Institute Papers

How do choices in criminal law and rights protections affect disease-fighting efforts? This long-standing question facing governments around the world is acute in the context of pandemics like HIV and COVID-19. The Global AIDS Strategy of the last 5 years sought to prevent mortality and HIV transmission in part through ensuring people living with HIV (PLHIV) knew their HIV status and could suppress the HIV virus through antiretroviral treatment. This article presents a cross-national ecological analysis of the relative success of national AIDS responses under this strategy, where laws were characterised by more or less criminalisation and with varying rights …

Determining Whether Female Circumcision Is A Human Rights Violation, Mahdiyyah Kasmani

Bridges: An Undergraduate Journal of Contemporary Connections

Female circumcision is a traditional practice commonly associated with culture, religion, or a mix of both. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the controversy surrounding female circumcision and determine whether this practice is justified or a violation of human rights. There are two main critiques of female circumcision as posed by the international community. The first critique is the health risks associated with the procedure and the second risk is the lack of consent within practicing communities. Due to these reasons, female circumcision is not only outlawed in most African countries with its disbandment supported by the African …

Addressing Correlations Between Gender-Based Violence And Climate Change: An Expanded Role For International Climate Change Law And Education For Sustainable Development, Achinthi C. Vithanage

Pace Environmental Law Review

No abstract provided.

How Far Will Fara Go? The Foreign Agents Registration Act And The Criminalization Of Global Human Rights Advocacy, Monica Romero

Washington Law Review

The Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) was enacted and enforced during World War II to protect the American public from foreign propaganda, especially from the Nazi party. Following the war, FARA was scarcely used for over half a century. But in the past five years, there has been a significant uptick in FARA enforcement, particularly against major political personalities. The revival of FARA has led many legislators and scholars to advocate for expansions of FARA’s scope and enforcement mechanisms in the name of national security. But most have failed to acknowledge the risk and likelihood of politicized enforcement. The United …

Genocide In China: Uighur Re-Education Camps And International Response, Julia Stern

Immigration and Human Rights Law Review

No abstract provided.

Foreword: Promoting And Defending Civil Rights In A Time Of Coronavirus, Elizabeth M. Iglesias

University of Miami Race & Social Justice Law Review

No abstract provided.

Responsible Business Conduct In The Extractive Industries: Prospect Of Respecting Women's Human Rights In Ghana, Veronica Dossah

LLM Theses

Business operations in the extractive industries (EI) continue to violate women’s human rights and the environment in the communities in which they operate. In Ghana, existing laws and regulations do not preclude businesses from such violations. This makes it important to reflect on innovative means including soft laws which could encourage companies operating in the EI in Ghana to respect women’s human rights and the environment over and above compliance with national laws and regulations. This thesis examines the problem of land grabbing by EI companies operating in Ghana, the unique negative impacts women in mining communities face as a …

Skorupskian Allyship: Human Rights Reconstructed Through Efficacious Enforcement And Social Relativism, Chase Opperman

Philosophy Honors Papers

This project aims to take the subject of Human Rights and attempt to wrestle with its clarity. The concept has been, since its more modern manifestation, as represented by the United Nations’ Uniform Declaration of Human Rights, heavily criticized for its being indeterminate, unclear, ambiguous, or somehow not fully understood. Despite the concept’s incredible moral potential, the extent to which this potential can be realized is determined by the concept’s intelligibility and defensibility—both of which are affected by the concept’s being understood to a sufficient point. Given Human Rights’ moral potential to challenge the forces of evil in the world, …

Human Rights In The New Era? Tools To Increase Participation Of People With Disabilities In The Workplace: An Analysis Of Laws In Hungary And The United States, Renata Bedo

Maurer Theses and Dissertations

People with disabilities face obstacles related to negative attitudes or opinions, deeply rooted stigma, and stereotypes in the workplace and everyday life, which leads to their social exclusion. The cornerstone of new developments in disability studies, the human rights model of disability, recognizes this social problem and aims to provide a catalog of the human rights of people with disabilities. It introduces the concept of human dignity to disability law, the human rights based approach, and advances the concept of inclusive equality. The question of this thesis is whether the human rights model of disability can give appropriate guidance on …

Book Review Of Law In The Time Of Covid-19, Jessie Wallace Burchfield

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Strategic Litigation And The Evolution Of Regional Human Rights Norms: Cases From Germany And The Netherlands, Cole Kovarik

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

This study seeks to fill gaps in our understanding of how private actors participate in international human rights politics by examining civil society involvement in European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) cases against long-standing democracies. Descriptive analysis of an exhaustive data set of instances of civil society organization (CSO) participation in ECtHR cases against Germany and The Netherlands is complemented by a comparative case study analysis of networks of organizations that mobilized around German and Dutch cases concerning Articles 8 (right to privacy) and 10 (freedom of expression). The data suggest that civil society organizations not only appear before the …

2021 Spring - Clihhr Newsletter, Cardozo Law Institute In Holocaust And Human Rights (Clihhr)

CLIHHR Newsletters

This Spring 2021 issue of the CLIHHR Newsletter highlights major institutional milestones and advocacy efforts during a period of global and political transition. It features Professor Richard H. Weisberg’s transition to emeritus status, successful litigation challenging sanctions against the International Criminal Court, student fellowship and clinic project achievements, virtual alumni engagement, and public programming on sanctions, religious freedom, mass incarceration, and farmers’ rights. The newsletter reflects CLIHHR’s continued commitment to human rights education, international justice, and accountability in a remote learning environment.

Foreign Cyber Interference In Elections, Michael N. Schmitt

International Law Studies

In the 2020 U.S. elections, Russia authorized and conducted influence operations designed to support former President Trump, although it did not attempt to alter any technical aspect of the voting process. Russia was not alone. Iran mounted a multi-pronged covert influence campaign intended to undercut Trump’s reelection prospects, while other foreign actors–like Lebanese Hizballah, Cuba, and Venezuela–also tried to influence the election. Interestingly, China did not conduct operations designed to alter the outcome, although it did consider doing so. The phenomenon of election meddling, however, extends well beyond the United States to such countries as Austria, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, …

Human Rights In The Era Of Artificial Intelligence “Figures, Opinions And Solutions”, Dr. Heidi Issa Hassan

UAEU Law Journal

Technology has cast its shadow on us in most aspects of our lives and nothing has escaped its grip even human intelligence. Human intelligence now has a major rival known as "artificial intelligence" (AI). The main question is can machines think like humans?!

Since AI involves, in part, the dispensation with humans, then it is a matter that affects human rights, regardless of the manifestations, consequences or even scope of this dispensation.

Accordingly, this study has several problems to tackle: 1) the absence of adequate binding national and international provisions governing AI, 2) AI systems involve changing the way businesses …

Transparency Of Land-Based Investments: Cameroon Country Snapshot, Sam Szoke-Burke, Samuel Nguiffo, Stella Tchoukep

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Despite a recent transparency law and participation in transparency initiatives, Cameroon’s investment environment remains plagued by poor transparency.

In a new report focusing on agribusiness projects in Cameroon, CCSI and the Centre pour l’Environnement et le Développement (CED) find that:

• Communities continue to be excluded from decision-making around investments.
• The government pursues a top-down approach to concession allocation and remains reluctant to recognize all legitimate tenure rights.
• The government faces threats to its legitimacy as the grievances of citizens and investors alike lead to the barring of roads by communities and investor withdrawals.

CCSI and CED therefore call for:

• A …

Reckoning: A Dialogue About Racism, Antiracists, And Business & Human Rights, Erika George, Jena Martin, Tara Van Ho

Faculty Scholarship

Video of George Floyd's death sparked global demonstrations and prompted individuals, communities and institutions to grapple with their own roles in embedding and perpetuating racist structures. The raison d'être of Business and Human Rights (BHR) is to tackle structural corporate impediments to the universal realization of human rights. Yet, racism, one of the most obvious of such barriers, has been a blind spot for BHR. While the field has contended with gender inequality, there have only been tokenistic nods to intersectional harms caused by business activities. The failure to address racism seriously undermines both the promise of BHR generally and …

Global Human Rights Organizations And National Patterns: Amnesty International’S Responses To Darfur, Joachim J. Savelsberg

Societies Without Borders

This article provides an analysis of Amnesty International and its efforts to establish a global, human rights-based narrative on the mass violence in Darfur, Sudan, during the first decade of the 21^st century. Interviews show how Amnesty’s narrative resembles that of the judicial field. Respondents insist that justice, once achieved, will help reach other goals such as peace. Relative unanimity in representing the violence supports the notion of globalizing forces highlighted by the world polity school, but national conditions also color narratives, in line with recent literature on national contexts of INGO work and a long tradition of neo-Weberian …

Counterterrorism In The Philippines: Review Of Key Issues, Ronald U. Mendoza, Rommel Jude G. Ong, Dion Lorenz L. Romano, Bernadette Chloe P. Torno

Ateneo School of Government Publications

Terrorism has taken root in almost all corners of the world with terrorist organizations thriving in both rich and poor countries. In the Philippines, the Human Security Act of 2007 came into force to address the threat of terrorism to the national security of the country. However, the law has never been fully utilized. To provide law enforcers with a stronger legal measure to address acts of terrorism in the country, President Duterte certified a new Anti-Terrorism Bill as urgent, with Congress adopting the Senate version and approving it in the shortest time possible. Despite opposition from various sectors and …

Cle Working Paper No. 3/2021--A Roof Over Our Stomachs: The Right To Housing In Canada And Its Implications For The Right To Food, Tasha Stansbury

Centre for Law and the Environment

In 2019, the Canadian government passed the National Housing Strategy Act, legislating for the first time a human right to housing in Canada. This was largely the result of pressure from housing advocates to align Canada’s legislation with the right to housing embedded in international human rights instruments. Despite similar efforts, food rights advocates have not had the same success in having the right to food recognized in Canadian law. This paper considers the question of whether, and how, food rights advocates can use the process of achieving a legislated right to housing as a model in pursuing the legislation …

Violence After Victory: Explaining Variation In State Repression Following Contentious Politics, Christopher Wiley Shay

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

If conflict onset leads to increases in human rights abuse, how can these abuses be curbed once conflicts have ended? To answer this question, researchers have traditionally focused on a country’s regime type and leaders’ incentive structures. This is insufficient, I argue, because many regimes with obvious incentives to curb repression (especially democracies) fail to do so. In addition to regime-type, therefore, the answer depends on whether a given regime can count on the cooperation of its military and law enforcement institutions, which I refer to collectively as the security apparatus. This is because security agents’ prior experiences usually create …

Betraying The American Public's Trust And Police Accountability Interrogations: The Darren Wilson Story, Shaymaa Shwel

Intercultural Human Rights Law Review

This paper will be focused on the specific failure by prosecutors to obtain an indictment when Michael Brown (Brown), the victim, was shot by law enforcement and will discuss: (1) systematic racism in the City of Ferguson (Ferguson), and the events leading up to the Darren Wilson (Wilson) case; (2) the specificities of the grand jury proceedings in the Wilson case; and (3) finally, conclude by evaluating how the Wilson case led to no indictment, and how attempting to indict a police officer is completely different.

Gender-Blind: International Human Rights On Abortion Through Irish Eyes, Christine A. Ryan

Duke Law SJD Dissertations

No abstract provided.

How A Fisherman's Murder Revealed Morocco's Police Brutality And Ethnic Discrimination, Nora Elmubarak

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Tanzania Blocks Direct Petitions To The African Court On Human And Peoples' Rights, Ben Phillips

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Submission To The Toronto Police Services Board’S Use Of New Artificial Intelligence Technologies Policy- Leaf And The Citizen Lab, Suzie Dunn, Kristen Mj Thomasen, Kate Robertson, Pam Hrick, Cynthia Khoo, Rosel Kim, Ngozi Okidegbe, Christopher Parsons

Reports & Public Policy Documents

We write as a group of experts in the legal regulation of artificial intelligence (AI), technology-facilitated violence, equality, and the use of AI systems by law enforcement in Canada. We have experience working within academia and legal practice, and are affiliated with LEAF and the Citizen Lab who support this letter.

We reviewed the Toronto Police Services Board Use of New Artificial Intelligence Technologies Policy and provide comments and recommendations focused on the following key observations:

1. Police use of AI technologies must not be seen as inevitable
2. A commitment to protecting equality and human rights must be integrated …

Human Rights And Transnational Organized Crime, Robert Currie, Sarah Douglas

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

This chapter will scrutinize the points at which these two legal regimes intersect with and infuse each other. It will proceed in three sections. The first section will provide a brief overview of the international human rights law system, specifically tailored to ground the following parts. The second section will examine the means by which protection is given to the human rights of individuals who are targeted for criminal investigation and prosecution as a result of their alleged involvement in TOC (referred to for efficiency as “accused persons” or “the accused”). It will first briefly explain the means by which …