Human Rights

Course Description

This interdisciplinary course explores both the rights of Indigenous people in settler colonies as well as the complex historical and theoretical relationship between human rights and settler colonialism. We will pursue three lines of questioning. The first critically explores how central political concepts of the international state system—sovereignty, property, territory, self-determination—entwine the histories of settler colonialism and human rights. The second charts the rise and mechanisms of the international Indigenous rights movement, in particular its activity at the United Nations leading to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007, and its contributions to ongoing debates on environmental and climate justice, group rights, natural resources and territorial autonomy, and cultural rights. The third unit interrogates settler state responses to the movement for Indigenous human rights, such as cooptation, recognition, and apology.

Through readings drawn from history, ethnography, political and critical theory, international relations, Native studies, law, and documents produced by intergovernmental organizations and NGOs, we will explore and deepen the tensions between human rights as a theory and practice and the political lives and aspirations of Indigenous peoples and activists. What technologies of rule—such as residential school systems and property law—do settler colonial states deploy to dispossess Indigenous peoples? How have Indigenous peoples used the international human rights regime to mobilize against such dispossession? How have these states resisted the global Indigenous rights movement? And can the human rights regime, rooted in the international state system, meaningfully contribute to anticolonial movements in liberal settler colonies? While we will touch on settler colonialism as it manifests around the globe—including in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Israel—the course’s geographical focus will be on North America.

Course objectives

Throughout this course, you will:

• Develop a historically-informed understanding of both international indigenous rights and settler colonialism as idea, practice, institution, and discourse;
• Place the literature on human rights and settler colonialism into critical conversation in order to deepen existing conceptual problems and generate new ones;
• Identify the main arguments in theoretical texts, legal and policy documents, and public debates;
• Read and think across disciplines to develop arguments that speak to multiple scholarly communities;
• Produce an original argument in relation to other authors’ arguments, and construct and organize an analytical, argumentative paper;
• Communicate ideas effectively in class discussions and presentations;
• Bring case studies and questions encountered outside the course into the classroom to challenge or nuance the assigned material.

This course will provide a wide-ranging survey of conceptual foundations and issues in contemporary human rights. The class will examine the philosophical origins of human rights, contemporary debates, the evolution of human rights, key human rights documents, and the questions of human rights enforcement. This course will examine specific civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights and various thematic topics in human rights.

This 3-credit course aims to give students a foundation in research, policy, and practice relevant to gun violence and the human rights of young people. In the first part of the course, we look at the US. In the US gun violence against children has increased, as part of a broader nationwide rise in crime. School shootings have also risen: The Washington Post counted 42 last year in the U.S., the most on record and up from 27 in 2019.  In addition to exploring its underlying causes, the prevalence, and solutions to gun violence in homes, schools, and communities in the United States, young peoples’ participation in legislation and other efforts to address physical insecurity. In the second half of the course, students examine the ways in which US foreign policy– including in the areas of small arms waivers, direct gun sales, and migration, have shaped the lives of young people in other nations. The focus of this part of the course will be on Central America where armed violence has had a dramatic impact on young people and has resulted in forced displacement and loss of education for young people. Throughout the course, students will explore the gun-related human rights issues affecting young people through the study of cases, reports, documentaries, and other visual images including satellites and aerial images. Students will examine the implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions 2250 and 2419-- the Youth Peace and Security Agenda (YPS), the Arms Trade Treaty, and the Optional Protocol on the Child Soldier, as well as the U.S. Youth Peace and Security Act of 2021 (HR 4838), national legislation that prioritizes the inclusion of youth in conflict resolution and recognizes that youth participation is a key component of U.S. peace and security strategy. An ongoing and significant consideration in the course will be the role of international education efforts and youth-led advocacy and legislative efforts around gun control legislation. 

In addition to the topics mentioned above, students will acquire and deepen their understandings

• the framing of gun violence and violence caused by small weapons as human rights issues for young people, including but not limited to the international and national human rights laws that protect the right to life, development, survival, and protection
• the impacts that race, ethnicity, gender, age, life experience all have on the realization of young people’s human rights   
• the debates surrounding the human right to self and community protection
• the power imbalances in young peoples’ representation in policy, practice, and research, as a barrier to protection and participation of young people
• the role played by state and non-state actors in human rights violations and protection in relation to gun violence
• the positive roles that young people play in conflict prevention, peacebuilding and disarmament processes, and human rights activism

The world economy is a patchwork of competing and complementary interests among and between governments, corporations, and civil society. These stakeholders at times cooperate and also conflict over issues of global poverty, inequality, and sustainability. What role do human rights play in coordinating the different interests that drive global economic governance? This seminar will introduce students to different structures of global governance for development, trade, labor, finance, the environment, migration, and intellectual property and investigate their relationship with human rights. Students will learn about public, private, and mixed forms of governance, analyze the ethical and strategic perspectives of the various stakeholders and relate them to existing human rights norms. The course will examine the work of multilateral organizations such as the United Nations and the International Financial Institutions, as well as international corporate and non-governmental initiatives.

The human rights movement is one of the most successful social justice movements of our time, establishing universal principles that govern how states should treat citizens and non-citizens. The movement strengthens, and is strengthened by, a complex web of institutions, laws, and norms that constitute a functioning global system that builds on itself progressively, animated by strong NGOs. The course will address the evolution of the international human rights movement and on the NGOs that drive the movement on the international, regional and domestic levels. Sessions will highlight the experiences of major human rights NGOs and will address topics including strategy development, institutional representation, research methodologies, partnerships, networks, venues of engagement, campaigning, fundraising and, perhaps most importantly, the fraught and complex debates about adaptation to changing global circumstances.

This course introduces the fundamental concepts and problems of international human rights law. What are the origins of modern human rights law? What is the substance of this law, who is obligated by it, and how is it enforced? The course will cover the major international human rights treaties and mechanisms and consider some of today's most significant human rights issues and controversies. While the topics are necessarily law-related, the course will assume no prior exposure to legal studies.