Dear AHRI colleagues,

Welcome to the June edition of our Newsletter. We hope that as summer holidays approach you find more time to attend conferences, classes and workshops that are offered. This will be the last newsletter for the summer months and will return in September. In the meantime, if there is anything you would like us to highlight, please email us. We would like to remind you that registration for the AHRI 2022 Conference is open, you can find more about it below. 

- AHRI Secretariat

AHRI 2022

The Centre for Human Rights at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, will host the AHRI 2022 conference at its Future Africa campus on 2-3 September 2022, preceded by a doctoral/early researcher workshop on 1 September. The theme of the conference will be technology and human rights with panels on the following themes:

Track 1: Surveillance and vulnerability

Track 2 Survival and sustainability

Track 3: Democratic participation and accountability 

The conference will be presented in hybrid format with the possibility of presenting papers in person or online.

Enquiries: magnus.killander@up.ac.za

Read the full call here, ahri_2022_call_for_papers

AHRI Joins LinkedIN

We are now on LinkedIn. Make sure to connect with us to see events, publications, news and more!

Click here to view our page. 

Publication of the second book in the AHRI Series

Edited by Norman Weiß, Extraordinary Professor, Law Faculty and Permanent Senior Fellow, Human Rights Centre, University of Potsdam and Andreas Zimmermann, Professor of Public, Public International and European Union Law, Professor of European and Public International Business Law, and Director of the Human Rights Centre, University of Potsdam, Germany

Where contemporary developments have significantly altered the implementation methods of, and relationship between, human rights law and international humanitarian law, this timely book looks at the future challenges of protecting human rights during and after armed conflicts. Leading scholars use critical case studies to shed light on new approaches used by international courts and experts to balance these two bodies of law. 

Divided into four thematic parts, chapters explore the protection of specific groups and actors during conflicts, including organised armed groups, armed non-state actors, and refugees, as well as using divergent methodological approaches to analyse the extra-territorial application of human rights treaties. Shifting to post-conflict, the book further examines the tools and practices involved in building lasting peace and sustainable post-conflict order while avoiding future resurrection of armed conflict. It concludes by considering whether the traditional interpretation of international law is still apt for the twenty-first century. 

You can find it, here. 

Human Rights Centre, Queen’s University, Belfast

News

“Theorizing Empirical Court Research”

Dr Sharon Weill gave a seminar  on “Theorizing Empirical Court Research” at QUB Human Rights Centre on 3 May 2022 at 1pm. The seminar was well attended. Make sure to follow them on twitter here, to catch their other events. 

“Neoliberalism and the Critique of Human Rights”

Dr. Jessica Whyte gave a guest seminar on “Neoliberalism and the Critique of Human Rights” at QUB Human Rights Centre on 11 May 2022 at 10.30am. 

Centre for the Study of Human Rights Law, University of Strathclyde, United Kingdom

News

May , 2022

Professor Elisa Morgera attends Glion Dialogue on the international recognition of the human right to a healthy environment

Professor Elisa Morgera was invited to the eighth Glion Human Rights Dialogue on 16-17 May 2022 in Switzerland, to focus on the question: “the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment - what does it mean for States, for rights-holders and for nature?”

The Glion Human Rights Dialogue is a high-level event bringing together around 65 human rights practitioners and thinkers (including governments, UN officials, independent experts, environmental human rights defenders, and civil society) in an informal space for open exchange and innovative thinking. Prof Morgera had been invited to contribute to a virtual preparatory policy dialogue in February 2022, and was invited to provide a keynote introduction, following remarks by the UN Special Rapporteur on Toxics and Human Rights, for a break-out group on the scope and content of the human right to a healthy environment.

See overview on the website of the Once Ocean Hub research project, here. 

• Call for Applications: PhD Studentship for Law
• Event: 2022 Summer/Winter School on Human Rights and the Environment

Newcastle Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice, Newcastle Law School, University of Newcastle

Call for Applications

Deadline: 30 June, 2022

PhD Studentship for Law

We are offering up to three studentships in law for PhD candidates to join our growing research community. Candidates will be based within one or more of our research groups. We welcome proposals across empirical and non-empirical methodologies and/or those that use interdisciplinary approaches. 

Our studentships include 100% UK Home tuition fees for three years (or part-time equivalent) or 50% reduction for international fees. The School offers conference attendance support (£500 per annum) and the opportunity for additional paid academic support activities including teaching or research assistance (from year two of the PhD studies).

Applicants should outline how their proposed research is situated in one or more of the research groups. They are welcome to contact the convenor of the relevant groups (details on the relevant web pages) to discuss their proposals and how they align with the groups’ priorities.

For more details and information for  how to apply visit the website, here. 

Centre for the Study of Human Rights Law, University of Strathclyde, United Kingdom

Event

June 20-28, 2022

2022 Summer/Winter School on Human Rights and the Environment

For the second year running, the One Ocean Hub research project will share research findings and methods at the Summer/Winter School on Human rights and the Environment (20-28 June 2022) co-hosted by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Global Network for Human Rights and the Environment (GNHRE). 

The School aims at raising awareness and building the capacity of human rights activists, researchers, and governments representatives from around the world on the basis of perspectives and experiences from the Global South. 

The theme of 2022 Summer/Winter School, “Water – from Oceans to Taps” is expected to shed light on the human rights challenges faced in relation to the freshwater, coastal and marine environment. The One Ocean Hub co-developed with UNEP and the Global Network this year’s call for panels, and has co-developed six different panels at the GNHRE and UNEP Summer/Winter School 2022.

Full details are available, here. 

• Event: Book Symposium- Human Rights in Times of Transition: Liberal Deomcracy and the Challenge of National Security

Global Justice Academy, University of Edinburgh, UK

Event

Date: June 9, 2022

Book Symposium - Human Rights in Times of Transition: Liberal Democracy and the Challenge of National Security

Human Rights in Times of Transition' is a new publication co-edited by Dr Kasey McCall-Smith and Dr Elisenda Casanas Adam of Edinburgh Law School, in collaboration with Dr Andrea Birdsall (School of Social and Political Science).

The hardback was released on 24 November 2020, and is available from Edward Elgar Publishing.

This timely book explores the extent to which national security has affected the intersection between human rights and the exercise of state power. It examines how liberal democracies, long viewed as the proponents and protectors of human rights, have transformed their use of human rights on the global stage, externalising their own internal agendas.

Contextualising human rights goals, structures and challenges in the immediate post-UDHR era, key chapters analyse the role that national security has played in driving competition between individual rights and rhetoric-laden, democracy-reinforcing approaches to collective rights of security. Internationally diverse authors offer evocative insights into the ways in which law is used to manipulate both intra and interstate relationships, and demonstrate the constant tensions raised by a human rights system that is fundamentally state-centric though defined by individuals’ needs and demands. Acknowledging the challenges in contemporary human rights practice, policy and discourse as features of transitional eras in human rights, this forward-thinking book identifies opportunities to correct past inadequacies and promote a stronger system for the future.

This is a hard-hitting and much needed study for students and scholars of human rights, security law, constitutional law and international relations more widely. Its practical dimensions will also greatly benefit practitioners in the field. 

This event is free and open to all but registration is required and can be done here