Journal of Human Rights Spring 2015

Journal of

Human Rights at NYU spring 2015

the journal of human rights is a student-run publication at new york university dedicated to bringing various human rights issues to light. the spring 2015 issue includes academic, op-ed, artistic, and creative pieces from nyu students. we thank all students who submitted to the journal and the members of our staff who worked tirelessly this semester to produce it.

Executive board President: Komal Patel Vice President: Taylor Maloney Treasurer: Rebecca McCarthy Secretary: Ryan Koul Communications Director: Tina Musigdilok

staff writers

staff editors

Emily Albert Linda Higazy Magi Higazy Lavanya Hinduja Lauren Parnaby Nora Rigney Maxwell Smith Shilpa Venigandla

Francesca Flink Audrey Gascho Maxwell Smith

letter from the editor Dear Reader, Thank you for your interest in The Journal of Human Rights at NYU. Our staff editors and writers have been working tirelessly to produce this publication, spending hours each week in researching human rights violations, fine-tuning their arguments and topical discussions, and crafting a high-quality journal for your benefit.

As technology has made the world a smaller place, we find that in turn, we must become more globally aware citizens.

Oftentimes we hear about international crises through a headline but look no further. Our attempt in creating this journal and highlighting the geographic locations in which these human rights violations occur is to engage the NYU community on these issues and demonstrate how widespread and damaging they can be.

We also challenged our staff to think more about complications within the human rights discourse at large. To that effect, many of our pieces revolve around the theoretical frameworks through which we understand human rights and their effects. In turn, we challenge our readers to approach both the topics within our journal and topics outside our journal in the same critical way.

Finally, we would like to thank NYU for providing an environment conducive to exploring and tackling issues of human rights. We would like to thank our writers and editors for their dedication to their work and this organization. And, of course, we would like to thank our readers once more, for their active interest in The Journal of Human Rights and the issues we are committed to combatting.

Sincerely, Komal Patel President

TABLE OF CONTENTS asia and the middle east

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Sisterhood of Survivors Komal Patel

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Contraception, Catholics, and Clash in the Philippines Mariquit Lu

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Finding a Blasphemous Faith Yael Haiblum

europe

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Who to “Save”?: Veiling and Human Rights Tina Musigdilok

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Human Rights Violations in Eastern Ukraine Maxwell Smith

united states and Latin america

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Queer Injustice Emily Bellor

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X Veronica Slabicki

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Just Money?: Gentrification in the Human Rights Discourse Rebecca McCarthy

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Johnson v. McAdoo (1917): The First Judicial Step in the Quest for Reparations Ryan Fisher

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The Violation of Human Rights in Guantanamo Bay Magi Higazy

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The Inhumanity and Illegality of Extraordinary Rendition Ryan Koul

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Nursing Home Abuse: The Devaluation of Human Life on the Basis of Age Linda Higazy

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Ariam and Nidieska William Martin

Africa

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Justice in Rwanda: Recognizing Economic and Social Rights Bailey Theado

multinational

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Convicting Recruiters of Child Soldiers Lavanya Hinduja

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Mapping, Confinements, and Access to Health Shilpa Veingandla

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The Potential Human Rights Benefits of State Secularization Emily Albert

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Perspective Kai Wahrmann-Harry

sisterhood of survivors komal patel

There was one day of the week that the survivors of Samrakshak Samuha Nepal (SASANE) looked forward to more than anything else-“Movie Day.” I had gone to work for two months at SASANE, an anti-trafficking organization led by survivor-activists, as part of my ethnographic fieldwork to study the reintegration of survivors post-trafficking.

Part of my job was teaching two-hour English classes daily, an assignment that my coworker Lizz and I had only learned of upon arriving at SASANE. Lizz and I realized the dire need for “Movie Day” on both ends; we, who had never taught before, found the task trying and exhausting, and the survivors found it tedious and boring.

Our invention gave us a rest while instilling some sense of excitement into the activists.

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As indicated by its name, these days were special occasions on which Lizz and I supplied an American movie purchased from one of the many shops in Thamel that sold bootlegged DVDs and CDs, and popcorn in lieu of a formal English lesson.

Survivors also completed a sheet of comprehension questions during the movie and answered a longer, paragraph-length question post-viewing. We typically selected movies with strong female leads, such as Frozen, Brave, and Bend it Like Beckham.

After coming across a copy of Mulan, we felt it was perfect for our students.

Mulan defied gender norms and won respect by doing what she thought was right in a society that believed the woman’s place was in the domestic sphere, similar to that of Nepal. The story,

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appropriated by Disney, is based off of an ancient Chinese ballad in which a girl named Mulan disguises herself as a boy, takes the place of her elderly father in the army, and becomes a war hero.

For our post-viewing writing exercise, every student wrote about who her favorite character from the movie was and why.

Lizz and I had expected that most of the survivors would have chosen Mulan as their favorite character, and many of them did. They loved her bravery, her competitive spirit, and her sense of duty.

To our surprise, however, most of the students cited Mushu, Mulan’s trusty lucky dragon, as their favorite character. Anjali was the first one to read her response favoring Mushu. She believed Mushu was the most important character in the

whole movie because “any girl who is facing against the society needs the support in order to become the success.�

This anecdote demonstrates how fundamental these survivors believe a support system to be. Mulan, a character who is perfectly capable of challenging society in her own right, was still considered by them to be secondary in importance to Mushu. One way in which this support system can be formed during reintegration is through the use of survivor-to-survivor connections, and more specifically, survivor-led programs.

The community at SASANE and the bonds these activists shared with one another are also built through the mutual vulnerability that survivors undergo when discussing their stories with each other. This, and the understanding that sur-

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vivors provide, allow other survivors to feel more comfortable with them, which is needed in bringing about a successful reintegration.

Indira, president and one of the founders of SASANE, is very passionate about the survivor-to-survivor style of reintegration. She says, “It is very helpful for survivors to work with other survivors because nonsurvivors don’t respect.” The other survivors interviewed feel this same sentiment; they all believe that nonsurvivors lack the capacity to understand what a trafficked person has gone through, and this makes it hard for the nonsurvivors to help survivors.

Anthropologist Denise Brennan finds the same desire for connection with other formerly trafficked persons among survivors of labor trafficking in the United States. She writes, “Running from gossip in their own coethnic communities, the group of friends who met at the shelter for trafficking clients in Los Angeles found that they could trust one another with anything” (Brennan 2013: 124-125).

She goes on to describe how these friends explained, “‘With one another and other survivors we feel free…We

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understand. We can share with one another like a family’” (Brennan 2013: 125). The Nepali survivors I worked with are not alone in feeling deeper bonds with survivors rather than nonsurvivors.

When I asked Shyam, SASANE’s managing director, why it is important to incorporate survivors into the reintegration process, he replied with a Nepalese proverb he had heard as a child: “Snakes know that other snakes have legs.”

Things that survivors may be experiencing or have experienced that are not apparent to nonsurvivors may get overlooked. Survivors, on the other hand, can better recognize these things that are invisible to someone who wasn’t formerly trafficked.

Though there is much left to do in order to strengthen our current anti-trafficking movement, this should be a welcome challenge both for anthropologists interested in human rights and advocates across disciplines. As Brennan says, the story of how survivors slip “through the cracks of the trafficking care regime” is underreported and overlooked (Brennan 2013: 130). Reintegration, and what happens in general to

formerly trafficked persons after rescue, is greatly understudied. This is a dismaying fact in itself, for support of any kind is greatly appreciated and cherished by formerly trafficked persons taking on the world, as evidenced by the SASANE survivors’ love for Mushu, the little dragon who stood

by Mulan.

works cited Brennan, Denise. Life Interrupted: Trafficking into Forced Labor in the United States. Durham: Duke UP, 2014. Print.

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contraceptives, catholics, and clash in the philippines mariquit lu

The contraceptive market in the Philippines suffers from a national and local inability to separate church and state. Since the mid1980s, policies striving for economic growth, poverty reduction and population regulation have turned to family planning (FP) for solutions.

Despite widespread increasing demand for family planning, the Philippines has struggled to achieve self-reliant contraceptive security over the past 30 years. The nation instead relied heavily on foreign aid to achieve their goals. Since the turn of the century, the Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5 (MDGs 4, 5) have further spurred the need for contraceptive access. Most recently, the 2012 Reproductive Health Bill passed, detailing reinvigorated support for FP services and supplies (RA No. 10354 2012). Pressure

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from the Catholic Church and rapid changes in administration means ever-changing, ambiguous policies, which in turn have restricted government-led procurement and delayed distribution.

The lack of past contraceptive security contributes to the country’s persistently high fertility rate, population growth, and maternal and infant mortality. This paper serves as a retrospective look at the consequences of politics and religion on the institutions that support contraceptive access in the Philippines. Additionally, maternal mortality is at 162 per 100,000 live births, far from the country’s MDG target of only 52 maternal deaths per 100,000 births by 2015. The World Health Organization, foreign aid organizations such as USAID as well as Philippine’s Commission on Population

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(POPCOM) evidence these dismal indicators toward the increased need for contraceptives.

Unfortunately for these goals of population regulation and millennium development, religious politics heavily influences both demand and supply of contraceptives. Despite a Catholic majority, 9 out of 10 Filipinos consider FP important and advocate for modern methods (Pastrana and Harris 2010). Unmet need for modern FP currently stands at 22.3%. On the other hand, the Catholic Church in the Philippines has long been a proponent for natural family planning (NFP) methods.

The Church’s influence on national- and local-level politics has created a fluctuating climate for contraceptives in the Philippines, oscillating between hostile, supporting or ambiguous to contra-

ceptives that would fill the growing, unmet need.

Whereas other countries in the ASEAN region have made wide strides in reproductive health, the Philippines’ contraceptive market remains especially poor in comparison. The World Health Organization has long recognized family planning as crucial in ensuring healthy mothers, healthy children, curbed population growth, and increased socioeconomic mobility and education (WHO 2013). Contraceptive use has increased steadily since the 1960s, with women from poorer households and rural areas registering the most rapid gains (Lamberte 2000).

However, 1 out of 3 Filipinos live under the poverty rate (33%), and the Philippines population growth is at 2.04% and fertility at 3.3%, both the highest rates in the

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ASEAN region (Pastrana and Harris 2010).

Catholicism has been the major religion in the Philippines for nearly 500 years.

When President Ferdinand Marcos took office in 1969, the nation’s Catholic community criticized his stance on reproductive health. Nevertheless, his family planning program brought stability in fertility rate and population growth for nearly 20 years. Under his successor, President Corazon Aquino, contraceptive policies took a step back due to her strong ties to the Catholic Church.

Around that time, ultimate church authority in the nation was the Philippine Catholic Bishops Conference (CBCP) (Herrin 2007). As an influential body in Philippine politics and society, it serves as a united voice of the church and advocated for the installment of Aquino as Marcos’ replacement.

Although the CBCP holds no official government authority, the political climate in the nation is such that the Church’s sway with public opinion holds a great deal of power over politicians. From Arroyo’s presidency onward, they continue to exert this authority against modern contraceptives. Among

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many actions, the CBCP has been integral in illegalizing abortion and abortifacient drugs such as emergency contraception (Pastrana and Harris 2010).

The following administrations of President Ramos and Estrada attempted to regain momentum for family planning (Lamberte 2000).

President Ramos even drafted a reproductive health bill, which he hoped to serve as a renewed commitment to universal access to birth control. The CBCP would go on to strategically keep this bill bottled up in the Philippine legislature for 15 years, until 2012.

The CBCP also played a prominent role in a second revolution that removed President Estrada in favor of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

When Arroyo became president in 2001, she pushed for the National NFP Strategic Plan 2002-2006 (AO No 125) (USAID 2002). The plan was in line with the Catholic Church’s stand that NFP are the only acceptable methods. Arroyo’s presidency lasted until 2010, and her successor, Benigno Aquino, III, is only now beginning to undo a decade’s worth of CBCP-backed NFP policy (Casauay 2012). In 2012,

he bypassed the Catholic Church by allocating $500 million (US$12.01 million) to the DOH for modern family planning commodities and supplies. Since the 1980s, the Catholic Church’s hand in politics have left outdated policies, incomplete frameworks and LGUs with insufficient capacity to establish a self-reliant, consistent and organized contraceptive market in the Philippines.

These challenges plague the DOH, LGUs, and other institutions that support growth of the contraceptive market. Because of these governmental inconsistencies, the Philippines has had to heavily rely on USAID and other in-kind foreign donations for contraceptive procurement and distribution. USAID has been providing contraceptives to the Philippines for nearly 50 years (USAID 2002). A combination of a hostile political environment and the presence of USAID meant that the Philippine DOH struggled to establish efficient policy and regulation on procurement, distribution, and price segmentation plan.

USAID began to to phase-out contraceptive donations in 2001, refocusing initiatives toward building

capacity of the national government, private sector and LGUs to deliver FP commodities and services (USAID 2002, Connel 2005).

USAID condom supplies ended in 2002 and supplies of pills and injectables were gradually withdrawn over 2004-2008 (Connel 2005). USAID commodities completely ended by 2010 (Pastrona and Harris 2010).

The USAID’s phase out, called the Contraceptive Self-Reliance (CSR) strategy, aimed to force the DOH to procure contraceptives using the national budget (USAID 2002). However, there is still no national budget line for family planning. The DOH is still hindered by AO No 40, which prohibits the government from procuring contraceptives not listed in the Philippine National Drug Formulary (PNDF), and are limited to about 5 contraceptive choices out of over 20 brands of contraceptives available in the Philippine market. At the local level, because LGUs are politically, administratively and financially autonomous from one another, they collective have failed to establish pooled procurement through a prime vendor for various regional facilities.

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The deeply embedded involvement of the Church in national politics has slowed down the country’s ability to organize a sustainable contraceptive market without foreign aid. The result is unmet need of modern methods demanded by Filipinas and has repercussions in population growth, education, natural resource capacity and socioeconomic mobility.

However, national and local opposition to the CBCP is not absent. The current president, DOH and LGUs find ways to bypass the Church’s influence. The long-awaited Reproductive Health Bill of 2012 is a hopeful sign of renewed commitment and progress. The landmark approval merits further discussion about the current nuances and capacities of public sector and private sector actors of the contraceptive market, and how the Reproductive Health Bill will affect suppliers, providers and users.

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works cited Armstrong, Paul E. Audit of USAID/Philippines’ Response to Customs Duties Levied on Donated Contraceptives. Rep. no. 5-492-99006-P. USAID, September 27 1999. Print.

Casauay, Angela. President Aquino signs RH bill into law. Rappler, December 2012. Print.

Connel, P, Cindi Cisek, Joan Robertson. Support to Contraceptive Social Marketing in the Philippines, Performance and Prospects.

Bethesda, MD: Private Sector Partnerships – One project, Abt Associates Inc. 2005.

Family Planning Fact Sheet No 351. World Health Organization.

USAID. 2013. Web: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/ fs351/en/ Herrin, Alejandro N. “17 Development of the Philippines ‘Family Planning Program: The Early Years, 1967–80.” The global family planning revolution: Three decades of population policies and programs 1967 (2007): 277.

Identification of Viable Alternative Modes of Contraceptive Procurement by the Department of Health. Publication. Philippines: USAID, 2002. Print.

Lamberte, Exaltacion E,. Nanette R. Lee, and Desiree COncepcio nU. Garganian. Family Planning Service Utilization and Market Segmentation in the Philippines. Calverton, Maryland: ORC Macro 2000. Print Osias, Tomas M. Reproductive Health Commodity Security: Philippine Experience. Commission on Population, Philippines. 2008.

Pastrana, Q and L Harris. Demographic Governance and Family Planning: The Philippines’ Way Forward. Bixby Center, Venture Strategies. 2010.

Republic Act No. 10354. The Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012. House Bill No. 4244, Senate Bill No. 2865. President Benigno Aquino III.

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Finding a Blasphemous Faith Yael heiblum

Her soft brown bangs slightly fall in front of her eyes as she quickly pushes them behind her left ear, only a few seconds before saying, “I hate how the fact that being Saudi stopped me from getting what I want.”

My roommate had spoken to me about Amina; about how inspirational her story was to the members of the Church of Latter Day Saints at which they had met, and how beautiful and hopeful a person she was despite her situation. I looked into Amina’s eyes trying to read the emotions behind them; the awkward nerves of meeting someone for the first time were starting to evaporate.

What took their place was something honest, something bare, something raw.

Something I had seen before.

It was like coming face to face with pain. But it wasn’t mine. I felt it through the

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eyes of the Afghan girl in the photograph in front of me: tears coming together at the corners of her eyes, piercing through the lens of the camera and across to the viewer. My eyes would flutter around her face, trying not to focus in on the gap where her nose should be, trying not to feel the inevitable shivers creeping deeper and deeper into my skin. Bibi Aisha, 18, was disfigured as retribution for fleeing her husband’s house in Afghanistan. This photograph taken

by Jodi Bieber had won the 2011 World Press Photo of the Year not simply for the shock of the image itself, but for bringing to surface the story about one of many girls who tried to run away from a violent, forceful relationship, and was punished by having her ears and nose sliced off.

The profound pain that I could see in the eyes of

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the girl in the photograph wasn’t the same as Amina’s.

As every word coming out of Amina’s mouth hooked me even deeper into her story, I realized it wasn’t solely Islam that interested me, but the disconnection between choosing a religion, and being forced to follow one. Though I had learned about Islam before, I found myself interested in Muslim women and the potential oppression Islam placed on their lives since religious beliefs seep into social life and law, preventing women from doing things, such as drive in Saudi Arabia. Especially in Saudi Arabia, religion is not only present when going to Church on Sundays, but exists in every aspect of social life. Is being Muslim, Jewish, Christian, or Buddhist just a set of practices and beliefs, or is it an entire culture that revolves around

adopting a set of rules that perhaps we never actively chose?

For people born and living in Saudi Arabia, the possibility of choosing a religion is systematically abolished: for it is not only frowned upon by society to be a “bad Muslim”, or one who doesn’t follow the laws of the religion, but the religious beliefs are further enforced by the government. As Amina said to me that day at the beginning of our interview, “to be Saudi you need to be a Muslim. There are no other religions – it’s the way of life over there.” Having lived in Saudi Arabia for several years of her life, including her high school years, Amina Malouf, 19 years old and currently studying at New York University, experienced the repression of the religious police first-handedly. Amina wanted to live a normal high

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school life, balancing school, family, and friends. It was in the international high school that she attended, that she met her boyfriend Chad: an American who had come to Saudi because of his father’s job, and who practiced the Mormon religion. Trying to keep the relationship with her boyfriend a secret from her family was especially hard, knowing that if she were seen in public with a boy, the mutaween (or religious police) would harass her and tell her parents. It would be even worse if they found out he was a practicing Mormon, for no other religions other than Islam can be openly practiced in Saudi Arabia. Her mother would never allow her to date someone who wasn’t a Saudi, and never, in her wildest dreams, would she be able to date an American Mormon.

“It’s really hard for guys and girls to go out together in public, because that’s not allowed. Once my sister was in the mall with a guy and the police took him away and questioned him”, says Amina as she explains the pressure of the religious police on her daily life. The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice

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(CPVPV), or the mutaween, or hai’a, dress in white robes and red-checkered headscarves. Patrolling the streets and public spaces throughout Saudi Arabia, some 4,000 members of the mutaween enforce dress codes, the strict separation of men and women, the observance of daily prayers and other behavior that it considers to fall under the purview of Islam (Al-Sharif).

“I want to change, I want to be good. I’ve always believed in God but I never followed the rules, and I’d always be, like, I wish I could be a good Muslim. Of course I couldn’t be perfect, but I couldn’t do it.” Amina mentions that while living in Saudi Arabia she tried covering herself and practicing Islam more closely, but the teachings never cemented – she never felt connected to what she was doing.

As she learned more and more about Mormonism, Amina felt as though something had awakened in her.

It was as though that same desire to be good that she felt when trying to apply Islam to her life resonated louder with Mormonism.

“I feel like religion is very personal, and there’s a right one for each person specifi-

cally... With Islam there are so many conflicted ideas that I just don’t know where to stand. The Church appealed to me so much more, and Islam just hadn’t worked for me.” For Amina, Islam was directly connected to her family as it wasn’t only expected for her to follow the religion as a law, but felt even more forced by her traditional family. Not following the commandments of Islam meant being shunned by her own family and bringing shame upon them, whereas for Mormons everyone has their own path and makes mistakes. This is one of the main aspects that appealed to Amina, for according to her, “in the Church, people are very open to admitting they make mistakes – whereas in Islam my parents would kill me if they found out I went against them.

I felt like I had to be perfect, and I was so scared of admitting I had done something wrong. I just knew I

was going to be condemned to Hell, because I didn’t do everything perfectly.”

“I hate how the fact that I’m Saudi stopped me from getting what I want. It was horrible. I hate how you’re forced to be that. Even to my parents I have to pretend to be someone I’m not – to be a good Muslim.” I look up from my coffee cup to look into Amina’s eyes. I realized the pain I had seen since the moment we sat down to talk, hadn’t gone away. But it wasn’t a pain of oppression.

It was a pain of pressure and sadness, of being molded to fit a set of rules to become someone you don’t want to become. The tears forming at the bottom of her eyes from the pain of possibly never seeing her family again was balanced by the glimmer of joy in her smile of knowing she had chosen the right path for herself.

works cited Al-sharif, Manal. “Rein In the Saudi Religious Police.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 10 Feb. 2014. Web. 07 Apr. 2014.

Malouf, Amina. Personal interview. 27 April 2014.

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who to “save”?: Veiling and Human rights tina musigdilok

Veiling typically refers to the type of religious dress worn by Muslim women. It includes not only the burqa, but also other types of veiling, such as the niqab and chadris (Brems 3-4). The face veil, in particular, has been heavily embroiled in human rights and women’s rights discourse for many years since the rise of the Taliban in the early 2000s.

The choice to wear a veil is sometimes a woman’s own, and sometimes not. This, along with the fact that facial veiling is not inherently a “violent” practice like female genital cutting, makes it difficult for human rights organizations and state governments to come up with a solution that will protect the rights of all women, not just one particular group.

In framing veiling as part of the human rights discourse, there are two

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separate issues that must be taken into account. The first is that forced veiling can be seen as a curtailment of the women’s rights and their agencies over their own bodies. Although veiling may now be commonly perceived as a practice imposed upon women, particularly in the Islamic states of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Afghanistan, this was not always the case; up until the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran, the veil was a choice for women (Abu-Odeh 1527).

Islamic fundamentalist dress was adopted and enforced beginning in the 1980s. The veil was now to be worn over a woman’s head and clothes whenever in the presence of men. The veil, in this way, effectively “concealed” women’s bodies that were seen as “too sexual” and shaming towards her family (Abu-Odeh 1529). In a United Nations

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document discussing violent cultural family practices against women, clauses 86 and 87 condemn practices that “compel” women to conform to a dress code that aims to “desexualize” and “restrict” women and their freedom of expression (UNCHR 25-26). This document condemns cultural relativism as being an often cited excuse to “permit inhuman and discriminatory practices against women” (UNCHR 28-29). Under these rules, the burqa and similar veils should be seen as a violation of women’s rights.

The blanket banning of veiling, on the other hand, is also considered to be a violation of freedom of expression.

In 2005, the Netherlands became the first European country to implement a blanket ban on all types of face covering (Moors 19). Following that, other countries

such as France and Belgium also began to implement their own nationwide bans on face coverings. The Netherlands and a number of other European countries had become “increasingly Muslim unfriendly” following the 9/11 attacks, and veils were catapulted into the center of these political issues (Moors 24). One cited reason for the ban in the Netherlands was that “the burqa is a symbol of women’s oppression and hence inhumane” (Moors 21).

These bans on face coverings were politically fueled, but hidden under a heavy rhetoric of the “oppressive” nature of veils on Muslim women.

At the time when veiling bans were beginning to gain traction in a number of European nations, the only human rights organization to comment on this was Amnesty International. Amnesty International stated

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that these bans would be a violation of Muslim women’s religious freedom (Brems 1).

Eva Brems writes that these bans were not supported by any empirical research and were solely driven my misconceptions about the veil.

They overlook the individual choices of women who may actually want to wear the veil of their own free will as part of their personal religion. In these attempts to “free” Muslim women from the oppressive reins of the veil, European nations were actually further inhibiting Muslim women from exercising their own rights.

The United Nations provides some suggestions towards addressing violent or harmful cultural practices including veiling.

Recommendations at both the international and state level suggest that there need to be laws put in place and actively enforced to ensure that cultural practices in the family do not hinder the rights of women (UNCHR 33-34). However, because of the veiling issue’s dual nature, intervention solutions that protect all Muslim women become hard to find.

Turning a blind eye towards forced veiling is not a good option. However, blanket

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bans on veiling, like those enforced in many European countries, are too general of a solution. From here, it seems that in addressing veiling and its complexities, a degree of reconciliation between universalism, a doctrine that promotes a universal application of rights to all humans, and cultural relativism, an approach that considers an issue from the viewpoint of a certain culture, is needed. The solution that anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod suggests comes in the form of “respect for difference” (Abu-Lughod 789). She argues that an important factor to consider is the agency, or personhood, of Muslim women. She warns that believing the misconception that veiling must be eliminated at all costs to “save” Muslim women, is buying into an ethnocentric, “West-is-best” ideology. Likewise, thinking the complete opposite and justifying veiling as being simply a part of culture is negligent and does nothing to make the world a better place, which in her opinion, is what we should all be striving to do.

There have been human rights efforts to address both problems, but none that seem to correctly remedy

the issue. Ultimately, both situations – “oppressing” or “emancipating” – are efforts to dictate the way women dress. The end goal that needs to be achieved is ensuring that Muslim women get to express their religion and their bodies in the way that they want.

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works cited Abu-Lughod, Lila. “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and its Others.”

American Anthropologist 104. 2002. 783-790.

Abu-Odeh, Lama.“Post-Colonial Feminism and the Veil: Considering the Differences.” New England Law Review 26. 1992.

Brems, Eva. “Introduction to the Volume.” The Experiences of Face Veil Wearers in Europe and the Law. Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Moors, Annelies. “Face Veiling in the Netherlands: Public Debates and Women’s Narratives.” The Experiences of Face Veil Wearers in Europe and the Law. Cambridge University Press, 2014.

UN Commission on Human Rights, Report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy, submitted in accordance with Commission on Human Rights resolution 2001/49: Cultural practices in the family that are violent towards women, 31 January 2002.

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Human Rights Violations in Eastern Ukraine maxwell smith

Since early 2014, an armed conflict has been waged in eastern Ukraine between pro-Russian armed groups and the Ukrainian military. At least 5,400 people have been killed, more than a million Ukrainians have been internally displaced and thousands more have been wounded, captured or are missing.

However, these statistics form a small but easily reportable part of the picture.

Reporting on the conflict primarily focuses on certain dramatic events, such as the shooting-down of the Malaysia Airline Flight MH17, before fading from the public consciousness. The reality of day-to-day life in the conflict region is affected as much by the definitives of deaths and injuries and occasional, particularly dramatic events, as it is by the human rights violations which are

apparently commonplace.

It is worth describing these reported violations in order to appreciate fully the extent and the various forms of the conflict’s violence. They have developed over time, in severity and breadth of impact.

This paper will trace that development to the present day.

In March and April 2014, pro-Russian protesters seized administrative buildings in the major cities of Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, before declaring two separate republics. Both then united to form an insurgency which began to occupy more land and settlements. In May, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reported that the “leaders and members of these armed groups commit an increasing number of human rights

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abuses, such as abductions, harassment, unlawful detentions, in particular of journalists” (May 2014, 4).

At that point, the human rights abuses, and the military campaign overall, were far less widespread. As the OHCHR report identifies, the focus was primarily on journalists. However, these abuses set a precedent of blatant disregard, if not outright hostility, toward the wellbeing of those not involved in the conflict. As the OHCHR report establishes, that disregard manifested itself in apparently systematic programs of human rights abuses.

By June 2014, the conflict had intensified, as the Ukrainian government responded with an expanded military campaign. The OHCHR reported that the targets of the human rights abuses were “no longer limited to targeting journalists, elected representatives” and other politically active members of society (June 2014, 3). The “criminal activity resulting in human rights abuses” had spread to “the broader population of the two eastern regions” and now involved “abductions, detentions, acts of ill-treatment and torture, and

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killings by armed groups” (Ibid.). Within three months of attempting to establish independent republics, the rebel rule had already produced extensive criminal activity which, in turn, caused extensive and gross human rights violations.

By July, this extensive criminal activity proved to be the rule, not the exception, to the way in which the self-declared ‘republics’ sought to maintain order.

According to the OHCHR, “the rule of law no longer existed and was replaced by the rule of violence” (July 2014, 3). This “rule of violence” was supplemented by a concerted effort to deprive the population of the occupied areas of “critical public utilities like water, electricity and sewerage plants.” All were shut down by the rebel groups and numerous public buildings and residences were attacked, all producing an “increased level of fear” (Ibid.). The rebels continued to establish that their method of rule is deeply violent, concerned far less with human rights and providing an effective alternative to the Ukrainian government than with the seizure of territory and the pursuit of victory in a grand ideological conflict

The above graph displays the number of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Ukraine, for each month since April of last year.

The consistent increase in the number of IDPs during the past year is striking; at no point did the conflict settle. It is worth noting also that, despite the creation of the Second Minsk Agreement in February 2015, nearly 125,000 Ukrainians were displayed from February to March 2015. It remains to be seen whether the conflict will settle. Even if it does do so, the problem of nearly 1.2 million IDPs in Ukraine will remain a burden on the country for a long time to come.

“Ukraine: Overview of population displacement.” UNHCR. Web. 15 Jul. 2014.

“Eastern Ukraine Conflict Briefing Note.” ACAPS. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.

“IOM’s Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons in Ukraine - Monthly Report.” IOM-MOM. Web. 18 Nov. 2014.

“IOM’s Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons in Ukraine - Monthly Report.” IOM-MOM. Web. Dec. 2014.

“ECHO Factsheet.” EU Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection. Web. 16 Feb. 2015.

“Ukraine: Internally Displaced People.” UNHCR. Web. 9 Feb. 2015.

“Ukraine IDP Figures Analysis.” IDMC. Web. Mar. 2015.

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with the rest of Ukraine.

Throughout the following months, the conflict escalated rapidly. The Ukrainian government’s offensive force increased greatly in number, just as the rebels’ force did.

During August, the OHCHR reported that “at least 36 people [had been] killed on average each day” and that “the number of casualties has more than doubled in total since the last report issued one month ago” (Aug. 2014, 3).

In September, Amnesty International published a report asserting that “members of the [Ukrainian volunteer] Aidar territorial defence battalion . . . have been involved in widespread abuses, including abductions, unlawful detention, ill-treatment, theft, extortion and possible executions” (AI 8 Sep 2014). It was one of the first major reports to accuse the Ukrainian armed forces of having also committed human rights abuses, though the perpetrators were allegedly only members of volunteer battalions. Regardless, the report proves that, by September, human rights violations had become a feature of the actions of both sides and that the inhabitants of the conflict

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regions were subject to a situation which was becoming more impossible to live in.

The OHCHR report from December 2014 asserted that “the total breakdown in law and order and the violence and fighting in the eastern regions . . . has for the past eight months had a direct impact on all fundamental human rights - including the security, liberty and well-being - of individuals living there” (3). During the first two months of 2015, the fighting continued as viciously as ever. Although the Minsk Agreement is now slowly being maintained by both sides, the consistent pattern of human rights abuses proves that a focus should continue to be placed on the day-to-day reality of life for those within the conflict regions, who have been subject to consistent and gross human rights violations for nearly a year.

Even if the ceasefire is maintained, there is no guarantee that these human rights violations will end.

works cited Amnesty International. Ukraine - Abuses and War Crimes by the Aidar Volunteer Battalion in the North Luhansk Region. 8 September 2014.

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine.

---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 15 May 2014.

---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 15 June 2014 ---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 15 July 2014 ---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 29 August 2014 ---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 15 December 2014 ---. Report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. 15 February 2015

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queer injustice emily bellor

It is no secret that sexual violence runs rampant and unchecked in American prisons. However, the disproportionate impact that sexual abuse and assault have on incarcerated queer and gender-nonconforming bodies and the culpability of the state for these conditions is less widely known. A study found that sexual orientation is the greatest determinant of sexual abuse in prisons; 18.5% of queer incarcerated people have reported sexual assault (and of course there are many, many more victims who never reported anything). Women are more likely than men to be abused by prison staff; with queer and gender-nonconforming women having the highest rates of abuse. The American prison has been constructed around Christian values and morality, thus their goal has always been not

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just to punish crime, but to punish “deviant” or “immoral” sexual identity. Prisons seek to instill incarcerated people with rigid and traditional sex and gender roles, thus queer people in prison (or suspected queer people) have always been especially punished, more so than their heterosexual counterparts, with “sexual systemic violence, forced segregation of sexual and gender expression, and failure to provide medically necessary treatment for conditions deemed queer, including hormone therapy and treatment of HIV/ AIDS.” (Mogul, Ritchie & Whitlock 93-94) The prohibition of any kind of sexual activity in prisons is evidence of the drive to quell, contain and prevent the “potential rampant homosexuality” believed to exist in prisons. Even interactions with visitors are regulated—

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hugging and kissing is not allowed between a visitor and an incarcerated person of the same sex (while it is allowed for those of the opposite sex). These are precautions to preserve the “sanctity of heterosexuality”.

(Mogul, et. al. 96)

Those most targeted by the system and by their fellow inmates are transgender incarcerated people.

People are incarcerated and segregated based on genitalia, not gender identity.

Therefore, the overwhelming majority of incarcerated transwomen are housed in male prisons. The leading argument against housing transwomen in female prisons is that they would pose a threat to the incarcerated ciswomen, but there is no evidence supporting this theory. Meanwhile, it has been substantially proven through multiple instances of sex-

ual assault and abuse that transwomen are endangered in male facilities. Because they do not conform to the gender binary embraced by the prison system, because they are “deviant”, transgender incarcerated people are not seen as needing or deserving of protection. The deliberate housing of trans people in unsafe spaces is a way of punishing them for their identity. On the other hand, some options for protective housing, called administrative segregation units, limit the opportunities incarcerated trans and queer people have for socialization, recreation, education, and ability to accrue “good time” credits. Some queer and gender-nonconforming inmates are placed in ad-seg units against their will. (Mogul, et. al. 107-108)

The deliberate refusal of prisons to incarcerate people

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based on gender identity, the deliberate refusal to grant protective housing for endangered queer and trans bodies, and the lack of programs and the isolation forced upon queer people incarcerated in ad-seg units are all acts of state violence against the LGBTQ community. Gender-nonconforming and queer prisoners need to be given safe spaces, should be able to stay in places based on gender identity and not genitalia, and should have safe options that do not limit opportunities and are not mandatory.

At Sensuntepeque Penal Center, a prison in San Salvador, formally incarcerated transwoman Karla Avelar has helped transform

the prison into a safe space for queer bodies. The prison holds a unit labeled Sector 2, which houses about fifty transwomen and gay men.

They sleep in a part of the prison that is walled-off from the men’s unit, but they are still able to socialize in and utilize common areas. The prison also provides them with condoms. (Feder & Courtright, “Meet the Trans Sex Worker Who Transformed a Gang-Controlled Prison”) American prisons should be obligated to maintain spaces such as these, and/or (and perhaps for the better) abolish genitalia as a prerequisite for certain housing and incarcerate people based on their gender identity.

works cited Feder, J. Lester; Courtright, Nicola Chavez. “Meet the Trans Sex Worker Who Transformed a Gang-Controlled Prison”. BuzzFeed News. Feb. 8 2015.

Mogul, Joey L.; Ritchie, Andrea J.; Whitlock, Kay (2011-02-15).

Queer (In)Justice: The Criminalization of LGBT People in the United States (Queer Ideas/Queer Action). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.

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u.s. & latin america

X veronica slabicki I read Malcolm and my throat is jammed with x’s.

X-ploitation of the poor for the x-cesses of the rich.

Ghettos full of crack, weed, and x-stasy, and the x-clusivity of education, make for an x-asperated youth fully x-pecting to end up behind bars.

Is god black, and the devil white?

Or do we all want to build our pyramids at the x-pense of the others?

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JUST MONEY?: GENTRIFICATION IN THE HUMAN RIGHTS DISCOURSE REBECCA MCCARTHY

Gentrification, having significant racial, ethnic, and economic connotations, is a complicated, loaded concept that is often thought of as a violation of human rights.

Just over a year ago, for instance, certain residents of North Philadelphia planned to appeal to the United Nations regarding the gentrification of their community as being a violation of their human rights (Russ). While there are some situations in which gentrification might violate certain human rights, in the discussion and critique of gentrification, human rights are being conflated with social injustices.

While the definition of gentrification does not carry racial or ethnic implications, it can in practice. Gentrification is defined as “the process by which an (urban) area is rendered middle class” (“Gentrification”).

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Theoretically, this definition only implies that prior to the gentrification transition, residents of a particular area were low income or working class; practically, however, socioeconomic status has much to do with ethnicity and race. According to U.S. Census data, in 2012, 9.7% of non-Hispanic whites were living in poverty, while 27.2% of blacks and just over a quarter of Hispanics were living in poverty (“Poverty”). There is a significant difference in poverty rates across races. These figures remain consistent with U.S. Census data from 1980, in which 10.2% of non-Hispanic whites, 32.5% of blacks, and 25.7% of Hispanics lived below poverty (“Table 710”).

This poverty gap between whites and blacks/Hispanics reinforces why gentrification is so racialized: gentrification often directly affects

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these populations since they are more likely to be the residents of impoverished, pre-gentrified neighborhoods.

The issue of whether or not gentrification intentionally promotes discrimination is less clear. The U.S. Supreme Court will issue a decision on Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. Inclusive Communities Project regarding housing discrimination this June (Hurley). This case, which will decide whether discrimination as described in the Fair Housing Act must be intentional, could be very helpful in understanding gentrification (Hurley). Freedom from discrimination is the second article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations).

Therefore, the definition of discrimination rendered by the Supreme Court will

have serious implications for understanding gentrification as a human rights issue.

There are instances in which gentrification gives rise to human rights violations. For example, in his study of gentrification in London, Rowland Atkinson writes that while “displacement was most often achieved through rental and price increases,” landlords also used methods of “inducements (cast sums for vacating the premises), harassment, violence and intimidation” (Atkinson 318).

When residents are forced to move through threats, intimidation, or violence, Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states that everyone has the “right to life, liberty, security of person,” is violated (United Nations). People can choose to move based on their inability to afford their

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homes, which can occur for a variety of reasons, such as job loss. However, forced or violently driven displacement is a different issue; it can restrict personal agency and can result in serious danger for those who are displaced. Forced evictions are human rights violations because such abuse or harassment interferes with the right to liberty and security.

Thus, certain cases of gentrification can be considered human rights violations when violence is used as a means of eviction.

However, social issues that come from gentrification are not always human rights abuses. In his New York City discussion of gentrification from 1986, Scott McDonald writes, “the middle-class invasion of the East Village has also provoked fear of displacement among poor neighborhood residents. Conflicts between old and new residents are occasionally reported, and visitors to the East Village cannot fail to notice the antigentrification banners and graffiti that are very much in evidence” (McDonald 176-7). Living in less safe, but more affordable parts of boroughs can be extremely problematic for accessing public trans-

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portation, maintaining jobs and social relationships, and ensuring wellbeing. But are these problems human rights violations? They are certainly social problems, but that does not mean that these potential consequences of gentrification are examples of discrimination.

Though it may place hardship on some, inconvenience is not an infringement of human rights.

In certain cases, gentrification can lead to human rights violations, such as violent displacement. Gentrification, however, is not intrinsically a human rights issue because it does not always displace people and, even if people are displaced, they are still able to find alternate homes that allow them to access resources.

One study actually found that increases in rent, based on research of seven gentrifying neighborhoods, were actually “associated with a lower probability of moving rather than a higher one” (Freeman and Braconi 48). There can certainly be negative social consequences associated with gentrification, but these should not be conflated with human rights violations. In fact, the more we use human rights

to justify issues that are actually problems of social inequalities, the less weight the term “human rights violation� holds. Gentrification is a process that is worth continued monitoring and studying, but to assume that it is intrinsically negative overlooks existing findings of how gentrification influences displacement and draws human rights connections that are not consistently there.

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works cited Atkinson, Rowland. “The hidden costs of gentrification: Displacement in central London.” Journal of Housing and the Built Environment 15.4 (2000): 307-326. JSTOR. Web. 8 March 2015.

Freeman, Lance and Frank Braconi. “Gentrification and Displacement: New York City in the 1990s.” Journal of the American Planning Association 70.1 (2004): 39-52. Web. 10 March 2015.

“Gentrification.” N.d. Oxford English Dictionary. Web. Hurley, Lawrence. “Supreme Court divided over housing discrimination case.” Reuters. Thomas Reuters, 21 Jan. 2015. Web. 10 March 2015.

McDonald, Scott C. “Does Gentrification Affect Crime Rates?”

Crime and Justice Vol. 8 (1986): 163-201. JSTOR. Web. 8 March 2015.

“Poverty in the United States: A Snapshot.” National Center for Law and Economic Justice. National Center for Law and Economic Justice, n.d. Web. 9 March 2015.

Russ, Valerie. “North Philadelphia meeting addresses gentrification.” Philly.com. Philadelphia Media Network (Digital) LLC, 4 March 2014. Web. 10 March 2015.

“Table 710. Poverty Thresholds by Size of Family Unit: 1980 to 2009.” U.S. Census Bureau. U.S. Census Bureau, 2012. Web. 9 March 2015.

United Nations General Assembly. “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights.” United Nations. United Nations, 10 Dec. 1948.

Web. 10 March 2015.

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Johnson v McAdoo (1917): The First Judicial Step in the Quest for Reparations ryan fisher

Human rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson suggests, “The most powerful thing we can do to advance justice is position ourselves someplace uncomfortable and say ‘I’m here’” (November 7, 2014 Tweet). Well, in the here and now, the moral, social, political, and financial issue of reparations to African Americans continues to be “someplace uncomfortable”— even, perhaps, an impossible quest. In order to advance justice, therefore, such reparations must be pursued....whether or not they are ultimately accomplished.

Nothing less than this nation’s future is at stake: Race relations in America are fractured and they must be fixed. The goal of reparations is to repair and the first step towards repairing American society is admitting its past wrongs. In the wake of last year’s protests of a Staten

Island grand jury’s decision not to indict a white police officer in the death of Eric Garner and the related chant “Black Lives Matter,” James Baldwin’s television appearances and written words are once again topical.

In a different context—but equally relevant to reparations—Baldwin writes: Everything now...is in our hands; we have no right to assume otherwise. If we— and now I mean the relatively conscious whites and the relatively conscious blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the consciousness of the others—do not falter in our duty now, we may be able, handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country (Baldwin 346-7).

What are reparations?

How were reparations for

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slavery pursued initially by African Americans? How did their Government respond?

What lessons can be applied in the future? These are several of the overarching questions that contextualize this brief monograph , which revisits the first documented African American Federal reparations litigation, Johnson v McAdoo (1917).

The so-called “cotton tax” case sought damages of approximately $68 million (in current dollars, $1.6 billion), described by the plaintiffs’ attorney Cornelius J Jones thus: [This] is money derived from many million bales of cotton, produced by the labor of the plaintiffs...in consequence of a system of involuntary servitude prevailing...where said cotton was produced under coercion and force... up to the year of 1863,...and for which no compensation was paid plaintiffs...[U] nder said system plaintiffs were denied all remedies or redress before the law for said labor at the time of the performance thereof (Johnson Jones Brief 6).

Such money, raised through taxes imposed on raw cotton without any

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Congressionally-designated purpose, was held in possession of the lawsuit’s defendant William Gibbs McAdoo, the then Secretary of the United States Treasury Department, and was alleged by plaintiffs as “not being the property of the United States according to the constitution, nor subject to any legitimate claim by the defendant” (Johnson Jones Brief 6). Essentially, this case claimed that taxation of cotton constituted unjust enrichment from the labor of enslaved African Americans. It was litigated during the second of “five major waves of political activism that promoted reparations” (Verdun 600) . The plaintiffs’ substantive arguments were ignored in their entirety: the case was dismissed (by trial, appeal, and US Supreme courts) on procedural grounds: in particular, the US Federal Government invoked sovereign immunity. As a result, this country missed an opportunity then to admit its human rights crime of slavery and begin the process of healing American society.

Almost 100 years later, this is unfinished business: The collateral damage of slavery is manifestly evi-

dent, recently in places like Oakland, Ferguson, Cleveland, and Staten Island.

Retracing Johnson v McAdoo’s century-old steps yields important lessons that can inform renewed activism for reparations to descendants of enslaved African Americans, such as how quantification of reparation damages can be argued with cold clear logic and what tactics can be marshaled to garner public support; furthermore, substantive legal arguments made—but ignored in 1917 for technical reasons—can be reprised to fight another day.

Why is a century-old case relevant today? It is because the law is not static.

As Robert Westley observes:

the US Government when accused of a human rights crime.

Slavery in the United States spanned 246 years, from 1619 to 1865. Randall Robinson describes slavery as “a human rights crime without parallel in the modern world [f]or it produces its victims ad infinitum, long after the active stage of the crime has ended” (Robinson 216). The scourges of slavery persist to this day: Analyses of the modern African American experience demonstrate high unemployment, incarceration, foreclosure, poverty rates and low wealth creation, affordable housing access, health care coverage, and upward mobility.

De facto segregation still [T]he law [is] a representaexists; new voter identification of broader social forces, tion laws in several states ideological commitments, would curtail black people’s and entrenched interests... ability to participate in the an expression both literally political process, and culturand figuratively of social-eco- al conservatism attacking nomic value (Westley 81-2). progressive gains of the past is omnipresent. The criminal

If history has taught justice system’s treatment us anything, it is that the of African Americans is also Supreme Court—given the broken, as evidenced by their appropriate alignment of disproportionate surveilUS history and politics—can lance, victimization of police change its mind. One such brutality, arrests, incarcerapossible change would be to tion, recidivism, and capital remove the bullet-proof vest punishment. of sovereign immunity for Reparation—the resto-

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ration, justified by principles of justice, of an inflicted loss through payment by the perpetrator to the victim (normally a member of a large group of claimants)—is a doctrine of international law dating back to Hebrew Scriptures. Notwithstanding the devastating socioeconomic effects of slavery, neither the legislative nor judicial branch of the US Federal Government has ever seriously engaged on the issue of reparations to descendants of enslaved African Americans.

In a November 2001 debate held at Boston University—where Martin Luther King, Jr. received his doctorate in theology—Attorney Alexander Pires discusses the relevance of World War II reparations cases (for Jewish Holocaust victims and Japanese-American internees) to the pursuit of reparations for African Americans:

right is always better than the easy wrong...What is better? The status quo that we always have here or the unknown: to look into something that hasn’t been looked into, to try to look more carefully at our history? (Should Reparations Be Paid)

The US Federal Government’s invocation of sovereign immunity in Johnson—eschewing entirely the case’s merits—is ironic, if not cynical. Slavery is the social, political, economic, and financial foundation of America: It built the White House, US Capitol, and US Supreme Court, and it made this country the richest on earth. This nation, constituted on the basis of racial inequality, should not be able to compound slavery, a “human rights crime without parallel in the modern world,” with the crime of “racial innocence”—the condition described by James [Finding] out what really Baldwin of willful ignorance happened: it’s better for to pervasive racial injustice everyone: the truth is always (Baldwin 292). Racial innobetter...It had nothing to do cence has historically imwith the checks...In the bigbued the political, legal, and ger scheme of things, it had justice systems and public to do with telling the truth: behavior in America. that our country made a

All “relatively conscious” mistake and [was] willing to blacks and whites should stand up for that...The hard embrace Alexander Pires’s

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maxim that “the hard right is always better than the easy wrong.”

works cited Baldwin, James. Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. Seventh Printing ed. New York: Literary Classics of the United States, 1998. Print. The Library of America 98. “The Fire Next Time”: pp 287-347, 1963, 1962, published by Vintage Books

Johnson v McAdoo US Supreme Court Transcript of Record with Supporting Pleadings (October Term, 1916): Motion to affirm submitted by John W Davis, Solicitor General Motion to dismiss submitted by Cornelius J Jones, Attorney for Appellants Brief on behalf of appellants submitted by Cornelius J Jones Robinson, Randall. The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks. New York: Penguin Group (USA), 2001. Print. Previously published in a Dutton edition

Should Reparations Be Paid to the Descendants of Slaves? YouTube. N.p., 19 June 2013. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. <https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=-1hPJC_j0Sc>.

“The Universal Declaration of Human Rights.” UN.org. United Nations, n.d. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. <http://www.un.org/en/documents/ udhr/>.

Verdun, Vincene. “If the Shoe Fits, Wear It: An Analysis of Reparations to African Americans.” Tulane Law Review 67.3 (1993): 597668. HeinOnline. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. <http://ezproxy.library.nyu. edu:2202/HOL/Print?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/ tulr67&id=623&print=section&section=23&ext=.pdf>.

Westley, Robert. “The Accursed Share: Genealogy, Temporality, and the Problem of Value in Black Reparations Discourse.” Representations 92.1 (2005): 81-116. JSTOR.org. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. <http:// www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/rep.2005.92.1.81>.

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THE VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN GUANTANAMO BAY MAGI HIGAZY

A fear of terrorism has gripped the American people since the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. This fear has proven to be one of the main motivations for the use of Guantanamo Bay as a CIA torture facility, a place where prisoners have few, if any, rights. Ultimately, the treatment of prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay needs to be reevaluated and changed since there is significant evidence that human rights are being violated through practices of systematic physical and mental abuse.

Guantanamo Bay, a 45-square-mile piece of land on the southern tip of Cuba, has a controversial history.

Its first use occurred in 1902, when the United States was given permission to lease this land “for use as coaling or naval stations only, and for no other purpose” (“Agreement”). The land did

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not actually develop into a prison until 1991, when it was meant to be a “shelter” for Haitian refugees (“Pentagon”). Yet this shelter was already being guarded by armed U.S. troops and fences of barbed wire, causing many Haitian uprisings as it was clear that this was no typical shelter for refugees (Schmitt). Guantanamo Bay as we know it today originated in 2002 during President Bush’s “War on Terror.”

Specifically, Camp X-Ray, an area within Guantanamo Bay, was created as a prison for captives called “unlawful combatants” as opposed to “prisoners of war” by the Defense Department, and this allowed for the rules established in the Geneva Conventions for prisoners of war to be manipulated (United Nations). It is this manipulation of the Geneva Conventions’ legal frame-

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work that allowed human rights violations to occur at Guantanamo Bay.

Camp X-Ray, a temporary facility, later developed into the permanent Camp Delta, where journalists have gone and come back with stories of violence and cruelty that, until recently, have been somewhat hidden from public eyes. Journalist David Rose, for instance, made a trip to Guantanamo Bay in 2003 and was able to interview several of the people involved in the interrogation process of the captives.

One person that he interviewed, Joint Task Force commandant Major-General Geoffrey Miller, stated, “We have an enormously thorough process that has very high resolution and clarity...

I think of Guantánamo as the interrogation battle lab in the war against terror” (Rose). But what methods

constitute this “thorough process?” Many cases of torture, according to the most recently released CIA report.

The report details practices such as waterboarding, and in one case, this form of interrogation was undertaken despite concerns raised by the on-site medical officer (U.S. Senate 87). Sleep deprivation was also used, keeping detainees awake for 180 hours straight while in standing or stressed positions (U.S. Senate 3). The report also states that at least five detainees were subjected to rectal feeding without medical necessity, having detainees sit in ice water “baths,” and threatening the lives of the detainees and their families (U.S. Senate 4). The degrading forms of torture used in Guantanamo Bay are not only violations of human rights, but are also highly questionable in their

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effectiveness.

Given these findings, many human rights advocates question how this abuse is allowed to continue. One such way is that the Bush administration submitted that members of Al-Qaeda were not meant to be protected by the Geneva Conventions, since they are not a state nor a party to the treaty (U.S. Congressional Research Service 2). Another issue is that international law, to some extent, is very difficult to enforce. The United Nations is merely the joining of certain states that wish to implement certain rules and come to international agreements when possible. However, when one state goes against one of these laws, there are no judicial or penal systems in place to punish that state or change the outcome (Henderson). Finally, these practices continue when public support encourages them to continue. During a time of war, such as two years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, public support for the president rises in what is politically known as the “rally around the flag effect” or the “rally effect” for short, and President Bush’s approval ratings increased

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35-40% post-9/11 (Schubert, Stewart, and Curran 559).

Hence, when a president supports the use of these torture methods under the justification of combatting terrorism, few people may be willing to raise an argument against those actions and in the favor of human rights.

The treatment of the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay is a clear violation of prisoners’ basic rights and the right to be protected against torture. The United States has prided itself on being a country where ideals and the quest for righteousness take precedent. We celebrate the fact that we are known as the land of the free, the home of the brave.

But there is nothing brave about taking rights away from others in an attempt to free us from our fear of terrorism. By denying human rights in order to satisfy the domestic outcry for national security, the United States takes away from the attributes that are supposed to set it apart from other countries.

works cited “Agreement Between the United States and Cuba for the Lease of Lands for Coaling and Naval Stations; February 23, 1903,” Washington, U.S. Govt. Printing Office.

Gedda, George. “Pentagon Preparing to Build Camp for Haitians at Guantanamo.” Pentagon Preparing to Build Camp for Haitians at Guantanamo. N.p., 25 Nov. 1991. Web. 21 Mar. 2015. <http://www.apnewsarchive.com/1991/Pentagon-Preparing-to-Build-Camp-for-Haitians-at-Guantanamo/id-ff6f93cc94024addbb371c1854cab1c5>.

Henderson, Conway W. Understanding International Law. Chichester, West Sussex, U.K.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. Understanding International Law. United Nations, 2010. Web. <https://treaties. un.org/doc/source/events/2010/Press_kit/fact_sheet_5_english.pdf>.

Rose, David. “The Real Truth about Camp Delta.” The Guardian.

N.p., 2 Oct. 2004. Web. 28 Feb. 2015.

Schmitt, Eric.”Haiti Refugees and U.S. Force Clash in Cuba,” New York Times, August 15, 1994.

Schubert, James N., Patrick A. Stewart, and Margaret Ann Curran. “A Defining Presidential Moment: 9/11 and the Rally Effect.”

Political Psychology23.3 (2002): 559-83. Web. United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. “Statement of High Commissioner for Human Rights on Detention of Taliban and Al Qaida Prisoners at US Base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.” January 16, 2002.

U.S. Congressional Research Service. Treatment of “Battlefied Detainees” in the War on Terrorism (Jan. 13, 2005), by Jennifer Elsea. Text in: Federation of American Scientists Intelligence Resource Program <http://fas.org/irp/crs/RL31367.pdf>.

U.S. Senate. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program for the 114th Congress. Available from: www. intelligence.senate.gov; Accessed 3/21/2015.

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The inhumanity and illegality of extraordinary rendition ryan koul

Extraordinary rendition is the U.S. practice of capturing suspected terrorists and transferring them to other countries, especially those known to use torture or harsh interrogation tactics, in order to extract intelligence by proxy (Fisher 12). Suspects are either detained and interrogated

by American operatives in foreign countries, or are handed over (rendered) to foreign operatives for interrogation; in both cases, the interrogation techniques are not consistent with U.S. and international protocol (Fisher 17-18, 22-23). The controversial practice was largely expanded in the wake of 9/11, allowing the Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A.) and other agencies to abduct suspects and send them to foreign countries without approval from the White House or Department

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of Justice (Satterthwaite 10).

The nature of extraordinary rendition and the latitude given to agencies that employ it, particularly from its inception in the 1990s to the implementation of an oversight committee in 2009, violated human rights and international law.

To begin, transferees are deprived of a legal hearing through which they may challenge their transfer. By definition, then, extraordinary rendition excludes due process: the right of an individual to receive fair and standard treatment through a judicial system.

This violates Article 10 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), which entitles all to a fair and public hearing by an impartial court (United Nations, Universal). Additional human rights violations of those extraordinarily ren-

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dered include, but are not limited to: the subjection to torture; the absence of restitutio ad integrum (restitution for pain and suffering); and the presumption of guilt rather than innocence (United Nations, Universal).

Thus, Articles 5, 8, 10, and 11 of the UDHR are violated by extraordinary rendition.

This has problematic implications apart from the clear contraventions of human rights. The free rein given to intelligence agencies that conduct extraordinary rendition enables them to capture suspects without having to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they were really involved in terrorism. As a result, some agencies have hastily sanctioned extraordinary renditions for the wrong person.

For example, Mamdouh Habib, an Egyptian-born Australian, was mistakenly

extraordinarily rendered, subjected to beatings and electric shocks, and then released after three years without ever being charged with a crime (Jehl and Johnston). If intelligence agencies had to overcome the burden of proof before capturing suspects, this wrongful abduction, and others, might have been prevented. But by its very nature, extraordinary rendition falls beyond the authority of law, and can therefore be authorized without adequate proof or legitimate oversight (Satterthwaite 46). The extra-legality of extraordinary rendition, therefore, poses a threat both to human rights and to innocent civilians.

Extraordinary rendition also fails to comply with international law. The practice is in violation of Clauses 1 and 3 of Article 3, Section 1 of the Geneva Convention,

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which prohibit at any time and at any place, “violence to life and person…cruel treatment and torture” and “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment” (Geneva). Furthermore, extraordinary rendition is illegal pursuant to the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

The Convention, ratified by the United States in 1992, considers every act of torture to be a crime, and prohibits any official in any level of government under any circumstance to authorize, commit, or “instruct anyone else to commit” torture (United Nations, Convention). Therefore, any instance of U.S. officials committing torture, regardless of their intention, would break this law.

Importantly, the U.S. government claims it does not intend for transferred prisoners to be tortured. The C.I.A. alleges that transfers take place only when “the receiving country provides assurances that the prisoner will be treated humanely, and that United States personnel are assigned to monitor compliance” (Jehl and Johnston). However,

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a U.S. State Department report found countries that receive detainees –notably Syria, Egypt, and Iran – to be “habitually using torture in [their] prisons” (Jehl and Johnston). Thus, to the C.I.A., diplomatic pledges not to torture suspected terrorists made by countries known to torture habitually are considered sufficient. In addition, a public court filing about a classified prisoner transfer from Guantanamo reveals that the U.S. government sought to send a prisoner, who would not provide information the normal way, to another country “where he can be interrogated under torture” (Silverstein).

The abysmal human rights records of countries that detainees are sent to make their diplomatic assurances inadequate, and coupled with the classified memo that shows the intent of U.S. officials to torture by proxy, it is reasonable to conclude that in some cases, U.S. intelligence agencies intend for transferees to be tortured. To carry out extraordinary rendition, therefore, the United States willfully violated multiple human rights, the Geneva Convention, and the Convention Against Torture.

Through extraordinary

rendition, the United States gathers intelligence by way of torture without being held liable for it. But the practice succeeds at gathering intelligence only by breaching human rights and violating international law. In the panic-stricken aftermath of 9/11, it is understandable that unlawful practices were authorized and utilized in the name of national security. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Extraordinaryâ&#x20AC;? rendition became routine. The paranoia has since waned, however, and on January 22, 2009, President Barack Obama signed an executive order that both called for the closure of all C.I.A.-run detention facilities, and established an oversight task force on interrogation and transfer policies (Exec. Order No. 13491). Notably, the order does not end extraordinary rendition, but as its first regulation, it is a step in the right direction.

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works cited Exec. Order No. 13491, 3 C.F.R. 1-4 (2009). Print.

Fisher, Louis. “Extraordinary Rendition: The Price of Secrecy.” American University Law Review 57.5 (2008): 12, 17-18, 22-23. Web. 20 Mar. 2015. < http://www.loc.gov/law/help/usconlaw/pdf/fisher_aulr57_5_final.pdf > Geneva Convention IV Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons In Time of War. Geneva: Aug. 12, 1949. Web. 15 Mar. 2015. < http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/Military_Law/pdf/GC_1949-IV.pdf > Jehl, Douglas, and David Johnston. “Rule Change Lets C.I.A. Freely Send Suspects Abroad.” The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 05 Mar. 2005.Web. 22 Mar. 2015. <http://www.nytimes. com/2005/03/06/politics/06intel.html?_r=0>.

Satterthwaite, Margaret L. New York University School of Law Public Law & Legal Theory Research Paper Series. New York University School of Law, Nov. 2006. 11, 46. Web. 21 Mar. 2015. <http://www.law. yale.edu/documents/pdf/Intellectual_Life/Satterthwaite_paper.pdf>.

Silverstein, Ken. “Pentagon Memo on Torture-Motivated Transfer Cited.” Los Angeles Times. Tribune Publishing, 08 Dec. 2005. Web. 24 Mar. 2015. <http://articles.latimes.com/2005/dec/08/nation/na-torture8>.

United Nations. Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Palais de Chaillot, Paris: United Nations, 1948. Web. 18 Mar. 2015. <http://www. un.org/en/documents/udhr/> United Nations. Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. New York: United Nations 10 Dec. 1984. Web. 15 Mar 2015 < http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/100296.pdf>

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u.s. & latin america

Nursing Home Abuse: The Devaluation of Human Life on the Basis of Age linda higazy

Today’s society thrives on constant improvements.

We are flooded with advertisements for the fastest and newest cars, computers, and phones as we happily toss aside our older models for newer versions. Generally, newer is better and older is bad. However, an overlooked problem with this hyper-progressive mentality is that our society has started treating people with this same attitude, a form of ageism.

Ageism is discrimination based on age, and though it may be less discussed than racism or sexism, it is nonetheless greatly widespread and damaging.

Examples of age discrimination against the elderly can be seen in the most ordinary circumstances of everyday life, such as being shouted at because of the false assumption that all older people are stupid or deaf. The American

Psychological Association reports that, “…in a survey of 84 people ages 60 and older, nearly 80 percent of respondents reported experiencing ageism – such as other people assuming they had memory or physical impairments due to their age” (Dittmann). Actions that arise from ageism lead the elderly to feel marginalized within a society.

Cases of ageism against the elderly can also be found in nursing homes, where those meant to care for the elderly mistreat them instead. This led former President Ronald Reagan to create the “Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987,” which included the Federal Nursing Home Reform Act. It was the first time anyone had specifically addressed the rights of nursing home patients since Medicare and Medicaid were created in

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1965. Its purpose was to set a national standard for the minimum care that must be provided to elderly patients (Turnham). According to Title 42 of this law, “Minimum protections...shall assure, through methods other than reliance on State licensure processes, that individuals receiving home and community care are protected from neglect, physical and sexual abuse, financial exploitation, inappropriate involuntary restraint, and the provision of health care services by unqualified personnel in community care settings,” (42, Federal Register § 1396T).

This act helps ensure that protocol for nursing home care is upheld nationally, offering a safeguard against the harmful acts that come from ageism.

But seemingly clear-cut laws are easier to navigate away from than one might think. Once their health has declined to a certain extent, elderly patients require a caregiver, usually a family member, who also acts as their legal representative.

The legal control that the elderly relinquish to their caregivers makes them easier targets for abuse, because the caregivers do not always act on the wishes

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and will of their patients (Administration on Aging).

And though elderly people in nursing homes have the right to report abuse, many still do not. According to the National Center on Elder Abuse, “The elderly may be reluctant to report abuse themselves because of fear of retaliation, lack of physical and/or cognitive ability to report, or because they don’t want to get the abuser (90% of whom are family members) in trouble” (“Statistics/ Data”). In addition, the longer patients stay in a care facility, the more likely it is that they will suffer abuse or neglect at some point (Administration of Aging). For these reasons, laws in place to prevent human rights abuses of the elderly should be revised to provide them a consistently high level of care.

Age discrimination offers an explanation for this abuse. Professor of Public Law at the National University of Ireland Galway’s School of Law Charles O’Mahoney writes, “...ageism leads people to view the elderly as something other than victims. Elderly residents with mental disabilities, e.g. Alzheimer disease or being coma-ridden, are

often not believed to actually be hurt by abuses because they don’t have the mental capacities to recognize the wrongs brought against them” (O’Mahoney). Furthermore, patients who suffer abuse are at a significantly greater risk of death than patients who have not been abused—300 percent greater, in fact (Administration of Aging). Ageism-driven mistreatment of the elderly is not only unethical, but also detrimental to their health.

The human right to healthcare gives all human beings regardless of age the right to safe and attainable physical and mental healthcare, yet this can be denied to the elderly who face abuse in their nursing homes. The protection from discrimination is also a human right, but when ageism prompts abuse against the elderly, this right is violated. In reevaluating the legal and public health statutes pertaining to the elderly, it is vital to remember that they are both morally and legally entitled to the dignities afforded to all human beings.

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works cited Administration on Aging. NCEA: National Center on Elder Abuse, n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2015. <http://www.ncea.aoa.gov/Library/Data/>.

Dittmann, Melissa. “Fighting Ageism.” Monitor on Psychology 34.5 (2003): n. pag. American Psychological Association, May 2003.

Web. <http://www.apa.org/monitor/may03/fighting.aspx>.

O’Mahony, Charles. “Nursing Home Abuse: The Effects of Ageism.”

Disability And Human Rights. N.p., 12 Feb. 2012. Web. 27 Feb. 2015.

“Statistics/Data.” National Center on Elder Abuse. Department of Health and Human Services, n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2015. <http://www. ncea.aoa.gov/Library/Data/>.

Turnham, Hollis. Federal Nursing Home Reform Act from the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 or Simply OBRA ‘87 SUMMARY. Rep. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Web. 3 Mar. 2015. <http://www. allhealth.org/briefingmaterials/obra87summary-984.pdf>.

42, Federal Register § 1396T. “Home and Community Care for Functionally Disabled Elderly Individuals”. Print.

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u.s. & latin america

ariam and nidieska william martin

Cuba is now slowly recovering from the dissolution of the Soviet Union—which had caused severe shortages of oil and crippled their state-controlled economy in the 90’s. But despite the tourism influx of money, many Cuban families have not recuperated from the radical hardships and overhaul of their country. Ariam is a sixteen-yearold Cuban living with his mother, Nidieska. The building they live in has been condemned since the 80’s—it lacks running water and had partially collapsed in 2000. Without running water or a steady income, Ariam and Nidieska improvise and work together to make ends meet.

Nidieska rests before preparing herself for the day. Due to her AIDS and Osteoporosis, Nidieska has a difficult time moving. Nidieska asks Ariam what they are going to do. Ariam responds that they can’t think like that, they have to take it one day at a time. “Cuba is hard... Cuba is hard,” Nidieska often says.

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justice in rwanda: recognizing economic and social rights bailey theado

It is impossible to say with certainty how many Tutsi were killed in Rwanda between March and July of 1994. However, it is estimated that during the Rwandan genocide, defined by many as 100 days of violence, “between ten and fifty thousand Hutu and between 500,000 and a million Tutsi were killed” (Mamdani 5).

Mahmoud Mamdani in his book When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Genocide in Rwanda argues that in the case of Rwanda, “there were often several killers for every single victim,” and reveals how the genocide was an “agenda imposed from above [that] became a gruesome reality to the extent that it resonated with perspectives from below,” demonstrating how the genocide was linked to social, political and economic issues (Mamdani

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5, 7). In order to achieve holistic justice in the case of Rwanda, the political identities of both Hutu and Tutsi must be reconciled to overcome Rwanda’s colonial legacy; reconciliation efforts must address the structural violence inflicted on post-colonial states by their colonial legacy, and address deep structural economic and social inequities perpetuated by development projects, state-led economic reconstruction, and Rwanda’s colonial legacy.

Colonized by the Belgians, the case of Rwanda demonstrates how colonial legacies contribute to social and economic inequity in post-colonial states today and can incite conflict.

Rwanda’s colonial legacy produced two imaginary racial identities set against each other in competition for power and resources.

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Post-independence, this bifurcation led to the creation of a “nativized majority [Hutu] opposed to several nonnative minorities” where the Tutsi were targeted (Mamdani 35). In order to realize holistic justice, reconciliation efforts must address the structural violence inflicted on post-colonial states by their colonial legacy.

While the colonial legacy is responsible for creating racist ideologies that created the idea of a ‘Tutsi problem,’ post-independence development initiatives are also implicated in creating a form of structural violence that violated the Rwandan people and created a general sense of insecurity leading up the genocide. According to Michel Choussudovsky, the Belgian colonizers were responsible for forcing the peasantry “to shift out of food agriculture into cash

crops for export,” which shifted land ownership and left the Rwandan economy and people vulnerable to market collapse (Chossudovsky 117-126). Before independence, Rwanda was in a poor economic state and had a “per capita income lower than any of its neighbors” (Mamdani 144). However, following independence, Rwanda was heralded for its economic achievements in agriculture, reforestation, and infrastructure. By the end of the 1980s, these quick economic achievements had structural consequences, where soil fertility was decreasing and food production was dropping. In reaction, the Rwandan state institutionalized forced labor for the state to work the land and increase food production. Just two years before the genocide, farmers revolted against this forced com-

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munal work, claiming that their economic and social rights were human rights directly violated by the state.

The farmer’s revolts also demonstrate that there was a general sense of economic insecurity and how economic crimes are not always linked with finances, but can have direct ties to land and resources. This general economic insecurity was a factor that contributed to how the genocide was carried out by many perpetrators. Peter Uvin, a development scholar argues that “state-supplied racism provided poor Hutu a sense of value, as well as an explanation for the mal-development they faced daily in their lives” (Uvin X). He goes on to argue that the cause of the Rwandan genocide “lies in a combination of extreme pauperization and reduction of life chances for a majority of the poor” (Uvin 2). The economic realities, or “mal-development” that Hutu’s faced contributed to the genocide as they attributed the violations of their economic and social rights to the ‘Tutsi problem.’

This shows how violations of economic and social rights can cause violations of civic and political rights, as during the genocide, Hutu

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retaliation for economic crimes were targeted at the Tutsi.

Additionally, the international development community is also implicated in the structural violence inflicted upon the Rwandan people through the World Bank’s imposition of the free market system and devaluation of the Rwandan Franc in 1990, which had severe consequences on the economic and social rights of Rwandans.

Rwandans were denied the opportunity to realize their economic rights within the imposed free market policies, creating general insecurity and what Chossudovsky calls “economic genocide,” which lead up to farmer led revolts in 1992. Peter Uvin cites that Rwandans generally mistrusted development projects which went even “beyond passivity and distrust to move into active resistance” as seen with the revolts. The resistance demonstrates that there were deep structural economic and social inequities perpetuated by development projects, state-led economic reconstruction, and Rwanda’s colonial legacy.

The growing general sense of insecurity in Rwanda leading up the genocide also

shows how insecurity and fear are not only a products of civic and political rights violations, but are linked to deeper economic and social inequities. Efforts in transitional justice to push forward with social healing and development must address these systemic insecurities, which contributed to the genocide as the Hutu linked these insecurities to the ‘Tutsi problem.’

works cited Chossudovsky, Michel. “Human security and Economic Genocide in Rwanda.” Globalization, Human Security and the African experience (1999): 117-26.

Mamdani, Mahmood. When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, nativism, and the genocide in Rwanda. Princeton University Press, 2001.

Uvin, Peter, and Charles Mironko. “Western and local approaches to justice in Rwanda.” Global Governance 9 (2003): 219.

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convicting recruiters of child soldiers lavanya hinduja

The conviction of those involved in the recruitment of child soldiers can be both messy and difficult. The United Nations (UN) has developed Action Plans and similar schemes to combat this problem, but these have proved ineffective as long-term solutions because governments face no material consequences. As a result, they often defect from the agreements. To confront this human rights abuse, recruiters must be held legally accountable, whether through national or international legislation.

Governments can be involved both indirectly and directly in the recruitment of child soldiers. In Myanmar, for instance, low birth registration, inaccurate military records, and age falsification in the National Registration Cards can facilitate the recruitment of child soldiers

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(Ratty). In addition, due to political instability, state brigades are pressured to meet quotas of new recruits, being punished if they lapse and rewarded with cash bonuses if they succeed (Ratty). Children are prominent in what Child Soldiers International describes as the “recruitment economy” in the country, whereby civilians assume roles as brokers (Ratty). In these ways, the government plays an indirect role in the recruitment of child soldiers.

Similar political instability in South Sudan has exacerbated efforts to decrease the number of child soldiers. A peace deal early in 2015 between current Sudanese president Salva Kirr and opposition leader Riek Machar resulted in the release of the first 580 of 3,000 children that the two agreed to free from the army (“South Sudan”). However,

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it was confirmed in early March of 2015 that neither side released further children and hundreds of new child recruits have been reported (“UN special envoy”). In South Sudan, Kirr and Machar were not only unwilling to follow through in their agreement to release the child soldiers, but also continued to actively recruit.

This demonstrates how governments can be directly involved in this human rights violation.

In considering the various ways these governments bypass barriers to recruiting child soldiers, it is no surprise that they do not adhere to internationally created plans, such as the UN Joint Action Plans under the ‘Children and Armed Conflict’ division. Eleven governments and 12 non-state armed groups have signed onto this plan, a commitment to

eliminating the use of child soldiers through a wide range of actions specific to national circumstances (“Office of the Special Representative”). While the UN Joint Action Plan, signed with the government of Myanmar in 2012, facilitated the release of 600 children from the military, the progress was short-lived considering the 723 cases of underage recruitment since 2013 (Ratty, “Myanmar”). Thus, Action Plans are extensively limited by their reliance on national courts to implement changes.

However, a significant leap forward was made with the development of the Special Court of Sierra Leone, which was established by and is overseen with the guidance and support of the UN. In September 2013, the Appeals Chamber of the Special Court of Sierra

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Leone decided to uphold the conviction of Charles Taylor, the former President of Liberia who was involved in the recruitment of child soldiers and other war crimes in Sierra Leone’s civil war (“Residual Special Court of Sierra Leone”). This set a precedent to convict those recruiting child soldiers, and it was a step towards reversing the norm of prosecuting child soldiers as opposed to their recruiters. Similar structures of UN-backed national courts need to be implemented, where possible, to work in tandem with the Joint Action Plans.

In cases where national courts fail to convict recruiters of child soldiers and impede the involvement of the UN in legislation, recruiters can and should be held accountable under international law. Thomas Lubanga, a warlord of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was sentenced to 14 years in prison before the International Criminal Court (ICC) in 2012 for enlisting children under the age of 15 into the Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (“ICC Appeals Chamber”). While this was a landmark case that pressured some commanders of armed groups in

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the Congo to release children in their ranks, its potential for deterring other recruiters was not fully harnessed. For example, though many parts of the trial were broadcast, the moment that would have most likely deterred other recruiters, Lubanga’s verdict, was not aired because the ICC did not provide funds for it (Kersten). Effectively publicizing such verdicts would prove a more successful strategy to deter other and future recruiters. The ICC should also reform the Rome Statute, a treaty establishing basic international crimes.

Currently, it criminalizes the recruitment of child soldiers under the age of 15, but this age limit should be raised to 18 (“Rome Statute”).

Overall, international law must endeavor persistently to convict recruiters of child soldiers because it is the only front that can systematically deter recruiters and rid children around the globe from being subjected to this violence.

The release of child soldiers should not depend on the fluctuating outcomes of political instability, as is currently the case in various nations. The issue of child soldiers must be tackled

independently for any hope of long-term results. Holding recruiters legally accountable through national and international law is the most concrete way of eliminating the presence of child soldiers.

works cited “ICC Appeals Chamber upholds conviction and sentence for child recruitment and use.” Child-Soldiers International. Press Release.

December 1, 2014. Web. Accessed February 15, 2015.

Kersten, Mark, “Lubanga Decision Roundtable: Lubanga and the Trouble with ICC Deterrence.” Opinio Juris. March 19, 2012. Web. Accessed March 6, 2015.

“Myanmar: Further steps needed to end army’s recruitment and use of children.” Child-Soldiers International. January 23, 2015.

Web. Accessed February 10, 2015.

“Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict.” United-Nations. Web. Accessed March 5, 2015.

Ratty, Sonya Carassik. “Child Soldiers and Burma’s long road to reform.” Democratic Voice of Burma. 25 January 2015. Web. February 17, ’15.

“Residual special court for Sierra Leone.” Web. Accessed March 8, 2015.

“Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.” Article 8:2b xxvi. International Criminal Court. January 16, 2002.

“South Sudan: Government Forces Recruiting Child Soldiers.”

Human Rights Watch, February 16 2015. Web. Accessed February 10, 1015 “UN special envoy joins demand for release of child soldiers by all parties in South Sudan”, UN News Centre, 4 March 2015, Web. Accessed March 6, 2015.

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mapping, confinements, and access to health shilpa Venigandla

Cartography has long been attributed to objectivity. It is through cartography and mapping that we, as politically-minded humans, have come to interpret, allocate, and divide geographical terrain. By this virtue, borders and designations as dictated by maps carry a tremendous weight, and as a result, they have become increasingly solidified over the years, usually through drastic military interventions. This phenomenon has become normalized on a global scale.

Visually, mapping gives us a much simpler, birdâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s eye view of land, nations, and borders. It doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t, however, enable us to understand physical, on-the-ground operations. It should be widely accepted that the construction of borders and maps has broader implications for populations living in

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the area. Forced and armed confinement, as dictated by those who have authority over map-making, is an exertion of power over a body of people. This ultimately facilitates the dehumanization of said bodies, easing the way for control and the establishment of a hierarchy of power that soon becomes ritualized and normalized. Mobility of individuals and resources is profoundly curtailed; such curtailment is a method of solidifying control. Any sort of attempt to defect results in violent altercations. This violation of freedom and human rights has detrimental effects on individuals. When analyzed through a public health lens, such restrictions can impede or even deny the provision of and access to health care, resulting in grave health consequences.

During the latest Ebola epidemic in West Africa,

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Liberia became notorious for implementing quarantines.

In Monrovia, its capital, soldiers and police officers violently blocked off the neighborhood of West Point, where Ebola ran rampant (Onishi).

Proponents of the quarantine argued that it contained the disease, but this method had many problematic implications. Those contaminated with Ebola were re-located to West Point, while those who were uncontaminated were forced to stay within the quarantine (Onishi). As a result, many came to see the quarantine as a violent act against free mobility that would foster an incubator-like environment in which Ebola could more easily spread. In consequence, health facilities in the area were looted and many Ebola-infected patients escaped (Hannon). The quarantines proved to be largely

ineffective (Onishi). While quarantining is mapping on a localized scale, it is nevertheless a critical example of the extent to which mapping, isolation, borders, and barriers can profoundly change health conditions and human rights. It further serves as an example as to how power is exerted over a body of people and how these people are then controlled; individuals within the quarantine become subject to constrainments and are denied their freedom to move. Their immobility and lack of autonomy results in a breeding ground for health to be neglected.

Militarized mappingâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; typically represented through the construction of large walls and fences--is another way in which a change in borders can have much broader implications. Walls can act as newly established

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barriers, and, when coupled with factors surrounding interstate tensions such as citizenship, can have a deeper impact on how health rights are manifested. According to a World Health Organization (WHO) report in 2013, the creation of a wall between Israel and Palestine has restricted movement into East Jerusalem for Palestinians with Gaza or West Bank identifications (“Right to Health”). Patients from Gaza and the West Bank must hold Israeli-issued permits to access health care, and without proper identifications, many Palestinians are denied entry to health care facilities and use of their services (“Right to Health”). In 2013, the approval rate for permits declined from rates in 2011 (“Right to Health”).

The World Health Organization has stressed the international legal obligation to protect the right for access to healthcare regardless of nationality (“Right to Health”).

Immobility plays an integral role in how Palestinians are confined and controlled by the superimposing wall.

Reaching and accessing health care facilities is a slow, tumultuous process; those suffering with ailments that must be treated

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quickly must either wait, travel much farther to access health care services, or deal with the ailment with the limited resources available to them at the time. Also, due to stagnancy, health issues are likely to grow and become worse (“Right to Health”). Citizenship becomes a determining factor; based on one’s citizenship, health care facilities are allowed or delayed. Likewise, the wall also limits the travel of health and medical resources. Because of this limitation, well-being and adequate health is further prolonged.

Walls, borders, and quarantines have been constructed for a variety of reasons, but those in charge of this construction emulate notions of security and defense against foreign threats. The discourse surrounding militarized walls focuses on this specific school of thought: a dichotomous narrative of “us” versus “them,” entrenched in the fear of the “other.” This narrative obscures the plight of communities detrimentally affected by these confinements. It also further prevents fluid discussion on how human rights abuses that arise from difficulties posed by the

walls can inflict a variety of health consequences on these communities. Health rights are thereby neglected. It may be in the best interest for the disciplines of health and human rights to continue to investigate how walls, borders, spatial fragmentation, and other such confinements can contribute to detrimental public health issues. By doing so, discourse surrounding mapping and forced confinement will become more nuanced, deviating from orientalist and dichotomous narratives that inundate the mainstream public sphere. A focus on human and health rights will be enabled.

works cited Hannon, Elliot. “Looters Attack Liberia Ebola Quarantine Center, Patients Under Observation Return Home.” Slate. Slate, 18 Aug. 2014. Web. 22 Mar. 2015. <http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2014/08/18/ebola_quarantine_center_attacked_patients_go_ home.html>.

Onishi, Norimitsu. “Clashes Erupt as Liberia Sets an Ebola Quarantine.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 20 Aug. 2014.

Web. 10 Mar. 2015. <http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/world/ africa/ebola-outbreak-liberia-quarantine.html?_r=1>.

“Right to Health: Crossing Barriers to Access Health in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, 2013.” World Health Organization.

World Health Organization, 2013. Web. 10 Mar. 2015. <http://www. emro.who.int/images/stories/palestine/documents/WHO_-_RTH_ crossing_barriers_to_access_health.pdf?ua=1>.

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the potential human rights benefits of state secularization emily albert

As politicians and human rights institutions contemplate the Islamic State and other forms of religious extremism that infringe on human rights, they are pressed with two vital questions: to what extent should political institutions become or remain secular to protect these rights, and to what extent should they yield to religious demands?

In response to reconciling secularity with religious demands, Ahmed Aboutaleb, the Muslim mayor of Rotterdam, declared in a public statement on February 18, 2015 that Dutch Muslims have a choice to either accept Western values or leave. After explaining that the Dutch constitution is based on tolerance, he says, “the moment you come to the Netherlands…and you get a citizenship then you have to at least underline

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and embrace the constitution and the values of the country” (Krever). The legality of gay marriage, prostitution, and marijuana in the Netherlands are all reflective of this liberal philosophy and incompatible with many interpretations of Islam.

Aboutaleb does not demand that Muslims join in these practices, but asks that they tolerate the choices of others –that is, that the nation’s secular laws pursuant to human rights supersede religious customs. This has been the theme of responses from Western states and peaceful Islamic institutions alike.

Secularism assumes that “political authority in a liberal democracy...is grounded in the consent of the people to be ruled [by the state] rather than in God’s act of authorization” (Eberle and Cuneo).

Since secular governments are not constrained by

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religious mandates, they have more freedom to uphold human rights. Thus, politics must mediate between opposing forces of religion and human rights (Eberle and Cuneo). That is precisely what Aboutaleb is doing, and that is what the global community needs to do more decisively today in response to rampant religious extremism that violates human rights. Secularism prioritizes national law over religious law, laying a humanistic, pluralistic foundation on which human rights may be maintained.

This might seem obvious, yet countries still struggle to reconcile law and religion. England, for example, currently faces burgeoning sharia councils that self-govern based on sharia law, completely circumventing the English judicial system (“A Secularist Success”).

Religious self-governance is also an issue in the United States. The New Yorker recently highlighted the recurrent absence of criminal action in orthodox Jewish communities, writing, “In exchange for political support, Brooklyn politicians give Hasidim latitude to police themselves” (Aviv). In these cases, religion is placed above national law, which poses a major concern for the nation’s judicial system.

There are also cases where religion is implicated in national law through lobbying groups and religious politicians. The Christian right in the United States, for instance, uses religious values to deny LGBTQ rights and the legalization of abortion. In cases such as these, religion is imposed on political viewpoints (Dunn).

The Christian right’s actions show that religiously

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informed politics can trump human rights, even in secular governments.

Secularism is not sufficient for upholding human rights, but it can and often does support them. The push for complete secularism, utopian though it may be, is nonetheless necessary to combat religious extremism that is detrimental to human rights. In future evolutions of national law, it is important that human rights are placed above both cultural and religious ideals.

works cited Aviv, Rachel. “The Outcast.” The New Yorker. N.p., 10 Nov. 2014.

Web. Dunn, David J. “Voting My Religion: The Hypocrisy of the “Christian Right”” The Huffington Post. N.p., 26 June 2012. Web. Eberle, Chris and Cuneo, Terence. “Religion and Political Theory.”

Ed. Edward N. Zalta. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 15 January 2015. Web. Ignatieff, Michael. “Human Rights as Politics and Idolatry.” Ed. Amy Guttman. Ethics & International Affairs 16.01 (2002): 153-55.

Web. Krever, Mick. “Dutch Muslim Mayor: I Can Say Things My Colleagues Can’t.” CNN. Cable News Network, 18 Feb. 2015. Web. “A Secularist Success.” The Economist. N.p., 25 Nov. 2014. Web.

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Perspective kai wahrmann-harry

Depending on how the piece is viewed, its representation changes.

Looking at it vertically, the pale bland landscape on the left represents the general perspective of those unaffected on an everyday level by the diverse set of human right issues that exist in the developed world. The other side, contrasted by the black smear, represents the same developed world from the perspective of those whose rights have been seemingly violated. Looking at it horizontally, the various textures, colours, and line patterns represents the abstraction of any major city. Despite how perfect and safe we think these metropolises may be, they are still plagued with the darkened backdrop of those who are facing issues from maintaining minimum wage to human trafficking. Both sides show that this is the world that we live in. In order to change any of that, we need to be aware of the issues around us and move for change.

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human rights: rights inherent to all human beings, regardless of nationality, place of residence, sex, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, language, or any other status.