Moving Beyond Conflict in Sri Lanka: The Economic Rights Dimension

Much of the literature on transitional justice underplays the role of economic rights in shoring up peace. The case of Sri Lanka demonstrates the urgency of addressing them. Until a month ago, Sri Lanka was the country with Asia’s longest running civil war. Since independence in 1947, the island nation has been wracked by conflict between the Sinhalese majority and the Tamil minority—a conflict that has eroded political stability and aggravated internal inequalities. The struggle was marked not only by inter-ethnic and religious tensions but also by a fight for control over land and resources

From Armchair Reading to Action: Acknowledging Our Role in the Horror of the Democratic Republic of the Congo - and Doing Something About It.

Reading Adam Hochschild\u27s extraordinary account of ordinary people caught up in the horrific ravages of a civil war raging in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), I was struck by how incongruous my own encounter with this suffering is. I read his article over lunch, safe in the comfort of my own home. As a woman, I live largely without fear of the kind of brutal sexual violence that Hochschild opens his article with, as he related the story of a Congolese NGO worker who is herself a victim of multiple rapes

Protest, Iranian Style: A Two-Way Conversation?

Darrell West gets it right when he argues that despite their promise, digital technologies alone “cannot produce revolutions. To generate fundamental change, it still takes strong leadership, powerful ideas, and people willing to risk detention and imprisonment.” West is writing about Iran—and the critical role that social networking has played in fostering social protest in the wake of a disputed election in that country. He also warns that oppressive regimes may turn the very same tool of protest against those fighting for freedom, by using digital technology to track protesters. Yet West underplays the importance of social networking for cracking the monolith of Iran—and the implications for human rights of the unfolding dialogue in words and images

The Challenges of Institutionalizing Community-Level Social Accountability Mechanisms for Health and Nutrition: a Qualitative Study in Odisha, India

Background: India has been at the forefront of innovations around social accountability mechanisms in improving the delivery of public services, including health and nutrition. Yet little is known about how such initiatives are faring now that they are incorporated formally into government programmes and implemented at scale. This brings greater impetus to understand their effectiveness. This formative qualitative study focuses on how such mechanisms have sought to strengthen community-level nutrition and health services (the Integrated Child Development Services and the National Rural Health Mission) in the state of Odisha. It fills a gap in the literature on considering how such initiatives are running when institutionalised at scale. The primary research questions were ‘what kinds of community level mechanisms are functioning in randomly selected villages in 3 districts of state of Odisha' and 'how are they perceived to function by their members and frontline workers’

Una contienda acotada: la defensa transnacional de los derechos laborales de las mujeres en las maquiladoras de México

Transnational advocacy on the rights of women workers in Mexico?s maquiladoras was central to broader international debates on human rights in the 1990s. This article analyzes one such cross-border campaign, organized by activists using the labor side accord to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The author argues that human rights activists often choose to limit their claim-making to narrowly civil and political demands, rather than more expansive economic or social rights claims. They do so because of existing institutional, resource, and political constraints. The article concludes with broader thoughts on the future of transnational human rights advocacy