This course meets February 23 through March 30th.
This course will provide a brief introduction to the United Nation’s human rights infrastructure and will give students an opportunity to learn about how to use the UN to conduct human rights advocacy. In addition, to readings that will help students understand how the UN human rights system works, this course will focus on building practical civil society advocacy skills. Specifically, students will learn to submit information on cases of illegal or arbitrary cases of detention to a UN working group and reports of torture to the UN Committee against Torture. In addition, students will also gain experience with drafting and delivering an NGO statement to the UN Human Rights Council. The course will involve several short writing assignments and one in-class presentation.