Since the establishment of the National Human Rights Commission (“NHRC”) of Nigeria, high expectations that the commission will ensure effective protection of human rights have dwindled due to pervasive human rights violations. Of great concern is that the security agencies in Nigeria, particularly the police who are empowered under the law to ensure obedience to law and order, often engage in unlawful arrest and detention. This thesis offers a comparative legal analysis of human rights norms and institutions in Nigeria and Canada, with a particular focus on the issue of unlawful arrest and detention. It argues that NHRCs have been unable to effectively address unlawful arrests and detentions by the Nigeria police, and that Nigeria can borrow from Canada’s human rights system to improve her human rights institutions and practices, especially with regard to arrest and detention. It also offers recommendations from the lessons drawn from Canada’s human rights system. / May 2016

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Student Number : 7905085 - PhD thesis - School of Education - Faculty of Humanities / This thesis is based on an exploration of human rights (in) South African education. In order to do so, however, it has been necessary to explore the origins of the notion of human rights in both its philosophical and legal senses. It covers the ways in which the claim of an equality of all human beings has developed historically and the ways in which they are articulated in the Universal Declaration of human rights and in the “new” South African Constitution. However, the argument in this thesis is that human rights tend to be generalised and universalised, and as such do not adequately address the ways in which human rights are experienced in specific social formations and in the contexts of particular people’s lives. In order to make human rights more specific and personal, I apply a sociology of human rights using Stuart Hall’s “theory of articulation” and demonstrate what this sociological analysis means in the context of South Africa under apartheid. In addition, to prevent reifying social categories and privileging particular types of human identity, I explore human rights under apartheid in relation to ‘race’, gender and sexual orientation. Throughout, I point to ways in which these identities and social categories interconnect with each and balance micro and macro approaches to an analysis of apartheid. Methodologically this thesis uses Sarah Lawrence-Lightfoot’s approach of “portraiture” in order to capture personal lives within a macro context and I provide accounts in this respect of Nelson Mandela and Simon Nkoli. I have also used a combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches in my investigation of experiences of human rights in South African education. Teachers’ and learners’ questionnaires were conducted in schools in the Western Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng in South Africa between 1996 and 1998. In addition, individual interviews with Grade 9 teachers were conducted and group interviews with Grade 9 learners in these schools were also done. Classroom observations in three schools, one in each of the provinces, were also conducted, and individual interviews with two gay learners also form part of the empirical data of this study. A national survey of what human rights programmes were used by educational institutions and organisations was also conducted. The thesis also contextualises the sampled schools experiences within the post-apartheid dispensation in South Africa, providing an account of how human rights are framed in South Africa generally and in the South African educational system in particular. Approaches to human rights (in) education are also covered, as are the principles of a human rights education. The conclusions that I arrive at in this thesis are that there are interventions in regard to human rights in South African education which tend to be located within legalistic and integrated approaches. In addition, experiences of racism in the sampled schools are prevalent within an assimilationist mode. In regard to sexual orientation, sex, gender and sexuality are conflated but the provision of human rights in terms of sexual orientation has had a positive impact on the sampled gay learners in this study. Finally, I argue that the sociological approach to human rights is useful and generative and has enabled this study to access an understanding of human rights in generalised macro terms and in specific contexts of people’s experiences.

Student Number : 0415941F - MA research report - School of Social Sciences - Faculty of Humanities / It is interesting how a specific date and month has come to define the world. In the dawn of the millennium, few people would have thought international politics would suddenly change. It was even harder to envisage that America would be a direct target of terror groups’ right inside their country in such a huge magnitude, in this age after the end of cold war when it was the only super power. The events of September 11, 2001 will forever remain entrenched in history and even more so the political events that followed after, since they have redefined the world and its political ideology. Different states have responded to the attacks differently, springing surprises, twists and turns that have shaped the agenda of the human rights discourse. The response to the attack on the Pentagon and World Trade Centre has posed a dilemma to scholars in international human rights law, some of them whom have questioned if this is the end of human rights era.1 This is because of how the human rights discourse has been put at cross purpose with the anti-terror efforts that have been employed. After Al-qaeda operatives crashed three airlines into the Pentagon and World Trade Centre, while a fourth one crashed in a field in Shanksville, this was seen as a direct act of aggression on America and President George Bush vowed revenge. On October 8th 2001, Bush launched a campaign to track Osama Bin Laden and followers of his Al-qaeda group, who were responsible for the attacks. The “war on terror” began the same day with the bombing of Afghanistan that aimed at toppling the Afghanistan government, which supported Al-qaeda. While doing this, Bush placed terrorism above any other global agenda. It is important to note that the toppling of the Afghanistan regime was through the UN Security Council. When a new government was set up after the regime was toppled, the “war on terror” entered new frontier. In his State of the Union address in January 2002, President Bush declared that Iran, Iraq and North Korea were “rogue states” and alleged that the three countries were developing weapons of mass destruction. Bush feared that terrorists would use these chemical and biological weapons to attack other countries, more so American interests and hence measures had to be taken before this happened. He next turned to Iraq which was suspected of having chemical and biological weapons and links with Al-qaeda. He vowed to topple the Iraq regime of Saddam Hussein on these pretexts.2 These actions led to a lot of international debate, with many countries urging America not to use force to push its agenda. Specifically, most countries were of the view that inspectors from the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNIMOVIC) should be allowed to inspect Iraq to authenticate the claims.3 In addition, many countries felt that for such a war to happen, the UN Security Council had to pass a resolution allowing the attack of Iraq. Nevertheless, America and its allies went ahead with their plans of toppling Saddam. On April 9, 2003 the regime of Saddam Hussein was toppled and he was captured on December 14, 2003. However, Osama has not yet been caught. At the same time, the United Nations (U.N.) has passed various resolutions condemning terrorism and urging countries to enact anti-terror measures that do not infringe on the people’s human rights. Despite this, the anti-terrorism measures adopted by many countries have fallen short of the U.N. human rights requirements and have proved to be a challenge to internationa l human rights law and refugee law. This has led to various scholars arguing that the U.N. charter should be reviewed to adequately cater for the “war on terror” and the enforcement of human rights while engaging in these efforts. In any case, it is clear that legal safeguards that were once viewed as unchangeable are now being challenged. As David Rieff avers, “…the threat that internal war and terrorism poses to the edifice of international law would have become apparent sooner or later. If anything, September 11 only hastened and focused the process.” This research report aims to study the implications of the “war on terror” for the protection of human rights in Kenya. In doing so, it is noted that even though Kenya has been a victim of terrorist activities, it was only after America began the “war on terror” in October 2001 that it started putting up structures to address terrorism. Thus, the main thrust of this research is to investigate the human rights dilemma that Kenya faces in these efforts includ ing interrogating the reasons for the tensions that resulted from the draft Suppression of Terrorism bill 2003 that was drawn up by the government in its effort to fight terrorism. In order to do this, several research questions inform the study. a) How has the “war on terror” shaped the understanding and practices of human rights in Kenya? b) How has the “war on terror” shaped Kenya’s approach to terrorism? c) How did the draft Suppression of Terrorism bill 2003 emerge? d) Was the draft bill a result of social struggles and history of the country as regards terrorism? e) What are the human rights concerns that have emerged from the draft bill? f) What are the tensions that have cropped up between protecting human rights and ensuring national security in Kenya? This will include a study of local campaigns by the Civil Society and Muslim community against the draft antiterror bill. g) Why have the tensions come up between the citizens and the government? To do this, the study will look into the human rights history of Kenya and relationship between the government and its citizens. h) What has been the impact of anti-terrorism measures on certain ethnic and religious groups? i) How have suspected terrorists in Kenya been treated while under custody? Human rights as applied in this research report refers to a set of internationally agreed upon principles which have been set down in the various declarations of United Nations human rights instruments, African Charter and other legal documents like Constitutions. Over the years, these principles have continuously been refined and extended to ensure that more people especially the minorities are catered for and have since been evoked when oppression occurs.

Thesis advisor: David Hollenbach / This thesis analyzes how the Catholic Church in Burundi used and can still use Catholic understanding of human rights to advocate for peace. Human rights discourse can be a way of translating the Catholic values of human dignity and human sacredness into secular language. Moreover, as Burundi is a signatory to most of the international instruments on human rights, this discourse becomes a tool for the Catholic Church in Burundi to denounce the violation and abuse of human rights and to advocate for peace. / Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

There has been talk of countries facing water "crises" and even predictions of a "global water crisis", for some years now. The effects of climate change, population growth, and ever higher levels of development are being felt around the world. Even in the United Kingdom, generally considered to have plentiful rainfall, there have been restrictions on water use. How much more serious a problem, then, is this issue for those countries with less bountiful water resources and fewer financial resources to cope with increasing water stress. One common response has been to consider the water crisis as a "crisis of governance", in recognition that it is less about the lack of water and more about the need to address poverty and power imbalances within society. However, this neither clarifies the measures to be taken nor the responsibilities that governments have towards their people when facing such a crisis. This thesis explores the meaning and implications of "good water governance" as a means of addressing the water crisis and concludes that for the meas to be successful a clear end goal is required. This thesis proposes that the normative content of the Human Right to Water is a useful starting point in defining the goals for national water policy able to meet the challenge of a potential water crisis. By combining positive contributions both good water governance and the Human Right to Water, the thesis develops a framework to assist governments in planning, implementing and monitoring the measures necessary to fulfil their responsibilities. In order to verify the framework that has been developed, the thesis applies the framework to the case of South Africa, a country that is facing increasing water stress while still redressing the balance of past inequities. The thesis concludes that a framework using aspects from a water governance approach and aspects of the Human Right to Water can assist governments to focus their efforts on the critical issues that affect their communities' access to water.

No description available.

How can a normative consensus on human rights develop out of a plurality of different and conflicting ethico-cultural discourses? It is frequently assumed that any agreement on universal human rights must necessarily occur in spite of pluralism from which conflict might arise. Consequently, various images of consensus have been proposed wherein pluralism is viewed as something to be mitigated or overcome. However, such images of consensus fail to offer a satisfactory response to the original question since they fail to fully recognise the political and contestational nature of human rights discourse. This thesis aims to address questions as to how conflict and contingency, both commonly associated with pluralism, can be mediated in a way that is constructive of a particular political community, and constitutive of a vital and innovative discourse on human rights. Hence, theories on agonistic pluralism are discussed and evaluated since they address this very issue ??? the potential for struggle to act as a constructive force. Also in this thesis, a historical analysis of key milestones in the development of a human rights discourse is presented wherein it is argued that human rights have indeed been contingent upon particular instances of struggle and have found expression in a plurality of distinct ethico-cultural discourses. Finally, in order to further illustrate the adaptability of human rights to more than one ethical discourse, examples are presented in which various Muslim scholar-activists justify human rights norms according to Islamic doctrinal principles. Overall, it is the argument of this thesis that it is possible to imagine a human rights consensus, not as a ???world consensus???, but in terms of a sectional political association whose membership is culturally pluralist. In saying this, it must be acknowledged that this construction is necessarily always precarious, precisely because of the contestational, contingent and transformative nature of the discourse of human rights. Also, although only sectional in terms of its support base, the ???consensus??? I describe necessarily strives to become a universal consensus. While universal respect for human rights is ultimately illusive, in view of the universalism of human rights as a discourse, to strive for anything less is unacceptable. In the end, the constant struggle to establish a universal consensus on human rights is precisely that which effects positive, practical change.

Thesis (LL.M.)--University of Hong Kong, 1994. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves [114]-118). Also available in print.

Climate change debates have typically centred around the environmental and economic effects of rising greenhouse gas emissions. The focus, however, has recently begun to shift towards acknowledging the human impacts of global climate change, especially in vulnerable regions and communities. This thesis considers whether human rights law can compensate for the inability of traditional, state-centred, environmental law and international law to address the human impacts of climate change. By using the situation of the Canadian Inuit as a case study, this thesis focuses on 'greening' existing human rights to address the environmental damage in the Canadian Arctic as a result of climate change. This study concludes that, although international human rights regimes provide potential forums for groups such as the Canadian Inuit, substantive environmental human rights are necessary in international law in order to best address the complex intersection of environmental degradation, such as climate change, and human rights.