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International Human Rights Clinic

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The International Human Rights Clinic enables students to critically engage with cutting-edge human rights issues, strategies, tactics, institutions, and law in both domestic and international settings.

Through weekly seminars, fieldwork and travel, students develop a range of practical tools and skills needed for human rights advocacy – such as fact-finding, litigation, indicators, reporting, and messaging – that integrate interdisciplinary methods and new technologies. Students also develop competencies related to managing trauma in human rights work, as well as the ethical and accountability challenges of human rights lawyering.

Types of clinic projects include those that: involve human rights advocacy abroad (e.g., gendered impacts of criminal justice approaches to countering terrorism); engage with international institutions to advance human rights (e.g., on trafficking in persons); apply a human rights framework to domestic issues (e.g., firearms and domestic violence); and/or focus on identifying promising practices and advances in the realization of human rights (e.g., tracking advancements to human rights made by governments during the COVID-19 pandemic). Students work closely with grassroots organizations, novel transitional justice institutions, international NGOs, and U.N. human rights experts and bodies to further the promotion and protection of human rights. 

Testimonial

The clinic showed me how human rights law can be used to advocate for marginalized peoples around the world: through litigation, research, and advocacy, to name a few. I highly recommend the clinic to students interested in international law and who want to protect the human rights to which all people are entitled.

Author
Maryam Kanna ’21

Clinic Faculty

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Course Description
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Students posing at International Criminal Court
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International Human Rights Clinic, 437

The International Human Rights Clinic provides students with an opportunity to critically engage with human rights issues, strategies, tactics, institutions, and law in both domestic and international settings. Through the weekly seminar and fieldwork, students will develop practical tools for human rights advocacy—such as fact-finding, litigation, indicators, reporting, and messaging—that integrate inter-disciplinary methods and maximize the use of new technologies. Students will also develop core competencies related to managing trauma in human rights work, as well as the ethical and accountability challenges in human rights lawyering. 

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International Human Rights Advocacy Seminar
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Students in the International Human Rights Clinic are expected to also enroll in the International Human Rights Advocacy Seminar either as a pre-requisite or co-requisite to the clinic. This course critically assesses the field of international human rights advocacy, its institutions, strategies, and key actors. It explores how domestic, regional, and global human rights agendas are set; the ethical and accountability dilemmas that arise in human rights advocacy; and human rights advocacy concerning a range of actors, including governments, international institutions, and private actors.