Contemporary Issues in Human Rights

This course examines basic human rights norms and concepts - and mechanisms of protection and enforcement - through the lens of selected contemporary human rights cases.  We focus primarily (but not exclusively) on the U.S. experience and place it in a global context. Students will have an opportunity to meet with experienced human rights “practitioners” during the course from the arts, journalism, medicine, and law. Learning about the reality of human rights “practice” is a core element of this course. The course will address contemporary human rights concerns, focusing on U.S. examples within the frame of international human rights, including whether non-citizens in the U.S. have full rights.  We will look at the persistence of racism, torture, and police abuse, and how international human rights can protect (or not) voting rights, economic, and social rights. Cross-cutting themes of the course include the universalism of human rights, impunity and accountability, notions of “exceptionalism,” the precarity of the “rule of law,” and the adaptability of the human rights regime to meet new challenges.