Human Rights Transformation in Practice (Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights)

Human rights are increasingly described as being in crisis, but the ideals inherent in them remain appealing. __Human Rights Transformation in Practice__ demonstrates how these ideals are embedded in everyday social practice and activism, and how they can be reinterpreted and redefined in a variety of contexts and for a range of problems. Human rights are increasingly described as being in crisis, but the ideals inherent in them remain appealing. __Human Rights Transformation in Practice__ demonstrates how these ideals are embedded in everyday social practice and activism, and how they can be reinterpreted and redefined in a variety of contexts and for a range of problems.

Human rights are increasingly described as being in crisis. But are human rights really on the verge of disappearing? Human Rights Transformation in Practice argues that it is certainly the case that human rights organizations in many parts of the world are under threat, but that the ideals of justice, fairness, and equality inherent in human rights remain appealing globally—and that recognizing the continuing importance and strength of human rights requires looking for them in different places. These places are not simply the Human Rights Council or regular meetings of monitoring committees but also the offices of small NGOs and the streets of poor cities.

In Human Rights Transformation in Practice, editors Tine Destrooper and Sally Engle Merry collect various approaches to the questions of how human rights travel and how they are transformed, offering a corrective to those perspectives locating human rights only in formal institutions and laws. Contributors to the volume empirically examine several hypotheses about the factors that impact the vernacularization and localization of human rights: how human rights ideals become formalized in local legal systems, sometimes become customary norms, and, at other times, fail to take hold. Case studies explore the ways in which local struggles may inspire the further development of human rights norms at the transnational level. Through these analyses, the essays in Human Rights Transformation in Practice consider how the vernacularization and localization processes may be shaped by different causes of human rights violations, the perceived nature of violations, and the existence of networks and formal avenues for information-sharing.

Contributors: Sara L. M. Davis, Ellen Desmet, Tine Destrooper, Mark Goodale, Ken MacLean, Samuel Martínez, Sally Engle Merry, Charmain Mohamed, Vasuki Nesiah, Arne Vandenbogaerde, Wouter Vandenhole, Johannes M. Waldmüller.

Human rights are increasingly described as being in crisis. But are human rights really on the verge of disappearing? Human Rights Transformation in Practice argues that it is certainly the case that human rights organizations in many parts of the world are under threat, but that the ideals of justice, fairness, and equality inherent in human rights remain appealing globally—and that recognizing the continuing importance and strength of human rights requires looking for them in different places. These places are not simply the Human Rights Council or regular meetings of monitoring committees but also the offices of small NGOs and the streets of poor cities. In Human Rights Transformation in Practice , editors Tine Destrooper and Sally Engle Merry collect various approaches to the questions of how human rights travel and how they are transformed, offering a corrective to those perspectives locating human rights only in formal institutions and laws. Contributors to the volume empirically examine several hypotheses about the factors that impact the vernacularization and localization of human rights: how human rights ideals become formalized in local legal systems, sometimes become customary norms, and, at other times, fail to take hold. Case studies explore the ways in which local struggles may inspire the further development of human rights norms at the transnational level. Through these analyses, the essays in Human Rights Transformation in Practice consider how the vernacularization and localization processes may be shaped by different causes of human rights violations, the perceived nature of violations, and the existence of networks and formal avenues for information-sharing. Contributors : Sara L. M. Davis, Ellen Desmet, Tine Destrooper, Mark Goodale, Ken MacLean, Samuel Martínez, Sally Engle Merry, Charmain Mohamed, Vasuki Nesiah, Arne Vandenbogaerde, Wouter Vandenhole, Johannes M. Waldmüller. Contents Preface List of Abbreviations Introduction. On Travel, Translation, and Transformation Part I. Initiatives by Formal Human Rights Norm-Setters Chapter 1. The Escher–Human Rights Escalator: Technologies of the Local Chapter 2. Accommodating Local Human Rights Practice at the UN Human Rights Council Chapter 3. Human Rights-Based Approaches to Development: The Local, Travel, and Transformation Part II. Interactions Between Social Mobilization and Legal Claim-Making Chapter 4. Lost Through Translation: Political Dialectics of Eco-Social and Collective Rights in Ecuador Chapter 5. Upstreaming or Streamlining? Translating Social Movement Agendas into Legal Claims in Nepal and the Dominican Republic Chapter 6. New Visibilities: Challenging Torture and Impunity in Vietnam Part III. Human Rights Programs and the Proliferation of Nonconfrontational Methods Chapter 7. Rural-Urban Migration and Education in China: Unraveling Responses to Injurious Experiences Chapter 8. Localization “Light”: The Travel and Transformation of Nonempowering Human Rights Norms Chapter 9. Global Rights, Local Risk: Community Advocacy on Right to Health in China Afterword. Our Vernacular Futures List of Contributors Index Acknowledgments