WK 316 Archiving and documentation to support human rights work

It has been said that "knowledge is power". In the area of human rights, documenting information and creating systems that help people access this information are critical prerequisites for planning and taking action. Innovations in building cooperative data systems, utilizing people with special skills and organizing resources for human rights educators provide additional ideas for sharing knowledge that can lead to healing and action.

Panelists

Featured Tactic: Damian Ferrari, Memoria Abierta, Argentina Complementary Presentations:

• Sasa Madacki, Human Rights Center, University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Theresa Limpin, Asia-Pacific Regional Resource Center for Human Rights Education (ARRC), Thailand

Featured Tactic

Coordinated preservation and integrated access to archival information (documentary, photographic and oral) of multiple human rights organizations Damian Ferrari, Memoria Abierta, Argentina

• View Damian Ferrari’s PowerPoint presentation 2374 KB (Spanish)
• Read the text of his slides (Spanish)
• Read his presentation (Spanish)

Memoria Abierta has created a system to make accessible all the public archives of documents, photographs and interviews that are a testament to the horrors of state terrorism in Argentina, its victims and the people who stood against it. Anyone with Internet access can search an online catalogue of the files. The actual materials (files, videos, photos and other materials) remain in the offices of each of the member organizations. The database provides a single index of all the different material, easily searchable by any user. It also exactly locates the original documents, photos, videos so that interested researchers can contact or visit the organization which possesses it if they wish to see the primary source. The project has created special software (also available) to help other organizations create similar databases of archives.

Complementary Presentation

Sasa Madacki, Human Rights Center, University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

• View Sasa Madacki’s PowerPoint presentation 303 KB
• Read the the outline of his presentation

Human rights practitioners can often benefit from institutional strengthening tactics. The Human Rights Centre at the University of Sarajevo provides new skills, new technology and organizational systems to allow human rights advocates to be more effective in advancing human rights. The library and documentation unit focuses on the information needs of the human rights advocates themselves, to free up their time and energy to be more effective advocates.

Complementary Presentation

Theresa Limpin, Asia-Pacific Regional Resource Center for Human Rights Education (ARRC), Thailand

• View Theresa Limpin’s PowerPoint presentation 154 KB
• Read the the outline of her presentation

The Asia-Pacific Regional Resource Center for Human Rights Education (ARRC) serves as a network for human rights education in the Asia-Pacific region, providing human rights training, workshops, development and exchange of instructional and other relevant materials, research and human rights education campaigns. The ARRC has developed a growing databank and resource center that makes training and other materials accessible to grassroots and formal human rights education campaigns.