Bengali (Bangla)

Testing for Discrimination

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:17 -0500

Testing for Discrimination: Identifying and Prosecuting Human Rights Abuses

By Bea Bodrogi

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This tactical notebook focuses on the successful transplanting to Hungary of "testing," a tactic developed in the antidiscrimination movement in the United States. In testing, an advocacy organization that has received a complaint of an incident of discrimination, immediately sends out "testers" to replicate the incident. If a person, for instance, is denied a job based on their identity, "testers" are sent out immediately to apply for the same job and document their treatment. This documentation will be legitimate evidence of the systematic nature of the discrimination.

The Legal Defence Bureau for National and Ethnic Minorities (NEKI) was founded in 1994 in response to problems caused by longstanding prejudices against the Roma, the largest ethnic minority in Hungary. NEKI seeks to document the experience of discrimination and demonstrate the absence of legal protection for the Roma. The organization has been involved with cases including police brutality, skinhead attacks, and the denial of employment, housing and service in public accommodation.

Since discrimination is often subtle, direct evidence is rare. Adapting a method used by U.S. organisations, NEKI uses testing to collect evidence with which to challenge discrimination in court. After an incident of discrimination is reported to NEKI by a Roma victim, testers – both Roma and non - Roma – are sent to repeat the experience in order to document whether the incident represents a case of systematic discrimination, and to collect evidence for a possible court case. Testing is thus an evidence-gathering tactic that can fit directly into the legal strategy of an organization like NEKI, one confronting the impunity and public apathy about the prevalent problem of racism and discrimination.

The process is quite straightforward: Once NEKI receives a complaint, testers are sent to the place of the alleged discrimination. If the allegation concerns employment, for instance, testing is done by sending out a Roma and a non-Roma person who have similar characteristics and qualifications but differ primarily in their ethnicity. They are sent out at closely spaced intervals on the same day to apply for a job. To make the comparison clear, each tester is asked to take actions comparable to those of his fellow testers. Immediately after completing the test they record their experiences on a questionnaire detailing all the questions asked at the interview, treatment of the applicant, and the description of the job, including salaries and benefits. The test coordinator can then evaluate from this data whether differential treatment has taken place and decide if legal action can be initiated on the grounds of discrimination.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

Making the State Pay

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:08 -0500

Making the State Pay

By Camelia Doru

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In this notebook, we read about the efforts of the ICAR Foundation to mobilize public resources for a socially marginalized group – victims of torture. The Foundation recognized that many citizens had suffered torture during the communist regime, and created an organization to provide treatment and care to the thousands of torture survivors. While there was international support, the Foundation knew that provision of this care was actually the responsibility of the state itself. The notebook outlines ICAR’s effort to pressure the Romanian government to pay for rehabilitation of torture survivors even though it was not willing to officially assume responsibility for past abuses. In effect, ICAR forced the state to begin to fulfill its moral and legal responsibilities as laid out in international and national laws. ICAR’s story provides ideas about how to pressure a state to carry out its obligations to a socially marginalized group and compel it to take a step toward justice.

In October 1991 the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims (IRCT) invited me to Budapest to take part in the first inter-national symposium in Eastern Europe on "Doctors, Ethics and Torture." During this symposium I met people from all over the world, people engaged in providing medical rehabilitation to victims of torture under many different circumstances and often in politically adverse conditions. This experience, along with the support I received from IRCT colleagues, encouraged me to create a non-governmental organization in Romania to address the terrible problem of torture. I knew there would be po-litical resistance, but I also saw that I could count on professional international training, management and financial support. The ICAR Foundation was registered in April 1992. Its name commemorates the Greek mythological figure Icarus, who needed help after successfully escaping from long imprisonment and finding that his wings did not survive the heat of the sun. Our logo contains the wings as a symbolic representation of the Icarus.

We began to search for resources that would allow us to provide services for the thousands of torture survivors in Romania.Throughout the subsequent decade of work, we have found our international colleagues and donors to be crucial. The treatment and care of torture survivors, however, should not depend on the interna-tional community. We believe that this work is the moral and political responsibility of the state itself. What I will describe in this notebook is our long-term strategy to pressure and persuade Romanian local and central governments to start accepting this responsibility.

We opened our first center in 1993 with only three doctors, two supporting staff, and a budget of US$20,000. We saw 85 clients, and our private and international supporters covered all expenses. In 1994 and 1995 our attempts to mobilize public resources began to succeed as we convinced local government officials to provide premises for our operations; we now estimate the value of this local government contribution at over US$100,000 per year. More recently we also obtained government support in prescribing free medicines for our clients – a public contribution worth over US$150,000 per year. By 2002, the ICAR Foundation had grown to three centers with a staff of more than 50. We provide services for 2,000 clients and receive annual international contributions of US$300,000.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

Open Memory

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:08 -0500

Open Memory

By Damian Ferrari

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Read how Memoria Abierta (Open Memory), a human rights organization in Argentina, organizes thousands of documents related to the state terrorism and makes them accessible through an online database as a way to raise public awareness about what happened in Argentina from 1976-1983.

Making Allies

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:07 -0500

Making Allies: Engaging Government Officials to Advance Human Rights

By Boris Pustyntsev

Download full notebok in English, Spanish, Urdu, Bangla and French, and a brief summary in Cantonese below.

In this notebook, we read about a collaboration tactic used by a local Russian nongovernmental organization, Citizens’ Watch, to engage governmental officials, who in many cases are seen as the adversary and not considered as collaborative partners. Citizens’ Watch recognized the potential for engaging bureaucrats who illustrated a level of interest and the potential in significantly advancing human rights. In this notebook, you will read about the unique uses of this tactic, highlighting examples of cross-sectoral cooperation between a nongovernmental organization and the Russian government to advance human rights. As with all tactics, it is not an approach that will work for everyone: well-connected individuals and organizations with highly-developed diplomatic skills will have the most success. But we all can learn, and perhaps get new ideas, from Citizens’ Watch use of collaboration with key government officials to strengthen these officials ability to further human rights from inside government. This notebook will describe how Citizens’ Watch, a Russian NGO based in St. Petersburg, has effectively built collaborative relationships with influential bureaucrats within the Russian administration. These relationships encourage the development of a democratic and participatory connection between the state and its citizens, one in which human rights are respected and the government functions to serve the people, rather than to rule over it. The legacy of Soviet rule and totalitarianism left extremely unpromising conditions for the development of democracy in Russia, in which bureaucrats had neither the experience nor the motivation to be responsive to the public as a transition to democracy demands. Thus, Citizens Watch was swimming against the tide, facing massive inertia and resistance. The development of a positive and collaborative relationship with government insiders in each case required a tailored and respectful approach.

Some of the key techniques Citizens’ Watch used to implement this arduous task included:

a.) An individualized and diplomatic approach – carefully selecting promising and influential players in the administration and approaching them in a respectful and supportive manner.

b.) The effective use of the "carrots" of invitations to domestic and international seminars, trips and meetings. Potential collaborators inside the administration were invited to interesting and useful gatherings outside of Russia, where they would meet international colleagues in their profession who would encourage their personal political transition. Meanwhile, educational events and conferences inside Russia would bring them together with academics and other experts in their field to help them see alternatives to the way the government currently functions.

c.) The provision of helpful resources and information to the bureaucrats, such as translations of documents and training materials from other countries, etc.

d.) Finally, in some cases, the creation of a collaborative relationship allowing for the development of joint strategies to address shared problems. This notebook will use several examples to illuminate the lessons learned from a decade of careful, diplomatic work. The final section will discuss some of the general questions an organization should ask when considering the use of this tactic in its own situation.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

Making the Global Local

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:07 -0500

Making the Global Local: Applying Global Agreements to Local Enforcement of Human Rights Laws

By Columbus Igboanusi

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See Phillipe Duhamel's creative take on this resource at interTactica!

In the human rights field, there is often a wide gap between the locus of abuse and the policies, laws and treaties that were created to prevent or stop it. Furthermore, often the discussion of these abuses and the law and policies to prevent them are only talked about in high level policy and diplomatic forums. The tactic presented in this notebook helps bridge these gaps. The League of Human Rights Advocates in Slovakia recruits people from the disenfranchised population – in this case the Roma – to serve as human rights monitors. The monitors learn, often for the first time, about their own rights under national and international law. The LHRA and the monitors then work to enforce those rights –that were signed into existence in far-off capitals–in their own town halls, police stations, schools and communities. The information from local monitors is used to present the true, on the ground, impact of national and international laws in the country. The work done in Slovak may provide each of us with tactical ideas to address similar gaps in each of our communities and countries.

This notebook describes the creation and functioning of a systematic volunteer network of human rights monitors in Slovakia, maintained by the League of Human Rights Advocates (LHRA). The LHRA believes that its grassroots monitoring of local compliance with international human rights commitments assists and encourages the state and its apparatus to live up to its international obligations. The LHRA’s investigatory work, public education efforts and high-level contacts with international human rights NGOs also enable it to put considerable pressure on the Slovak government to live up to its international commitments. The LHRA’s volunteer monitors thus help achieve justice for local Roma people and others suffering human rights abuses. In addition, since LHRA monitors are themselves Roma activists living in Roma communities. The LHRA training process empowers them and their communities to understand and stand up for their rights.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

Making Sense of the Information Wilderness

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:04 -0500

Making Sense of the Information Wilderness

By Sasa Madacki

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See Phillipe Duhamel's creative take on this resource at interTactica!

Sometimes institutional strengthening tactics applied inside an organization improve the way human rights practitioners do their work and what they can do. Organizations that use their resources effectively, can more effectively advance human rights work. In this notebook, the experience of the Human Rights Centre at the University of Sarajevo is presented. They built a strong information system and central role for an information specialist or librarian. The utilization of this information system and information specialist’s skills allowed other staff to better, and more productively, focus on their core programmatic missions. Although the Human Rights Centre is now a fairly large and relatively well-funded organization, the tactic explained in this notebook presents ideas in a way that nearly any group doing human rights work could apply this organizational strengthening tactic.

When I walked into my new office at the library of the Human Rights Centre in Sarajevo, I found myself with two cardboard boxes containing a card catalogue, an inventory list, a thousand dusty books and a pile of documents. A total wilderness. It was an idyllic and inspiring sight: a librarian sitting in the middle of a room surrounded by stacks of papers with the daunting task of creating order out of chaos. Creating this order would yield an efficient tool to promote human rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina – where human rights are so abused and where reliable sources are lacking. In this notebook it is my modest hope to describe the results of this transformation, and what we have learned from it that can help others working for human rights. I believe now that every organization can improve its work and more effectively promote human rights and justice, if it can systematically develop both a library and a librarian’s position appropriate to its own size and objectives. The goal of this notebook will be to take the Sarajevo Centre’s experience and draw out lessons to enable other organizations to develop the tools and skills to more effectively navigate the ever-expanding wilderness of available information that can help them in their work.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

Expanding Access to Justice

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:08:02 -0500

by Marcos Fuchs

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Until a few years ago, there were no legal firms in Brazil that offered free services to people in need. The Pro-Bono Institute has created a new legal tradition in São Paolo, convincing major law firms to donate their legal services and connecting them with NGOs in need of legal services. The Institute has recruited about 140 lawyers and is offering a variety of free services to all kinds of NGOs, including support for important human rights cases. It has achieved a rapid change in attitude in the legal community and pro bono work has become steadily more popular. This workshop demonstrated how to develop pro bono services in the professional legal community to give NGOs and victims of human rights abuse access to more frequent and better legal services.

The expression pro bono publico is Latin for "for the public interest." The expression is now most commonly used to refer to lawyers or other professionals who offer free services to assist people in need or to promote the public interest. By institutionalizing mechanisms to facilitate such public service, the basic human urge to volunteer time to help those in need can become an integral part of the ethic of an entire profession. The pro bono relationship provides a great benefit to both parties: The clients receive services they might not otherwise afford, while the lawyer receives the satisfaction of using his or her skills for a good cause. As a result of this mutual interest, in some countries special institutions have been created to promote free legal assistance for poor people and charitable nonprofit organizations.

Institutionalized pro bono activities are very strong in places like the United States, Australia and Europe, where most of the top law firms have their own pro bono projects providing assistance to the poor, to immigrants and to NGOs. The institutionalization of pro bono services has a direct benefit for human rights. For one thing, human rights NGOs themselves can benefit from such free services. Secondly, the pro bono movement is responding directly to an often-denied human right: the right to a lawyer. Volunteer lawyers are often interested in providing assistance to victims of abuses. In Brazil some of the most respectable NGOs started their activities during the dictatorship (1964-1989) by assisting victims of the repressive government. Many lawyers were providing free legal support to people detained for political reasons.

Unfortunately, there is huge potential being lost. There is a general openness in the legal profession to offering free services to those who need it most. Yet a great many countries with significant and strong legal establishments have no institutionalized process by which people in need can be linked to volunteer lawyers. Despite the Brazilian experience of legal support to victims of repression, until we created the Instituto Pro Bono in 2001 there was no institution with a mandate and capacity to bring together lawyers offering their services with organizations who might need them. More importantly, there was no built-in ethic or professional expectation that lawyers should offer such services. Unlike in the United States, where it is a basic assumption of the legal profession that a firm will offer a certain percentage of its time pro bono, in Brazil and many other countries this is unheard of.

Voluntary service is a purely personal matter, not related to the firm or to the profession as a whole. The Instituto Pro Bono was created to change this reality: to institutionalize the ethic of pro bono service within the Brazilian legal profession and to create an efficient system for bringing together pro bono lawyers with clients in need. In the long run, we believe that this step will increase access to justice for all Brazilians and assist many worthy NGOs. We want to share this experience with you, as we believe the institutionalization of pro bono services is a step that could have a similarly positive effect in many other countries where it is not yet common practice.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

A Mock Tribunal to Advance Change

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:07:58 -0500

A Mock Tribunal to Advance Change

By Mufuliat Fijabi

Downlaod full notebook below.

In this notebook we learn about the creative and effective use of a mock tribunal to change public perceptions and beliefs regarding violations against women, and to change public policy and law. BAOBAB for Women’s Human Rights, in collaboration with CIRDDOC (Civil Resource Development and Documentation Centre), highlighted violations of women’s rights in Nigeria that were viewed by the public as normal or even justifiable abuse. The organization used prominent people–a Nigerian Supreme Court justice, a member of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (CEDAW) committee in Nigeria, lawyers, and representatives from the National Human Rights Commission–to create a high powered panel of "judges" to draw media attention and hear testimonies by women from many areas of Nigeria. The judges were selected based on their prominence and their concern for women’s rights. The tribunal’s recommendations was instrumental, at both local and national levels, in subsequent attempts to advocate for new laws and for reforms of existing laws related to violence against women. This tactic may provide each of us with ideas for addressing public perceptions and misunderstandings regarding other disadvantaged or abused populations.

On March 14, 2001 the Nigerian public, media, and government witnessed something that had never happened before. In a "mock tribunal" in Abuja, the federal capital of Nigeria, 33 women and girls told a distinguished panel of judges their individual stories of violent victimization. The event attracted ample media coverage and an audience of from 150 to 500 people over the course of the day. It was the first major organized attempt in the country to break the public silence on violence against women. As each woman finished her testimony–or the testimony of her sisters, for the woman who did not survive–the audience was often in tears. At the end the panel of judges retired to deliberate, and returned with a powerful set of recommendations for significant policy changes to protect Nigerian women from violence and human rights abuse.

This mock tribunal was organized by BAOBAB For Women’s Human Rights and by the Civil Resource Development and Documentation Center (CIRDDOC). The idea developed after seeing the impact of tribunals like those in Vienna and Tokyo, and the worldwide attention they attracted. CIRDDOC had itself, in 1999, organized a mock tribunal in Anambra State in South East Nigeria, addressing human rights violations. This event attracted a strong public turnout, and began further discussions on human rights violations in general and those affecting women in particular. Since 1996, BAOBAB had been running workshops and producing radio programs to draw attention to violence against women, and working with women on ways to recognize violence and build defenses against it. Prior to this event, violence against women was given no serious attention in the press, in the halls of government, or in law enforcement. We felt that engaging prominent persons in such a high-profile event would facilitate policy changes. We organized this mock tribunal so that the general public would recognize violence against women and help stop it; so that law enforcement agents would recognize such violence, their own role in perpetuating it, and their responsibility in preventing it; so that the government would agree to play a more significant role in reducing the violence and make resources available to help care for victims; and also so that the government would provide resources to compensate and counsel survivors, helping them integrate back into their lives and communities.

We believe that the tribunal and its associated media workshops influenced the consciousness not only of the Nigerian public, but of bodies such as the National Assembly and the law enforcement agencies (police, army, customs, and the like). At the tribunal itself, legislators vowed to use all power within their reach to fight violence against women, and promised to play a significant role in ensuring that the bill on violence against women was passed into law. The tribunal attracted a great deal of media and public attention, which helped move the problem of violence against women onto the public agenda, opening the way for more effective application of other tactics such as public education and pressure. It also helped empower survivors and give them hope for the future.

Additional Resources:

The International Museum of Women has posted an article on BAOBAB for the March, 2008 focus of Women, Power and Politics! The story has inspired and attracted 1,000 visitors a day to read, comment and take action at www.imow.org.
The website of the International Museum of Women has a new online community allows both individuals and organizations to become a member and connect with like-minded women, men and organizations around the world.

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.

A Call to End Corruption

bharris — Fri, 25 May 2007 20:07:57 -0500

A Call to End Corruption

By Ezel Akay

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In this notebook, we read about how mass numbers of people – 30 million people – in Turkey turned off and on their lights to demand that the government act against corruption. Government corruption had been an open secret. Yet, the public felt apathetic about being able to change the situation. The Campaign of Darkness for Light gave people an easy and no-risk action everyone could take – simply turning off their lights at the same time each evening – and thus show their displeasure with the system. Such a simple action – a flick of the switch – and yet when people saw that their neighbors had turned off their lights, too, they felt the power of their collective voices and began to invent their own ways to speak out by gathering on the streets, marching and banging pots and pans. This deceptively simple tactic carried out in a mass numbers sent a powerful signal that the public was calling for an end to corruption in Turkey.

A "Crash Course" in Democracy Begins!

November 3, 1996. Western Turkey. After sunset, on an intercity highway near a roadside town called Susurluk. A dark green Mercedes is speeding from an Aegean resort town towards Istanbul. Inside are four people with a bag full of dollars, a trunk full of arms, ammunition and silencers, and pockets full of cocaine. They are coming home from a "business" trip. At the same time at a roadside gas station near Susurluk. A truck has just filled up its tank and heads off on a long journey home. It slowly eases its way onto the main road. The Mercedes arrives full-speed just as the body of the turning truck covers the road. Crash! For Turkey a "crash course" in democracy begins.

Three Months Later: The Hopeful Noise of 30 Million Citizens ... On February 1, 1997, at precisely 9 p.m., the lights started to go out in Istanbul and other Turkish cities. Household after household, in a perfectly synchronized mass action, turned off their lights for one full minute. On February 2, the same thing again, only more houses. On February 3, again. By February 15, an estimated 30 million Turkish households throughout the country were participating in the biggest public protest against corruption in Turkish history. Turning off the lights for one minute was all the organizers had suggested anyone do. But it wasn’t enough for the citizens. As the action’s momentum grew, people needed more. They spontaneously went beyond the suggested one minute. They began flicking their lights on and off repeatedly, turning the cities of Turkey into a light show. Then people began opening their windows, blowing whistles, banging pots and pans. The light show became an audio-visual extravaganza. Finally, people began pouring out into the streets. Cars on the highways stopped and began blowing their horns. Even the most affluent neighborhoods in Turkey were turned into spontaneous street carnivals. The unspoken frustration of all of Turkey, hidden for so many years behind fear and apathy, was now out in the open and on the streets!

*Note: You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open the files marked with an asterisk (*). You can download a free version of this program from www.adobe.com.