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Using the World Bank Inspection Panel to pressure the government to releace social program funds and strengthen human rights

Lrubenstein — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 13:43:48 -0500

In 1999, the Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales (CELS) worked with a group of beneficiaries of a nutritional social program, the Garden Program, to successfully prevent its elimination. In order to pressure the Argentine government to reinstate the needed money to ensure the survival of the program CELS made a presentation to the World Bank Inspection Panel requesting that the undisbursed tranches of a Structural Adjustment loan be withheld until the problem was solved. Less than a month after we made this presentation the Argentinean Government doubled the budget of the program allotting it an additional 4 million pesos.

Our chosen tactic was a game of political pressure.CELS put pressure on the Inspection Panel in order to put pressure on the Bank Management in Argentina; the Bank Management put pressure on the Minister of Economy and he released the money to the Garden Program.

After unsuccessfully campaigning against the threatened budget cut, the Garden Program’s beneficiaries and staff came to CELS for help. The technical staff of the Garden Program knew that the program, although not funded by the World Bank, was included in a list of social programs that was to be protected during the implementation of a World Bank Structural Adjustment Loan (SAL). The SAL was to be disbursed in three tranches and the third tranche was pending. With this information CELS team began its research requiring information from both the Secretariat of Social Development and the World Bank Office in Argentina.

CELS considered different strategies and took account of the conservative position of Argentinean courts towards economic, social and cultural rights. CELS’ lawyers concluded that the most effective way to guarantee the protection of the right to food of the Garden Program’s beneficiaries would be a presentation in front of the World Bank denouncing a failure by the Argentine Government to honor its commitments under the SAL agreement.

Once CELS decided to present the case to the Inspection Panel instead of filing a suit in domestic courts, it had to change its approach to the issue from a pure legal argument to a more political one. Even though CELS is a human rights organization it did not structure its claim as a typical human rights legal action. It did invoke the right to food and human rights standards but knew that that could not be the most effective argument. CELS chose instead to use to its advantage the Bank’s operational guidelines that the Panel is called to supervise.

The Garden Program had been in place since 1990 and provided fresh seeds and training in gardening and agrofood production systems to families with unmet basic needs. The aim of the Program is to help poor people to have a more balanced diet and improve the household food budget. The program also promotes community participation in food production and encourages small-scale agrofood production systems. The program was launched with the expectation that its coverage would grow over time. Until the last quarter of 1998 the beneficiaries of the program had been increasing during the years as well as its budget.

In 1998 it reached some 2.7 million of the poorest of the poor with an annual budget of $11.2 million. But with the approval of the budget for the 1999 fiscal year, the Secretariat of Social Development received only 4 million pesos, specifically earmarked for the Garden Program, equivalent to 32 percent of the total that was originally budgeted by the secretariat which meant the program would disappear altogether by mid 1999.

In July 1999, Garden Program participants presented a formal claim to the Inspection Panel. Under this claim, the local bank officials were charged with failing to comply with the Bank’s policy directives relating to poverty reduction, project supervision, and public access to information. The claim argued that such negligence was leading to the imminent shutdown of the Garden program that would result in direct material damage to the program participants. CELS asked the World Bank to postpone the pending disbursement until the Argentine government had earmarked sufficient funds to keep the Garden Program operational, as required under the terms of the SAL.

In less than a month, once the Bank Office in Argentina and the Argentine government heard about this presentation, and before the Inspection Panel had initiated any investigation, the program was allotted an additional 4,5 million pesos. On August 27, 1999 the Government announced a resolution which allotted an additional 3 million to the Garden Program from funds reallocated from customs auctions. Another $ 1,5 million was added by the Secretariat for Social Development as part of a reorganization of its funds.

Apart from guaranteeing the continuity of the Garden Program, the outcomes of the tactic open the possibility of using the Inspection Panel as an international mechanism for protecting social rights or programs under certain circumstances and show how effective leveraging the power of money might be as a tactic for ensuring economic and social rights.

CLES recognizes some potential problems with this type of tactic. First, by using the mechanisms the Bank is providing, there is the danger of legitimizing the international financial institutions system, in particular the validity of these kinds of structural adjustment loans and the logic of their conditionality. In this regard there are many human rights activists that –with good reasons– would prefer not to participate in, not to support, any of the initiatives that the financial institutions have taken in order to open the dialogue with Civil Society or to become more accountable. Such activists would query the effectiveness or real intention of the political dialogue encouraged by the World Bank or IMF, suggesting that rather than “facilitate effective participation or contestation,” those procedures would contribute to legitimizing the present model.

In addition, our strategy was potentially a double-edged sword: CELS was asking that the Bank be more strict in monitoring social conditionalities while in general we are very critical about the level of encroachment of the IFI’s (international funding institutions) in the domestic affairs of our countries. In considering the use of this type of tactic it is essential to be familiar with the World Bank as an institution, with its operational guidelines and with the different mechanisms and procedures.

Using the budgetary process to work for equity and social justice

Lrubenstein — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:48:24 -0500

The Centre for Budget Advocacy (CBA) is a program operated by the Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC) in Ghana. ISODEC works in a variety of advocacy areas to improve the lives and livelihoods of Ghanaians. As part of ISODEC’s Social Justice and Rights Programme, the Centre for Budget Advocacy examines how national and local budgets impact the human rights of Ghanaians, particularly the poor and vulnerable, and seeks to influence these budgets and the general allocation of public resources for the benefit of disadvantaged groups in the country. The CBA views access to necessities such as food, shelter, and potable water, and to basic social services such as education and health, as rights to which every citizen should be assured.

To evaluate current budgets and developing budget proposals within this human rights framework, the CBA works first to define those rights that the state has agreed to protect. It then thoroughly examines national and local budgets within the context of these human rights, and drafts recommendations on how best to allocate resources and to influence budgets and other economic policies.

Next, the CBA works to gather support for these proposals within two different audiences: the poor and vulnerable themselves, who are represented by civil society organizations and NGOs, and policymakers, such as public officials, elected representatives, and members of both the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Staff members conduct workshops and training programs, which can involve seminars on budget analysis and discussions on how to integrate budget activism into advocacy work. They use the media as a tool, joining debates, participating in radio call-in programs, publishing comments in newspapers, and conducting public forums in which people can discuss policies and submit comments. They also network with members of other NGOs, hosting workshops on economic policy and forming coalitions.

In reaching out to citizens of Ghana, the CBA works to inform them of their rights to participate in decision-making and to demand that resources are fairly distributed. In reaching out to policymakers, both national and global, it works to convince them that the allocation of public resources must benefit deprived and marginalized citizens, and that the agencies which provide basic services—such as education, health, and potable water—to these citizens should receive increased resources.

Responses to the CBA’s efforts have generally been positive. Members of Parliament as well as other government representatives have shown interests in the CBA’s budgetary analyses, and staff have frequently been invited to participate in public forums and workshops. A strong relationship has also developed between the CBA and the World Bank.

These positive responses from policymakers, however, do not always translate into policy changes. In addition, it has often been difficult to reach and involve the citizens of Ghana. Illiteracy rates in the country are extremely high, and there is a general lack of involvement in government issues even among literate and highly educated citizens. Together with the technical nature of budgets and other economic issues, these problems have made it difficult for citizens to understand and contribute to the debates led by the CBA, and to actively contribute their support. However, the CBA has laid the groundwork for future impacts on human rights in Ghana.

Creating a written history based on oral testimony to help people in isolated communities understand the full extent of the war

Lrubenstein — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:38:34 -0500

As part of the on-going REMHI (Recovery of Historical Memory) Project, several dioceses of the Catholic Church in Guatemala mobilized their own members to collect testimonies from victims of state violence. These testimonies were compiled in a report to disseminate and return that history to the affected communities and individuals.

During Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, nearly 200,000 people were killed, disappeared or suffered other human rights abuses primarily by state security forces. The REMHI Project began in 1994, one year before the 1995 Peace Accords, as an initiative of the Human Rights Office of the Archbishop of Guatemala, under the leadership of Archbishop Juan Gerardi. While a truth commission had been outlined as part of an earlier Peace Accord, the commission had not been established and the church felt that it would not be able to meet expectations due to the extreme divisions and the degree of violence suffered by the society.

Therefore, REMHI decided to use the structure of the church and the enormous network of people associated with it to open a space for dialogue on the violence and to facilitate the work of a future truth commission. The church publicized the project through posters, flyers and radio spots. Each participating parish nominated two parishioners as ‘facilitators of reconciliation.’ REMHI’s approach has differed from other reconciliation efforts in its grassroots mobilization of individuals, especially victims of the violence who often served as facilitators. All across the country, close to 800 facilitators collected testimonies from people who had suffered violence, torture or the loss of a family member. Through the project they collected and analyzed 5,000 to 7,000 interviews. The collection of testimonials was carried out at great risk to the church and members involved since violence was still occurring.

Analysis of the testimonies demonstrated state security forces were responsible for most of the human rights abuses during the war. A final report, “Guatemala: Never Again” was released in four volumes and presented to the public on April 24, 1998. Tragically, Archbishop Gerardi was assassinated two days after the report was released; military personnel were later convicted for his death.

Despite the Archbishop’s death, many of the same facilitators have continued the project. They presented the participating communities with the results of the project, which helped place the individuals and communities experiences in a historical and national context. When translations are available in local languages, participants are given copies of a popularized version of the report, which is meant to be read aloud in group discussion. From the report, they learn that what happened to them was not their fault and that it happened to many people throughout the country. The facilitators also accompanied the communities in their reconciliation efforts, working to contribute to the construction of a culture of peace by promoting nonviolent methods to resolve conflicts in the communities. This process occurred in conjunction with the ongoing exhumations and reburial of victims’ remains, which form an important part of the healing process in Maya culture. Lastly, when the Guatemalan Truth Commission (the Commission for Historical Clarification) was established REMHI’s work contributed to the commission by supporting witnesses, the participation of community organizations and providing testimony

History is traditionally written by those in power. Victims of abuse – whether they are poor communities or civilians caught in the middle of a civil war – rarely have their say, even after the abuse has ended. In this next tactic, a group in Guatemala created a way to bring isolated communities ravaged by the war into the process of writing the history of that war. Concretely, the outcome of this process is a report, but the creation of this report began a process of reconciliation at the local level and gave a voice to people who otherwise would have had one.

REMHI’s tactic could be used in other countries to help facilitate or contribute to the work of a truth commission. Additionally, this tactic could be used in other situations where there is not a truth commission or where those most affected by human rights abuses cannot participate in processes like truth commissions and litigation.

In Guatemala this tactic was effective largely because of the extensive institutional structure and reach of the Catholic Church. Without a pre-existing, trusted network it would be difficult to gather personal stories on this scale. Funding is also necessary to carry out this tactic. In Guatemala, financial resources were limited and work was distributed among the individual dioceses.

Furthermore, the risks that can exist by using this tactic need to be taken into account. The project of REMHI generated hostility from the army and paramilitaries, especially given that many of the human rights violators continue in positions of authority in the army and government, and they have responded with threats and even assassinations of those associated with the project.

Building Child Friendly Villages

kantin — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 11:43:39 -0500

by Bhuwan Ribhu
Download full notebook below.

This notebook will introduce and share the concept of Child Friendly Villages or Bal Mitra Gram (BMG), developed by Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA), which directly address the multi-dimensional problems that generate, maintain and perpetuate the child labour situation. BMGs attack the triangular paradigm, a vicious circle of illiteracy, poverty, and child labour. The BMG is an innovative concept that offers a long-term, sustainable solution to a wide variety of problems such as child labour, trafficking for forced labour, poverty alleviation, and illiteracy, among others. BMGs aim at prevention while understanding the root causes to ensure sustainability and permanent settlement of the child labor problem. Not only does the BMG programme aim to withdraw children from work while enhancing the quality of education, it also aims at a holistic development of villages towards the creation of a child friendly society. Throughout the whole process emphasis is given on child participation, community mobilization, promotion of education, victim empowerment, gender equity and awareness of gender issues, while drawing upon the convergence of various poverty alleviation schemes and programmes, and ensuring long-term sustainability of the initiatives through the creation of sound community organisation and building a resource base.

A BMG village has no child labour. All children receive compulsory, good quality education, and the voice and opinion of the children ar eheard and taken into account. To date there are more than 150 Child Friendly Villages and currently BBA is working in an additional 43 villages to make them Bal MItra Gram. This notebook will outline how the BMG approach is child-centric and ensures participation of children, making it a comprehensive programme.

*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.

Using government resources to institute women's human rights education

Lrubenstein — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:41:05 -0500

The Women for Women’s Rights Project—“New Ways” in Turkey, gained the financial support of government to implement human rights education for women. This support allowed the organization to carry their program out much more extensively in communities, reaching many more people in the country.

Even though women’s rights have been protected under Turkish law since the beginning of the Republic, in reality, they felt that the majority of women didn’t know they have rights and were under the control of traditional practices carried out by the men in their lives. In areas such as marriage, divorce, inheritance, and work, they saw that many Turkish women experience discrimination and abuse.

The Women for Women’s Human Rights project believed human rights education among women would help them to claim their rights. The group concluded that their education program would need to be sustained and promoted in a more institutionalized way to have a significant impact on women’s lives. As a result, they moved to collaborate with the government to implement the human rights education through government social workers and community centers and has now been able to provide group facilitator training to 94 social workers in 28 cities, and has involved over 1,300 women in the program. The organization provides on-going consultation and support to the trained social workers through letters, phone calls and site visits.

There were a number of important steps taken that were essential in gaining government support to supply the personnel and community center resources. The group researched the appropriateness of utilizing the government community centers and the social workers who run them. Because the vision of the community centers was based on a horizontal model of administration—run and supported by the community itself rather than a “top-down” model—this was very compatible and made it possible for the women’s human rights program to be implemented in these Community Centers.

The organization then determined that they would need support from high levels in government to carry out their plan. They believed the General Directorate of the government’s social service department, which had created the community centers, would be a potential ally in implementing their pilot education program. They arranged to meet with the head of the department to present extensive research on women and law, human rights violations against women, and the program they developed. The group gained the support of the General Directorate of the government social service department to implement the program in its entirety, including an agreement that the sixteen modules would be taught without changes. Additional modules could be added and would be welcomed to address specific regional issues identified by the women themselves but the core program would remain the same.

In order to maintain the support of the government, the group equipped the General Directorate with detailed information about pertinent human rights abuses and the women’s rights education program. This allowed the General Directorate to defend the agreement to offer government financial support to the program, if confronted with opposition to this decision.

Women’s for Women’s Rights ultimately signed a protocol with the government community centers to train the social workers as group facilitators to provide the women’s rights program. The social workers participated in the 16 module program themselves as well as receiving facilitation training. They then implemented the program as facilitators with a group of women in their own community center with support from Women for Women’s Human Rights. This process ensures that the personnel at the centers maintain the integrity of the program. They understand the program and they can provide it to others.

This tactic can provide ideas and insights into the utilization of government resources to promote human rights endeavors in a wide variety of arenas such as education, health, and victim or special population services to name a few. In implementing this tactic, it is important to identify potential allies in government and take the time to understand the agency that will be approached for funds. Other considerations include the risk that government priorities will shift, or that supporters within the targeted agency will leave, affecting future support for the program.

Using street theater to inform the public about social issues

Lrubenstein — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:27:31 -0500

The Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA) stages informance plays—performances meant to inform—on social issues ranging from women’s rights to children’s rights across the Philippines to educate the public. With its mobile theater, PETA uses informance plays as tools to engage the public to confront important social issues that remain unaddressed. In doing so, PETA indirectly forces individuals to seek solutions to their own problems.

Today, one-third of the Filipino population lives below the poverty line. As a result, a majority lacks education. This lack of education is seen with social problems such as family planning, domestic abuse, marital rape, and child abuse. A majority of the Filipino population have come to accept silently these social concerns, relying on tradition to justify the use of violence in families or the growing number of children in impoverished households. PETA’s work has sought to reverse this situation.

PETA was established in 1967. It is committed to social change. For thirty-three years, PETA has presented educational and developmental performances on various issues, from domestic abuse to family planning. PETA has given mobile workshops for marginalized communities as well as for an array of audiences to promote a “culture of peace, social justice and sustainable development” (“Histoire récente du Théâtre,” Online). Through informance plays, PETA has sought to achieve this mission.

Communities, villages, or organizations first request PETA to perform. These requests usually ask PETA to stage their plays around specific issues affecting the community. For example, the Commission on Population asked PETA to stage its informance play around the causes and consequences of unmet needs. PETA then gives the issue a human face by incorporating everyday characters with whom the audience can relate. This may include a male-chauvinistic husband and a desperate wife. In addition, PETA stages the setting of the play in accordance with its audience’s situation. The informance play lasts around seventy-five minutes. The play, however, portrays a social issue without giving any solution to it. PETA’s intent in doing so is to give the audience something to think about. PETA’s work, though, does not finish there. After each performance, actors hold a discussion with the audience. If the audience is small, they discuss the impact of the play in a circle. The actors ask for the audience’s reaction to the play. In many cases, individuals relay to the actors their connections with a specific character. To the actors, this indicates that a connection was made as intended. During this debrief session, PETA listens to the audience’s feedback, personal stories, and initiatives for action. PETA may recommend or provide ideas for the audience to act upon; however, PETA mostly acts as a supporter. PETA wants the audience to find their solutions on their own.

PETA’s work has made the company evolve into a prestigious theater in the Philippines and in Asia. PETA has performed more than 300 productions attended by thousands of individuals. Examples include “Tumawag kay Libby Manaoag,” plays on domestic violence, and “the Libby Files.” The success of informance plays has been so tremendous that requests for PETA cannot accommodate any more performances. PETA’s tactic has left its mark most significantly on its audience. As a result of these performances that touched the heart of many of the spectators, local communities, individuals, or groups have taken action to solve their problems. Issues no longer remain unaddressed. For example, after an informance play on marital rape, a woman went back home and said no to her husband when she did not feel like it. PETA, in other words, has challenged its audiences to re-think conventional, deeply rooted beliefs about issues such as man and wife, gender roles, and population control.

In thinking about how to implement this tactic in another context, i.e. child prostitution or HIV/AIDS, it is important to keep in mind that 1) criticism to one’s theatrical approach may emerge, 2) participation from communities, villages, and organizations is necessary, and 3) funding for the tours is important.

Phasing out child labor in the garment industry and providing education for ex-workers

ahorwart — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:23:00 -0500

The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (BGMEA), in collaboration with the International Labor Organization (ILO) and UNICEF, developed the Child Labor Project to eliminate child labor in factories that belong to its 2,500 members, and to provide an alternative to former child laborers in the form of an education program. In 1995, the ILO, UNICEF, and the BGMEA entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which required, among other things, (1) a fact-finding survey to determine the extent of the use of child labor in the Bangladeshi garment industry, (2) the establishment of an education program for child laborers phased out of the industry, (3) the establishment of monitoring and verification systems, and (4) the provision of a monthly stipend to phased-out child workers and their families. The MoU served as the basis for the implementation of the Child Labor Project, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Labor.

The first component of the Child Labor Project is the provision of three years of informal education for ex-child workers with the goal of mainstreaming them into the formal Bangladeshi educational system. Through the course of the project, UNICEF and two non-governmental organizations created 353 schools for this use in which 9,740+ children had enrolled before May 1998. The BGMEA also undertook to offer employment to qualified family members of ex-child workers. In addition, the project provided the families with access to micro-credit systems so that families can increase their income, resulting in less dependency on wages earned by child workers.

The second part of the project, the monitoring and verification system, was established to gain an understanding the extent to which child labor was used in Bangladeshi garment factories and to monitor progress toward the elimination of child labor. The ILO trained inspectors to advise factory owners and managers about the benefits of the Child Labor Project and the need to get rid of child labor. Since the inspectors were not trained as “police” force, their factory visits engendered some level of trust between the inspectors and factory owners. The inspectors focused solely on the use of child labor and did not address working conditions, wages, or other employment issues. During its first survey in 1995, monitoring teams visited about 2,100 factories and found that child labor was being used in approximately 42.5% of garment factories. By 2000, the percentage had been reduced to 4.5%. The goals of the project also included ensuring that ex-child workers were able to return to their positions in the garment industry once they reached 14 years old.

The success of the Child Labor Project in Bangladesh has led to the implementation of modified versions of this project by the ILO in Pakistan, East Asia, Africa, and Central America. Similar to the BGMEA version, the new applications of the project all combine social protection programs for ex-child workers and families which are implemented by local NGOs with a monitoring system run by the ILO. The new projects focus specifically on the coffee and commercial agricultural industries. The lessons learned by the organizations involved in the Bangladeshi project have led to the elimination of the monthly stipend payment for ex-child workers because of the cost involved and the related lack of sustainability of that component of the project. Instead, ex-child workers in the modified versions of the project receive access to vocational training and micro-credit for their families.

The Child Labor Project in Bangladesh faced a couple of challenges in its implementation. First, once children reach age 14, they can legally work and thus, there was a need to continue providing a stipend after that point to encourage them to stay in school and not go back to work. This increased the costs of the project and there were questions about the sustainability of such an approach. Another important consideration in implementing this type of project is the importance of the role played by employers in this process. The BGMEA and ILO stressed the significance of having employers’ cooperation in order to develop a successful and sustainable project. A third, and related, consideration is the pressure that the Bangladeshi garment industry was facing as a result of a bill proposed by Senator Tom Harkin in the U.S. Senate in 1993. The bill proposed a ban on imports from countries that used child labor at any stage of production. It did not pass, but the resulting negative publicity and the threat of a ban on selling its garments in the U.S. played a part in the industry’s willingness to cooperate with the project.

Training minorities to produce and direct community-based television programming to break down prejudices

ahorwart — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:16:02 -0500

Based in Hungary and Romania, the Black Box Foundation works to improve attitudes towards the Roma minority by helping them produce television programs for local channels. The Foundation creates production teams, trains them in video production, secures airtime, and sees that programs are exchanged between teams.

The Roma minority is the primary subject of prejudice in Hungary and Romania. The general public’s overwhelmingly negative attitude toward the Roma is strengthened by the mass media’s portrayal of them in a context of poverty and criminality, and their inability to access the media has effectively left them without a voice in which to address their image in the majority culture.

To address the public’s lack of knowledge about Roma culture and daily life, in 1997 the Black Box Foundation began a project to train people in television production and to help them acquire airtime in which to inform local viewers, both Roma and non-Roma, about issues affecting their community.

The Foundation solicits applications, and from the chosen applicants creates five-person teams. As the teams are meant to be models of cross-ethnic cooperation, members are Hungarian, Roma, and Romanian. Foundation staff members first work to build trusting relationships with and among team members, discussing individual viewpoints, and addressing the sensitive issues that will be brought up in the program. Teams then participate in a training program in Budapest where, in addition learning the fundamentals of television production, they are able to consult with experts on minority issues.

During the last three days of training, teams produce their first films. They are then provided with a camera, lights, microphones, and other necessary equipment, which they use to produce their own monthly programs at local television stations. Team members act as writers, camerapersons, reporters, directors, editors, and presenters of the programs. The Black Box Foundation supervises and regularly monitors the project for six months following training. The Foundation negotiates with local broadcast companies to secure regular airtime for monthly television programs; production teams, however, work independently and are required to find their own resources in their respective communities. Completed programs are broadcast at the crew's local television stations, and are also exchanged between the teams of each country.

The Black Box Foundation has trained approximately 150 people in twelve locations in both Hungary and Romania. Outcomes among the production teams have varied. A number of teams still broadcast regularly on local television, and members of one crew were hired by a local station. Although other teams no longer broadcast on their television stations, they now use their skills and equipment to record the activities of their human rights organizations.

Although it involves a long and complicated process, the program has helped change the way minorities are viewed and treated in the region, reducing ethnic tensions and prejudices. It has also helped to show how human rights activists, with training in only the most basic video skills, may use television as a powerful medium for exploring and promoting discussion of human rights issues.

Edited 16 February 2003

Training grassroots human rights groups in video and communications technology

ahorwart — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:09:08 -0500

WITNESS empowers human rights organizations around the world to incorporate video as an advocacy tool in their work. Rooted in the power of personal testimonies and in the principle that a picture is worth a thousand words, WITNESS and its partners’ videos have been used

as evidence in legal proceedings;
to corroborate allegations of human rights violations;
to complement written reports to international/regional organizations that provide a counterweight to official versions of a country’s human rights performance;
to stimulate grassroots education and mobilization;
to provide information for news broadcasts;
to promote human rights via the internet; and
to produce documentaries for broadcast on television worldwide, among others uses.

Founded in 1992, WITNESS has created partnerships with more than 150 groups in 50 countries on a variety of issues, ranging from the “social cleansing” of street children in Central America and sexual abuse of women/girls during Sierra Leone’s civil war to sweatshops in the United States and the plight of people displaced in Burma.

WITNESS chooses partners who seek to build a long-term capacity to use video effectively and also seeks specific campaign opportunities where video can tip the balance between success and failure. Once a partnership is established, WITNESS provides the group with video equipment and training, then follows up with workshops in camera techniques, intensive instruction in using video for human rights work, systemic evaluation of video footage, post-production assistance and constructive feedback to create powerful documentaries.

WITNESS and its partners then create video advocacy campaigns around these videos. These campaigns are built around strategies with many components, including broadcast and distribution platforms, collaboration with other organizations and networks, targeted screenings before key audiences and opportunities for individual viewers to take action. These campaigns may be as targeted as using video to influence a small group of key decision-makers or as broad as trying to mobilize youth around a particular issue. Footage is also kept in the WITNESS Archive, where it is available as a unique resource of human rights information to the global community.

WITNESS’s recognizes that depending on the local context, a human rights advocate may be protected or endangered by using a camera.. WITNESS uses the experience of its staff and partners to help others create policies that are safe and appropriate for their situations. They also stress the importance of the relationship of trust between the person filming and the person being filmed, including a clear explanation of the risks and benefits of speaking to a camera.

One example of a strategic and savvy use of video advocacy is WITNESS's work with Mental Disability Rights International (MDRI) to document the deplorable conditions in a Paraguayan psychiatric hospital.

“Julio and Jorge were two adolescent boys being kept in the hospital along with 458 other people – naked, in bare cells without access to bathrooms. The cells reeked of urine and excrement and the walls were smeared with feces. The boys spent approximately four hours every other day in an outdoor pen, littered with garbage and broken glass.

In December 2003, MDRI filed an emergency petition before the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights (IACHR) at the Organization of American States (OAS), asking the IACHR to intervene on behalf of the boys, as well as the others in the hospital.

Along with a legal brief, MDRI submitted a video that they had shot and edited with WITNESS. The video was structured according to the specific articles set forth in several international human rights instruments to which Paraguay is bound. Using images that clearly demonstrate how Paraguay had failed to fulfill its obligations, the video put a human face on the issue. The video was specifically presented within a human rights framework to argue that these patients are legally entitled to a minimum standard of living. This led the IACHR to establish jurisprudence on the rights of those in mental health facilities, a legal precedent that can now be used in other countries in the region.

In December 2003, for the first time, the IACHR approved urgent measures to protect the lives and physical integrity of those in psychiatric institutions. MDRI and WITNESS subsequently brought the issue to the general public by streaming the video over their web sites and by collaborating with CNN en Espanol on a follow-up story. The president of Paraguay and the minister of health personally visited the hospital, after which the hospital director was fired and a commission was formed to investigate the issue.

By reaching a broader group of people, MDRI and WITNESS garnered further support for change By exposing these conditions to a broader public, they called attention to the situation of mental health facilities in Paraguay, and the press played a pivotal role in the unfolding of events that brought about significant changes.

Although Julio and Jorge’s ward is still in the process of being renovated as this book goes to press, they have access to showers and clothes, as well as 24-hour nurses. The Paraguayan Health Ministry is working with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) to bring conditions up to the most basic standards of human rights.

The collaboration between WITNESS and MDRI has now produced system-changing results, but the challenge lies ahead, in ensuring that human rights advocates pick up the momentum created by the video and follow up on the case to ensure that conditions are improved for all psychiatric facilities in Paraguay. While this case has relied upon strong visual evidence of a violation, it is also important to note that WITNESS partners have successfully used video without relying upon filming such graphic images. For instance, many have created powerful videos by collecting testimonies and telling the stories of those most directly affected, which can have just as a powerful impact within a human rights campaign”

Offering community education and developing alternative rites of passage to discourage Female Genital Cutting

ahorwart — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 11:57:15 -0500

The NGO PATH (Program for Appropriate Technology in Health) and Maendeleo Ya Wanawake, Kenya's largest women's organization, have collaborated to offer alternatives to Female Genital Mutilation. They combine community education for young girls and parents with alternative rites of passage that preserve many traditional aspects of the coming-of-age ritual, while prohibiting physical harm to girls.

In recent years the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), endemic in Africa and surviving in many transplanted immigrant communities, has been a focus of international discussion and condemnation by medical and human rights organizations worldwide. If women in nations where FGM is practiced hope to make gains in the area of women's rights, it is essential that they learn there are alternatives. However, eradicating FGM is proving to be a more tenacious challenge than external pressure can achieve. This tactic is a response to objections often raised by communities claiming that the West does not understand the cultural significance of a practice, rooted in centuries of tradition, which marks a girl's transition into adulthood.

The program began in August 1996 with an aggressive, yet sensitive approach to community education in the Masai community. Kenyan women, many of whom had experienced the procedure themselves as children, spoke to schoolgirls and frankly informed them of FGM’s physical effects. At the same time, parents of young girls were approached by educators with a different angle: discussing the effect of FGM on their daughters’ economic future (typically, a girl drops out of school following FGM and is married, with little personal earning power).

The alternative, non-FGM centered coming of age ritual preserves many of the traditional features of the old version—seclusion, family life education, celebration and gift giving. Thus, parents and their daughters are able to choose to honor cultural traditions without sacrificing their rights to health and economic opportunity. From an initial class of 28 girls participating in a week-long ceremony, the program has grown considerably: by late 1998, more than 1,100 girls had 'graduated' in a dozen ceremonies in several communities. The program has achieved success in that none of the girls who have 'graduated' have given into societal pressure to be circumcised.

This educational tactic has potential for impact far beyond the African continent. FGM has also become an important issue in Australia, the UK, Canada, France and the United States due to the continuation of the practice by immigrants from countries where FGM is common. These nations can learn how to deal with the issue of FGM in a way that is sensitive to the immigrants' native culture, but which protects the interests of young women.