Human Rights

The New America Foundation/Wireless Future Program is pleased to announce that the International Summit for Community Wireless Networks (ISC4CWN) will be held on May 28th – May 30th, 2008 in Washington, DC. Co-hosted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) at its downtown headquarters, IS4CWN is the largest gathering of community wireless networking developers, implementers and allies working to build universal, low-cost wireless broadband networks around the world. The Summit serves as an integral… more

This article is the third part of a TNR debate between Steven Clemons and Richard Just, deputy editor from The New Republic, on the appropriate response to the Beijing Olympics.

Please click here for the first part of the debate. For the second part, please click here.

From: Steven Clemons To: Richard Just

Richard reads me pretty well. I don't believe that the U.S. government should throw its weight behind an Olympics-tethered human rights rebuke of China --… more

When Samantha Power won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, many people wondered what she would write for an encore. Her answer is a groundbreaking biography of Sergio Vieira de Mello. In nearly four decades of work for the United Nations, Sergio distinguished himself as the consummate humanitarian, able to negotiate with-and often charm-cold war military dictators, Marxist jungle radicals, reckless warlords, and nationalist and sectarian militia leaders. … more

Trade is controversial; around the world many people believe that trade agreements, even trade per se, undermines particular human rights such as labor rights or access to affordable medicine (the right to health). But trade and trade agreements can also advance human rights, directly or indirectly. In fact, some countries use trade policies to advance specific human rights such as labor rights or property rights.

Nonetheless, policymakers struggle to achieve both goals because:

The global economic environment is increasingly complex Human… more

Even western observers who criticise human rights groups for naivety or irresponsibility generally give them credit for purity of intentions -- and, of course, this noble character is indeed true of many groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. But it is not always true, and western public debate would benefit greatly from a recognition of the moral ambiguities involved in some contemporary human rights advocacy.

The uses of such advocacy for imperial propaganda are alive… more

Eliza Griswold is a writer who focuses on conflict, human rights, and religion. Her reportage and analyses have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Harper’s Magazine, and The New Republic, among other publications. She was a 2007 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University and is the recipient… more