Echenberg Human Rights Fellows

Fellows Rebecca Hamilton and Jina Moore have contributed a chapter to an e-book on Kony 2012 edited by Wronging Rights blogger Amanda Taub. Check it out here. A description below:

This book is for those who know a little about Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army, and want to know more.

Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 has become the most viral video ever. Concerned citizens around the world, from middle school students to celebrities like Oprah and Justin Bieber, watched the film and shared it with their friends. It has now been viewed more than 87 million times.

That success was soon met by a critical backlash. Critics nearly as varied as the campaign’s supporters pointed out that Invisible Children was offering an oversimplified, even misleading narrative. They faulted the campaign for failing to provide a context for the LRA conflict, and pointed out that the video portrayed Africans as either helpless victims, or heartless killers.

This book is both a collection of that criticism, and a constructive response to it. The authors each wrote a short essay offering information that they felt was missing from the video, or explaining how they thought the campaign could be improved.

The first several chapters provide historical and political context. Adam Branch, Daniel Kalinaki, and Ayesha Nibbe explain the roots of the conflict, and how it has persisted for so many years. Alex Little and Patrick Wegner discuss various attempts to end the conflict through peace negotiations, ICC arrest warrants, and military operations, and why they have not been successful.

Later chapters consider the ethics and effectiveness of awareness campaigns like Kony 2012. Glenna Gordon and Jina Moore draw on their experiences as journalists to critique the video’s portrayal of Africa and the people who live there. Rebecca Hamilton, Laura Seay, Kate Cronin-Furman, and Amanda Taub examine the weakness of “awareness” advocacy. Alanna Shaikh explains the ethical dangers of bad aid work. Teddy Ruge offers a different view of Africa, as a place of dynamic innovation instead of violence and helplessness. And youth activist Sam Menefee-Libey describes his frustration with the tone and substance of the campaign meant to target his generation.

Also, a bit out of date, but here’s a link to a radio interview with Hamilton on Kony 2012 from early March.

We recently held a small seminar on Ethical Engagement (spurred by the Kony 2012 debate) at the McGill Faculty of Law. You can view the full seminar here. Comments appreciated!

Check out Jina’s blog for some great news posts, including:

• In Liberia, Threats for Covering Female Circumcision
• The Terminator in Tanzania, or, How an Advocacy Video Can Change the Narrative
• Visible Liberians
• Five Questions for Invisible Children and #Kony2012

Journalist Jina Moore writes in Miller-McCune:

Brenda Wandera’s iPhone buzzes in her lap. A text message has made its way through the blurry heat of Kenya’s Chalbi Desert, and it changes her next move. “As soon as we get to Kalacha, we have to go to Network,” she says.

Go to Network, I wonder. That must be a Kenyan turn of phrase for “finding a cell tower.”

I’ve been warned that Kalacha is off the grid, which would make it one of the more remote corners of Africa, where mobile-phone and Internet service in even far-flung villages can be stronger and more regular than in parts of the American Southwest or Appalachia. Indeed, Kalacha is isolated. It sits in northern Kenya, about 40 miles from the border with Ethiopia, just at the edge of the Chalbi. Rounded huts of thatched grass zigzag across dry land. The horizon is dark and bulbous and looks very, very far away.

Continued.

From Rosebell’s blog:

Dr . Payam Akhavan, is a former UN Prosecutor at The Hague, he advised the Ugandan Government on the LRA case before the ICC as part of a broader strategy of isolating and defeating Kony in 2003-2005. He is now a professor of international law at McGill University n Montreal. I have known Payam  for a few years. Here is what he told me about KONY2012

“The video is ten years too late.  Watching it, one imagines that nobody was ever involved in this struggle before they started filming.  Back in 2003, we devised a brilliant strategy with highly competent Ugandan officials on how to eliminate the LRA by depriving them of rear-bases in southern Sudan.  Within two years, the war in Uganda was over and Joseph Kony’s force of several thousand was reduced to a few hundred fugitives in the Congo.

The failure to capture him thus far has nothing to do with lack of funds. It is a complex intelligence operation against a cunning and ruthless adversary who knows how to survive in the jungle.  The millions in funds gathered so far are needed for rehabilitation of former child soldiers and their communities, not to pay overhead for NGOs in America.  The video may be useful for public education since the world is woefully ignorant about Africa.  But its content is at best uninformed and at worst deceptive.  Exploiting other people’s suffering for self-promotion is unethical.

Had the Ugandan communities directly affected been consulted, the video would have had a very different focus, and the millions of dollars in funds too would have reached those that need it most.”

Just a few days ago, the Invisible Children campaign to arrest Kony hit social media. A number of people have provided excellent critiques. Check out Fellow Rosebell Kagumire’s responses: she recorded a great video blog here and followed up with a number of articles here and here. I also posted my own critique here and followed up with a few other articles.

Thoughts and commentary welcome!

Fellow Rosebell Kagumire has some interesting new posts on maternal health care in Uganda:

1. Uganda simply not doing enough to save pregnant mothers says US government health strategist.

2. When a woman bleeds a nation bleeds: tackling maternal deaths in the Rwenzori ranges.

International Forum for Young Leaders – Global Conference on Democracy, Human Rights and the Fragility of Freedom – March 2013

Deadline: April 13, 2012

The Global Conference on Democracy, Human Rights and the Fragility of Freedom will be held at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, March 21-23, 2013. This will be the third Echenberg Family Conference on Human Rights. Before each of these conferences, a Young Leaders Forum is held; Alumni of each Young Leaders Forum become McGill Echenberg Human Rights Fellows and remain active in a vibrant community of human rights professionals around the world. This third conference will provide a unique networking opportunity for like-minded young leaders from around the world, allowing them to engage with each other and work with some of the Conference’s distinguished speakers.

The Young Leaders will address key issues around democratic citizenship, the protection of fundamental rights and freedoms, including the violent repression of democracy and economic and social rights, as well as the role of transnationalism, globalization and foreign policy in democracy. Young Leaders will have the opportunity to develop practical skills in human rights advocacy, including in the use of social media and community-building to effect change.

One of the main goals of the International Forum for Young Leaders is to share practical tools and experiences while engaging with these Conference themes.

We now invite applications from young professionals and scholars who can speak to the promotion of democratic issues and human rights, both in their own countries and in the international arena.

The application form is available here.

If you missed this great event with Fellow Rebecca Hamilton, Kyle Matthews and Prof. Payam Akhavan, catch the audio here.

Over on her blog, Fellow Rosebell Kagumire has some new updates from Uganda;

1. Is it outrageous to want to live in peace?

1. Kisenyi: A case for urban poor in Uganda