Central European University A Program for University Teachers, Advanced Ph.D. Students, Researchers and Professionals in the Social Sciences and Humanities Summer University

 
  HUMAN RIGHTS AND FORCED DISPLACEMENT: AN  INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

  July 24- August 4, 2000

 

Course Directors:   Professor Arthur C. Helton (Senior Fellow for Refugee Studies and Preventive
                                                            Action, Council on Foreign Relations; Visiting Professor, CEU)
                                Professor Boldizsár Nagy (Associate Professor, Eötvös Loránd  University,
                                                                            Recurring Visiting Professor, CEU )
Resource Persons: Professor Alastair Ager, Queen Margaret College (Edinburgh)
                               Elspeth Guild, Center for Migration LAw, University of Nijmegen
                               Professor Will Kymlicka, University of Ottawa (Canada)
                               Nuala Mole, Director, AIRE Centre (London)
                               Dimitrina Petrova, European Roma Rights Centre
                               Professor Vello Andres Pettai, University of Tartu (Estonia)
                               Professor Endre Sík,  Budapest University of Economics (Hungary)
 

Arthur C. Helton is a Senior Fellow for Refugee Studies and Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations and a visiting Professor at the Central European University. Mr. Helton held prior positions with  the Forced Migration Projects at the Open Society Institute (Soros foundations), the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights and the New York University School of Law.
Boldizsár Nagy is Associate Professor at the International Law Department of the Eötvös Loránd University and Recurring Visiting Faculty at the Central European University, both in Budapest. He read law and philosophy at the Eötvös University and pursued international studies at the Johns Hopkins University Bologna Center.

Alastair Ager is Director of the Centre for International Health Studies and Professor of Applied Psychology at Queen Margaret University College, Edinburgh and a research Associate of the Refugee Studies Programme, University of Oxford. He is a graduate of the universities of Keele, Wales and Birmingham.

Elspeth Guild is the academic coordinator of the Centre for Migration Law, University of Nijmegen and a partner at the London firm of Kingsley Napley. She specializes in immigration, asylum and nationality law from a European perspective.

Will Kymlicka is a Queen's National Scholar at Queen's University in Kingston (Canada), and a recurrent visiting professor in the Nationalism Studies program at the Central European University. He is the author of four books published by Oxford University Press: Liberalism, Community, and Culture (1989), Contemporary Political Philosophy (1990), Multicultural Citizenship (1995), and Finding Our Way: Rethinking Ethnocultural Relations in Canada (1998).

Nuala Mole is the Founder Director of the AIRE centre. She has worked in immigration and asylum for almost twenty years and has been involved in more than twenty five cases in this field before the European Commission and Court of Human Rights.

Dimitrina Petrova is the Executive Director of the European Roma Rights Centre which is an international non-profit human rights organisation based in Budapest, Hungary. Previously, from 1992 to 1996 she was the Chair of the Human Rights Project in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Vello Pettai is a Lecturer in Political Science at the University of Tartu. He is a PhD candidate at Columbia University and has published articles on comparative ethnopolitics and the Baltic state in particular.

Endre Sik, Professor of Sociology at the dept. of Human Resources  at BUES, project manager at TARKI and director of the Centre for Refugee and Migration Research. Research areas are informal economy, xenophobia, foreigner on the labour market, social capital.

Course Description
The aim of the course is to offer an intensive interdisciplinary review of the law (with a focus on human rights) and other social sciences related to the refugee (forced displacement) phenomenon. Centered around a comprehensive approach to the process of forced displacement from its inception and its underlying causes to durable solutions, the course presents insights from a variety of disciplines -- including law, political science, international relations, sociology, social psychology, and other interdisciplinary inquiries such as the study of nationalism.

The course is designed for an audience with varied backgrounds. Scholars who are used to broad statements about "refugees" will investigate the law and associated issues at the universal level, with significant regional dimensions. Practitioners will become acquainted with the sociological problems of integration, and the psychological complexities of traumatized, isolated persons. After the course, each participant should have a deeper knowledge of forced displacement in his/her own field and a clear understanding of the interrelationships between the fields.  They should have the resources to develop a curriculum, conduct research, and analyze issues of forced displacement.

Course level and target audience
Because of its interdisciplinary character, the assumption is that participants will have at least a basic level of knowledge of the topic within their own field of specialization, but have little or none in the other aspects of forced displacement.  The course is designed for a varied audience with different professional backgrounds, who nevertheless have common characteristics: they are educators or researchers associated with educational institutions, or graduates who are policymakers in their early to middle careers.

Course content
The course is issue oriented, combining insights on forced displacement from different disciplines.  It introduces the participants to relevant classical and current literature, theories and documents necessary to develop and support the capacities of university faculty,  professionals and policymakers in the areas of human rights and forced displacement.
The core content of the course is organized along an imagined sojourn of a forced migrant.

Part I puts forced displacement into context, reviewing theories explaining migration, the contemporary use of the terms, and trends. The "factual" context is then  enlarged to provide insight into deeper causes of frictions within societies leading to displacement, concentrating on nationalism, ethnic tensions, and cultural clashes, including language and citizenship policies.

Part II presents the remedies embodied within refugee law and international regional institutions, reviews the League of Nations and UN refugee regime, and explores the interplay between international politics and action by UN agencies and regional organizations, with an emphasis on the law of international human rights.

Part III turns to the analytical context in which forced displacement has to be interpreted. The interrelationship of forced displacement and international security, the role of the European human rights enforcement system as well as the potential of NGOs in transitional societies to protect and assist the displaced, with comparative references.

Part IV looks at the forced migrant as an individual confronting the receiving society. Myths about threats posed by the displaced will be explored with sociological investigations of the actual benefits and burdens for the individual and receiving society. This includes psychosocial perspectives of the refugee experience.

The last day of the course summarizes the lessons of the previous two weeks in the form of a role-playing simulation of current relevance.  Students and faculty  will draw upon the course to better understand (and search for alternatives concerning) problems leading to forced displacement.

In order to enhance the policy relevance and practical application of the course, afternoon sessions will include presentations by expert commentators from the region, as well as meetings with senior officials and other important actors in the Hungarian refugee field. Consultations on curriculum development will be available to participants.  Course reference persons and the course syllabus will be drawn mainly from the course which was initially offered at CEU/SUN in 1999.

 

Central European University does not discriminate on the basis of-including, but not limited to-race, color, national and ethnic origin, religion, gender or sexual orientation in administering its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship and loan programs, and athletic and other school-administered programs.