Admission requirements
Master degree
Description
While the rise of human rights regimes across the globe is evident, the extent to which these regimes are accessible and effective is less clear. Citizens who wish to invoke human rights in support of a particular cause are usually confronted with both legal and practical obstacles, and may choose alternative forms of action rather than going to a court or a human rights body. Moreover, in particular in societies where religious and/or customary law are important, framing problems as human rights issues may even be counterproductive and reinforce resistance against redressing such problems.
This course examines issues concerning the proliferation and effectiveness of human rights, access to justice and legal and non-legal human rights-related strategies that actors use in practice. It will introduce students to the main theories regarding the potential and limitations of rights and rights discourse, regarding access to justice, as well as regarding the way in which human rights may be interpreted, contested and reframed in practice. Such analysis will assist students to better understand under what conditions and in what ways human rights can become effective tools for citizens in improving their lives. The primary focus will be on the developing world, as it is here that the problems of realising human rights are generally most profound. The course is of a socio-legal nature and will thus help students to broaden their view from an internal-legal perspective to an external view of what human rights may and may not achieve.
Course objectives
Objectives of the course
Students are able to explain the roles human rights play in different social contexts, and how they can be translated into local normative repertoires, notably in societies where customary and religious law are important
Students are able to explain what the relevance of access to justice theories is for promoting human rights and apply this knowledge to concrete cases
Students can understand the difference between looking at human rights from an internal-legal perspective and from an external, socio-legal perspective and how these two relate to one another, and they are able to assess concrete cases from both perspectives
Mode of instruction
Lectures
Number of (2 hour) lectures: 10 Lectures/seminars of 2 hours each
Names of lecturers: Adriaan Bedner
Required preparation by students: Students are supposed to have read all the assigned materials for the course before the seminar concerned. See further under assessment.
Assessment method
Examination form(s)
Assessment method(s) and the weighting of each form of assessment towards the final grade
Papers (15%)
Essay (30%)
Group presentations (15%)
Exam (40%)
Submission procedures
All assignments will be submitted through Blackboard or by email to the course lecturer.
Areas to be tested within the exam
The examination consists of the required reading (literature) for the course, the course information guide and the subjects taught in the lectures, the seminars and all other instructions which are part of the course.
Contact information
Course Co-ordinator: Dr. Adriaan Bedner
Work address: Kamerlingh Onnes Gebouw, Steenschuur 25, room B 3.16
Telephone number: 071-527-7252
Email: a.w.bedner@law.leidenuniv.nl