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31. Green Without Borders: The Operational Benefits of Hezbollah's Environmental NGO

Author:
Matthew Levitt and Samantha Stern
Publication Date:
05-2020
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
In this illuminating Policy Note -- complete with detailed maps and satellite imagery -- Matthew Levitt and Samantha Stern tell the story of the Lebanese NGO Green Without Borders and explain why the mandate for the UN Interim Force in Lebanon must be reworked. According to its blog, the Lebanese NGO Green Without Borders plants trees, creates public parks, and fights forest fires. But the benignly named outfit also has another mission. Working with Hezbollah's construction arm Jihad al-Binaa and with the militant group's allies inside and outside the government, GWB openly seeks to advance the "southern Green resistance" against Israel. To this end, it provides direct cover for Hezbollah's operational activities, from harassing UN patrols, to carrying out missile attacks on Israel, to obstructing UN cameras at the border with deliberately placed trees. In this illuminating Policy Note -- complete with detailed border maps and satellite imagery -- Matthew Levitt and Samantha Stern tell the story of GWB and explain why the mandate for the UN Interim Force in Lebanon must be reworked after the secretary-general's next report in July. The sovereignty of an economically battered Lebanon and the stability of the wider region depend on a renewed effort to address all facets of Hezbollah aggression.
Topic:
Environment, Non State Actors, Borders, Hezbollah, and NGOs
Political Geography:
Middle East and Lebanon

32. Bridging the Elite-Grassroots Divide Among Anticorruption Activists

Author:
Abigail Bellows
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The professionalization of the anticorruption field has produced a cadre of capital-based NGOs with the technical expertise to be formidable government watchdogs. But at what cost? Corruption-fueled political change is occurring at a historic rate—but is not necessarily producing the desired systemic reforms. There are many reasons for this, but one is the dramatic dissipation of public momentum after a transition. In countries like Armenia, the surge in civic participation that generated 2018’s Velvet Revolution largely evaporated after the new government assumed power. That sort of civic demobilization makes it difficult for government reformers, facing stubbornly entrenched interests, to enact a transformative agenda. The dynamics in Armenia reflect a trend across the anticorruption landscape, which is also echoed in other sectors. As the field has become more professionalized, anticorruption nongovernment organizations (NGOs) have developed the legal and technical expertise to serve as excellent counterparts/watchdogs for government. Yet this strength can also be a hurdle when it comes to building credibility with the everyday people they seek to represent. The result is a disconnect between elite and grassroots actors, which is problematic at multiple levels.
Topic:
Corruption, Political Activism, NGOs, and Political Movements
Political Geography:
Caucasus and Armenia

33. UN Treaty Body Promotes BDS at Urging of Norwegian NGO

Author:
Anne Herzberg
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
The Begin-Sadat Centre for Strategic Studies (BESA)
Abstract:
UN treaty bodies are increasingly violating their mandates as part of discriminatory anti-Israel campaigns. In March 2020, the UN Committee on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) embraced this disturbing trend by adopting a BDS agenda after being convinced to do so by the NGO Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA).
Topic:
Human Rights, Politics, United Nations, BDS, and NGOs
Political Geography:
Europe, Middle East, Israel, Norway, and Palestine

34. Joint NGO Letter: The UN Human Rights Council should extend the mandate of the Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan

Author:
Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
Publication Date:
02-2020
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
The Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
Abstract:
A letter to the UN Human Rights Council from a number of NGOs (African Centre for Democracy and Human Rights Studies (ACDHRS); AfricanDefenders (Pan-African Human Rights Defenders Network); Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS); Center for Reproductive Rights; Central African Network of Human Rights Defenders (REDHAC) CIVICUS; Community Empowerment for Progress Organization (CEPO) – South Sudan; Crown The Woman – South Sudan; DefendDefenders (the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project); Dominicans for Justice and Peace; Geneva for Human Rights / Genève pour les Droits de l’Homme; Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect (GCR2P); Human Rights Watch; International Commission of Jurists; FIDH (International Federation for Human Rights); International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism (IMADR); International Service for Human Rights; Lawyers’ Rights Watch Canada; Legal Action Worldwide (LAW); National Alliance for Women Lawyers – South Sudan; Southern Africa Human Rights Defenders Network (SAHRDN); South Sudan Human Rights Defenders Network (SSHRDN); World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT)).
Topic:
Civil Society, Human Rights, United Nations, and NGOs
Political Geography:
Africa, United Nations, and South Sudan

35. Building a Multi-Directional Transnational Solidarity Movement

Author:
Jeff Bachman
Publication Date:
02-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
Transnational solidarity movements have typically flowed from a central point located in the West, particularly in the United States, to the East and the Global South. Shadi Mokhtari describes this phenomenon as the “traditional West-to-East flow of human rights mobilizations and discourses.” Viewed individually, this phenomenon is not problematic in all cases. However, as Mokhtari argues, this one-directional flow of human rights politics precludes non-Western non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from weighing in on human rights violations committed in the United States. Human rights violations in the United States are typically experienced by marginalized communities, from the mass incarceration and disenfranchisement of African-Americans to the detention and ill-treatment of immigrants, migrants, and refugees. For a truly global human rights movement to emerge—one that is not grounded in Western paternalism and perceived moral superiority—this must change.
Topic:
Development, Human Rights, Post Colonialism, Immigration, Refugees, NGOs, and transnationalism
Political Geography:
Global Focus and United States of America

36. Chinese Civil Society in the Times of Covid-19

Author:
Diana Fu, Elizabeth Knup, Jing Wang, and Nick Bartlett
Publication Date:
10-2020
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
This panel, part of the WEAI in a COVID-19 remote lecture series, features brief presentations and discussion by scholars and practitioners who have studied and participated in Chinese civil society activities. The conversation covers changes to the role of and spaces for non-government actors in the Hu and Xi eras, as well as recent developments in light of the COVID pandemic and the rise of Hong Kong and Black Lives Matter protests.
Topic:
Civil Society, Protests, NGOs, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
China, Asia, and Hong Kong

37. Fighting for the Disability Rights through Vernacularization in Bangkok

Author:
Swe Zin Linn Phyu
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Review of Human Rights
Institution:
Society of Social Science Academics (SSSA)
Abstract:
In many non-Western societies there are still challenges to the legibility, and hence applicability, of international human rights law. This is partly due to the gap between Western legal regime and local cultural contexts. However, with the process of vernacularization some of this gap has been bridged, especially in issues of relating to women rights. This paper explores how NGOs and Human Rights defenders in Bangkok have adopted the process of vernacularization to enhance disability rights.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Law, Disability, and NGOs
Political Geography:
Asia, Thailand, Southeast Asia, and Bangkok

38. Fissile Materials Security in Civilian Facilities

Author:
Robert D. Lamb and Arpitha Peteru
Publication Date:
10-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland (CISSM)
Abstract:
This report presents the results of a preliminary study focused on the following question: What will it take at this point to encourage civilian facilities to adopt safer alternatives to fissile materials and, more broadly, to develop a culture of security enabling facilities to be more proactive in mitigating and adapting to risk as it emerges and evolves. Its purpose is not to provide a definitive answer but to map the factors affecting nuclear security so the next phase of research can prioritize attention to the dynamics most likely to influence the quality of nuclear security governance in the future. Perhaps more importantly, this report seeks to draw attention to underemphasized opportunities to experiment with different pathways to nuclear security. For this scoping study, the general problem of nuclear security governance needed to be bounded, so this report’s primary focus is on the security of fissile materials. But a number of our observations are likely to be applicable to radiological materials as well. Given the preliminary nature of this study, these observations should be taken as hypotheses that are worth testing, rather than as robust findings. Our recommendations are therefore geared toward future research rather than policy and governance. Our primary audience is the nuclear security NGO community and their funders rather than government or industry. Throughout this report we use the terms “advocates” or “experts” as a convenient shorthand for this audience, even though we recognize that different NGOs have different missions and take different approaches: some as scholars, some as conveners, some as advocates. Most, however, seem to focus their efforts on what it will take to improve nuclear security, however they individually define it. And most seem to recognize that their collective efforts and progress toward their collective goal have both stalled. The focus of this study, therefore, was on the factors that stand between their efforts and their goals, asking: Why isn’t nuclear security improving at the rate or scale advocates believe is necessary? What are the factors and dynamics preventing progress? And where are the most promising opportunities for kickstarting progress? The approach we took to answer these questions is a system mapping exercise. System mapping involves a set of well-developed methods and visualizations for making sense of situations involving many factors, many actors, and perplexing outcomes. By displaying how different factors affect each other, we are able to show the causal structure of the problem in a way that clearly identifies the likely dynamics preventing progress, plus potential paths to self-sustaining solutions. A system map also makes it easier for anyone working on any aspect of nuclear security see how their work fits in to the collective effort. (It can also serve, in future research, as a basis for simulating different strategies to aid in decision making.)
Topic:
National Security, NGOs, and Civil-Military Relations
Political Geography:
Global Focus

39. Euro-Mediterranean Relations: Democratization and the Role of Civil Society

Author:
Cengiz Günay
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Austrian Institute for International Affairs (OIIP)
Abstract:
Many documents, programs and strategies of the European Union highlight the importance of civil society as an element of democracy promotion. In this short article I deal with the question of what civil society actually is and whether the idea of civil society as a motor of democratization is still a valid presumption. Civil society is an often mentioned but essentially contested concept. As the term is characterized by a plurality of different meanings that depend on the historical, cultural and legal context, there is no single, generally accepted concept that defines civil society. It remains rather unclear whether civil society includes any form of non-governmental organiza-tion (NGO), such as business people’s associations, syndicates or trade unions. Is the media part of civil society or does the concept refer exclusively to NGOs that address specific societal issues? Does the concept only refer to institutionalized and licensed organizations and associations or are social movements, thematic platforms, informal networks and other un-institutionalized forma-tions also part of civil society? After all, they do often fulfill the same functions as civil society organizations (CSOs). And how about religious organizations, are they also part of civil society?
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, and NGOs
Political Geography:
Europe and Mediterranean

40. Toward a Politics of Responsibility: The Case of Climate Change

Author:
Kathryn Sikkink
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Centerpiece
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
And so the topic of the book is a broader book about how to combine rights and responsibilities. And climate change is just one of about five topics I talked about in that book, but it's a particularly useful case to make the main point of the book, and that is that it's not enough in these days to talk about rights. We have a big gap in implementation with rights. And in order to implement rights more fully, we have to think simultaneously about rights and responsibilities. And that when we think of responsibilities, it's not enough to think just about state responsibilities. Of course, and of course with climate change, we want to think about state responsibilities for mitigating climate change, we want to think about corporate responsibilities. But we also want to think about responses of other nonstate actors. And in that I include—I include not just corporations for nonstate actors, but also NGOs, also universities, also individuals.
Topic:
Climate Change, Environment, Political Activism, Leadership, and NGOs
Political Geography:
United States and North America