Human Rights and Diplomacy: The Right Mix for the Indo-Pacific

Join this webinar held by the University of Tasmania on Human Rights and Diplomacy: The Right Mix for the Indo-Pacific on 2 September 2021 at 05.30 PM AEST / 02.30 PM WIB – and get the chance to explore the role of human rights in foreign policy and what steps the Australian government can take to defend human rights values that are under attack.

Today’s world is a challenging time for human rights. In many parts of the world, authoritarianism is rising while democracy is under siege.  Street protest movements have arisen and been brutally suppressed by authorities through draconian laws and at times with excessive use of force. Some of the traditional Western governments that have defended human rights face their own legitimacy challenges. Meanwhile, the space for media and civil society to expose and push back against human rights violations is shrinking in many countries around the world. Journalists and activists face arrests, intimidation, and violence. And the coronavirus pandemic much like the threat of terrorism has provided a convenient pretext for some governments to crack down further on civil liberties and silence criticism. International institutions such as the UN are being tested.

At the same time, solidarity between activists and between like-minded governments around the world are pushing back against repression. Technology is a tool for surveillance and repression, but also a powerful means of mobilizing people and documenting violations in real time through smartphones.

This webinar will feature Elaine Pearson, who is the Australia Director at Human Rights Watch, based in Sydney. She established Human Rights Watch’s Australia office in 2013 and works to influence Australian foreign and domestic policies in order to give them a human rights dimension. Pearson writes frequently for a range of publications and her articles have appeared in the Guardian, the Sydney Morning Herald, the Australian, Foreign Policy and the Washington Post. From 2007 to 2012 she was the Deputy Director of Human Rights Watch's Asia Division based in New York. She has conducted numerous human rights investigations in Australia and around the world.