Strength & Solidarity

Excerpted from Strength and Solidarity Episode 4. Afghan champion of human rights Shaharzad Akbar shares a poem by American 19th century poet Emily Dickinson

When authoritarian governments want to hobble civil society and human rights activists, a favored strategy is to choke off their funding. Since money often comes from foreign donors, a law to limit access to support from abroad can hit activists hard. In China, where conditions were already very tough for rights defenders,  two such laws passed in 2016. Shawn Shih-hung Shieh, director of Social Innovations Advisory, tells us how affected groups are adapting and using innovative strategies to offset their lost income. In this episode: Host Akwe Amosu and her colleague Chris Stone consider whether leaderless movements are really leaderless Civil society researcher Shawn Shieh finds out how Chinese NGOs are coping without foreign funding The Coda:  How  a 19th Century American poem inspires hope in Afghanistan For a list of supplemental readings and additional information about this episode’s content, please visit www.strengthandsolidarity.org/podcast Send us your ideas and your feedback at pod@strengthandsolidarity.org

Excerpted from Strength and Solidarity Episode 3. US civil rights activist Charles Cobb Jr shares a song commemorating the day that US civil rights activists met an African anti-colonial fighter in 1963.

South African human rights lawyer Kayum Ahmed’s entire career has been spent defending and extending the rights of excluded and oppressed people, at home and abroad.  But this former CEO of the South African Human Rights Commission harbors considerable doubt about whether the human rights framework rooted in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights can meet the demands of radical black and brown activists. In this episode:  Host Akwe Amosu and her colleague Chris Stone talk about why police reform in Nigeria –and elsewhere –is so hard to achieve Interview with human rights lawyer Kayum Ahmed about radical activist critiques of the human rights framework The Coda: A song that commemorates the day that US civil rights activists met an African anti-colonial fighter in 1963 For a list of supplemental readings and additional information about this episode’s content, please visit www.strengthandsolidarity.org/podcast Send us your ideas and your feedback at pod@strengthandsolidarity.org

Excerpted from Strength and Solidarity Episode 2. Turkish human rights leader Murat Celikkan shares an Ariel Dorfman poem evoking the determination of the “disappeared” and their loved ones.

In 2017-18, South African social justice movement, Equal Education, went through a major –and very public -upheaval after allegations emerged of sexual harassment by members of the movement’s leadership.  General Secretary Noncedo Madubedube describes her root and branch effort to rebuild Equal Education’s culture and restore confidence in the organization. In this episode: Akwe Amosu and her colleague Chris Stone discuss a recent campaign for the release of some Egyptian rights defenders and what it tells us about their organization Interview with Noncedo Madubedube, General Secretary of Equal Education, South Africa The Coda: Turkish human rights leader Murat Cellikan shares an Ariel Dorfman poem that evokes the pain and fierce determination of the“disappeared”and their loved ones. For a list of supplemental readings and additional information about this episode’s content, please visit www.strengthandsolidarity.org/podcast Send us your ideas and your feedback at pod@strengthandsolidarity.org.

Excerpted from Strength & Solidarity Episode 1. A reading of the Persian poet Hafez’s ‘10,000 Idiots’ by Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Afghanistan’s Human Rights Commission chair Shaharzad Akbar talks about the challenge of entrenching and enforcing rights amid continuing conflict and violence against civilians. With a state that struggles to deliver public services and great uncertainty about the future of President Ashraf Ghani’s negotiations with the Taliban, how can Afghan citizens have confidence that the human rights framework give them meaningful protection? In this episode:  Host Akwe Amosu and her colleague Chris Stone discuss the relevance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in today’s rights struggles Interview with Shaharzad Akbar, Chairperson of Afghanistan’s Independent Human Rights Commission The Coda: Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, shares a poem by 14th century poet Hafez on the perils of arrogance. For a list of supplemental readings and additional information about this episode’s content, please visit www.strengthandsolidarity.org/podcast  Send us your ideas and your feedback at pod@strengthandsolidarity.org

Strength and Solidarity is a podcast that takes you into the ‘engine room’ of human rights activism. Every two weeks, we invite human rights leaders to speak with us about the dilemmas they face, and the tactics they use to achieve their goals. By speaking with defenders at the heart of critical struggles, as well as the lawyers, journalists, researchers, artists and organizers engaged with their movements, we hope to offer an up-close view on the current and future course of human rights. Join Akwe Amosu as she interviews smart, passionate guests and check out The Coda –a regular opportunity for someone in the human rights field to tell us about the literature, music, and art that inspires them.