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AMERG014: The Politics of Human Rights in Latin America: Challenges to Democratization

Course convenor: Dr Par Engstrom

Outline

This course provides a comprehensive introduction to human rights issues in Latin America in the context of contemporary processes of democratization in the region.

Week 1 provides a historical overview of the development of conceptions of rights and democracy in the region.

Following the introductory lecture in Week 1, the course is divided into three main sections:

Section I highlights the role of judicial processes and courts in the politics of human rights in Latin America

Section II outlines a number of institutional dimensions related to the rule of law and state capacity in the region

Section III addresses the nature of challenges to contemporary citizenship, particularly as they relate to historically vulnerable groups in the region.

Seminars will employ both a thematic, comparative approach and more specific case studies to examine the principal analytical debates. The course is inter-disciplinary, drawing on politics, law and anthropology.

A list of introductory reading is given below. A full course reading list is normally issued at the beginning of the session. When you are offered a place, you will be sent a password which will enable you to access Student Intranet with detailed reading lists from the current year.

N.B. The course listed is offered subject to availability of staff, and may change without notice. The Institute will endeavour to enable students to take their preferred combination of courses subject to quotas and timetabling.

This course is assessed by means of a 4,000 word essay.

Introductory Reading

• A. de Brito, C. González-Enríquez and P. Aguilar (eds.), The Politics of Memory Transitional Justice in Democratizing Societies (Oxford, 2001);

• P. B. Hayner, Unspeakable Truths: Confronting State Terror and Atrocity (New York, 2001);

• A. de Brito, Human Rights and Democratization in Latin America: Uruguay and Chile (Oxford, 1996);

• A. Brysk, The Politics of Human Rights in Argentina: Protest, Change and Democratization (Stanford, 1994);

• J. Donnelly, Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice (Ithaca, 1989);

• N. J. Kritz (ed.), Transitional Justice: How Emerging Democracies Reckon with Former Regimes, Vol. I (Washington, D.C., 1995);

• E. Jelin and E. Hershberg (eds.), Constructing Democracy: Human Rights, Citizenship and Society in Latin America (Boulder, 1996);

• K. Sikkink, Mixed Signals: US Human Rights Policy and Latin America (Ithaca, 2004);

• J. E. Mendez, G. O’Donnell and P. S. Pinheiro (eds.), The (Un)Rule of Law and the Underprivileged in Latin America (Notre Dame, 1996);

• L. Roniger and M. Sznajder, The Legacy of Human Rights Violations in the Southern Cone: Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay (Oxford, 1999);

• R. Sieder (ed.), Impunity in Latin America (London, 1995);

• P. Domingo and R. Sieder (eds.), Rule of Law in Latin America:The International Promotion of Judicial Reform (London, 2001);

• Mark Ungar, Elusive Reform: Democracy and the Rule of Law in Latin America (Boulder, 2002).