scholarly journals Singing in the Wilderness

2010 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Ker ◽  
Jacob Locke

The word kuchi conjures up a romantic but ultimately anachronistic lifestyle—tattooed women in red and gold embroidered dresses and men riding alongside flocks of goat and sheep; the reality, however, differs starkly. The past two decades of armed conflict, poverty and socioeconomic change have had a profound impact on Afghanistan’s kuchi nomads, and the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) have identified them as one of the country’s largest vulnerable populations.1 In contemporary academia, though, there has been a dearth of literature that links issues particularly salient to the kuchi—the pastoral economy, internal displacement, and their relations with the Afghan government as well as other societal groups—to Afghanistan’s reconstruction and development. Modernity requires that the kuchi no longer be distinct and removed from the Afghan state. Kuchi participation and representation in government is the necessary first step for their issues to be effectively addressed; at the same time, cautious measures must be taken to preserve their culture and distinctive lifestyle.

2020 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 298-318
Author(s):  
Roman Girma Teshome

The effectiveness of human rights adjudicative procedures partly, if not most importantly, hinges upon the adequacy of the remedies they grant and the implementation of those remedies. This assertion also holds water with regard to the international and regional monitoring bodies established to receive individual complaints related to economic, social and cultural rights (hereinafter ‘ESC rights’ or ‘socio-economic rights’). Remedies can serve two major functions: they are meant, first, to rectify the pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage sustained by the particular victim, and second, to resolve systematic problems existing in the state machinery in order to ensure the non-repetition of the act. Hence, the role of remedies is not confined to correcting the past but also shaping the future by providing reforming measures a state has to undertake. The adequacy of remedies awarded by international and regional human rights bodies is also assessed based on these two benchmarks. The present article examines these issues in relation to individual complaint procedures that deal with the violation of ESC rights, with particular reference to the case laws of the three jurisdictions selected for this work, i.e. the United Nations, Inter-American and African Human Rights Systems.


Born in 1945, the United Nations (UN) came to life in the Arab world. It was there that the UN dealt with early diplomatic challenges that helped shape its institutions such as peacekeeping and political mediation. It was also there that the UN found itself trapped in, and sometimes part of, confounding geopolitical tensions in key international conflicts in the Cold War and post-Cold War periods, such as hostilities between Palestine and Iraq and between Libya and Syria. Much has changed over the past seven decades, but what has not changed is the central role played by the UN. This book's claim is that the UN is a constant site of struggle in the Arab world and equally that the Arab world serves as a location for the UN to define itself against the shifting politics of its age. Looking at the UN from the standpoint of the Arab world, this volume includes chapters on the potential and the problems of a UN that is framed by both the promises of its Charter and the contradictions of its member states.


This volume documents the intellectual influence of the United Nations through its flagship publication, the World Economic and Social Survey (WESS) on its seventieth anniversary. Prepared at the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) and first published in 1948 as the World Economic Report (subsequently renamed the WESS), it is the oldest continuous post-World War II publication of this kind, recording and analysing the performance of the global economy and social development trends, and offering relevant policy recommendations. This volume highlights how well WESS has tracked global economic and social conditions, and how its analyses have influenced and have been influenced by the prevailing discourse over the past seven decades. The volume critically reflects on its policy recommendations and their influence on actual policymaking and the shaping of the world economy. Although world economic and social conditions have changed significantly over the past seven decades and so have the policy recommendations of the Survey, some of its earlier recommendations remain relevant today; recommendations in WESS provided seven decades ago seem remarkably pertinent as the world currently struggles to regain high levels of employment and economic activity. Thus, in many ways, WESS was ahead of the curve on many substantive issues. Publication of this volume will enhance the interest of the wider community of policymakers, academics, development practitioners, and members of civil society in the analytical work of the UN in general and UN-DESA in particular.


Author(s):  
Caroline Fleay

Throughout the past forty years various leaders from both major political parties in Australia have categorized the arrival by boat of people seeking asylum as a “crisis” and the people themselves as “illegal.” This is despite Australia being a signatory to the United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, and receiving relatively few people who seek asylum compared with many other countries. Punitive government policies and processes have further reinforced these representations, such that “crisis” and “illegal” can now be understood as both categories of analysis and practice. The repeated use of such categories may be helping to produce and reproduce prejudice and racism and obscure the needs and experiences of people seeking asylum.


2001 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 663-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asim Erdilek

The surge in foreign direct investment (FDI)—investment with managerial control by the foreign investor, usually a multinational corporation—has been the major driver of globalization in the past two decades and the accelerator of economic development in many developing countries. It has, however, bypassed Turkey. By all relevant relative measures found in the United Nations' annual World Investment Report, Turkey has failed to attract much FDI.


1972 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 23-26
Author(s):  
Louise W. Holborn

While the world press has focused over the past year on problems surrounding the creation of still another refugee population in Africa — that of Uganda's Asians — far too little attention has been directed to the remarkable though still fragile process of repatriation and resettlement of hundreds of thousands of Southern Sudanese. This population of displaced persons includes both refugees who fled to other countries and large numbers of homeless who hid in the bush during the civil war that wracked the Sudan for seventeen years, from 1955 through the first months of 1972. Responding to the initiatives of President Gaafar al-Nimeiry of the Sudan, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (HCR), under an explicit mandate from the Secretary- General of the United Nations, has been raising funds, organizing activities on behalf of the most pressing needs and working closely with all local interests to meet overwhelming problems.


1994 ◽  
Vol 34 (301) ◽  
pp. 340-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Allen

According to UNHCR figures, in 1970 there were 2.5 million refugees in the world. In 1980, the figure was 11 million. By the early 1990s, the alarming spread of civil wars was prompting an average of 10,000 people a day to flee across an international border. In 1993, the estimated number of refugees had risen to 18.2 million. In addition there were at least 24 million people who been forcibly displaced within their own countries (UNHCR, 1993:1). In 1994, the situation has deteriorated further, particularly in Africa. In the past few weeks, well over a million refugees have fled the fighting in Rwanda.


1993 ◽  
Vol 33 (293) ◽  
pp. 94-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Doswald-Beck ◽  
Sylvain Vité

International humanitarian law is increasingly perceived as part of human rights law applicable in armed conflict. This trend can be traced back to the United Nations Human Rights Conference held in Tehran in 1968 which not only encouraged the development of humanitarian law itself, but also marked the beginning of a growing use by the United Nations of humanitarian law during its examination of the human rights situation in certain countries or during its thematic studies. The greater awareness of the relevance of humanitarian law to the protection of people in armed conflict, coupled with the increasing use of human rights law in international affairs, means that both these areas of law now have a much greater international profile and are regularly being used together in the work of both international and non-governmental organizations.


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