Jul 7, 2008

Written by Michael Swan, The Catholic Register
Friday, 27 June 2008

TORONTO - The founding executive director of Project Ploughshares — one of Canada’s leading Christian voices for peace — wants Canadian troops to stay in Afghanistan, for now.Following 10 days interviewing Afghanis and Canadians in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul, Project Ploughshares senior researcher Ernie Regehr concludes Canadian troops are not creating the peace and stability necessary for economic and social development in Kandahar province. However, the soldiers are still necessary to prevent an all-out civil war. “The country really is in deep-rooted conflict between the southern communities and the northern communities,” said Regehr. ....

(This story includes an interview with me where I argue that Canada does not have a diplomatic strategy in Afghanistan and lacks both the will and military muscle to pursue a policy separate from the Americans)

Full story here

http://www.catholicregister.org/content/view/2005/849/

Canada needed in Afghanistan

7/07/2008 07:33:00 PM ,

May 19, 2008

“Routes to Freedom: Reflections on the Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade”

Presentation at the Conference on the Bicentenary of the of the Slave Trade organised by the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa, Canada. The conference explored the reality and impact of the transatlantic slave trade, anti-slavery movements and their link to contemporary relationships between the peoples of Africa and the world.

This presentation is titled:
"Managing the Social Residues of Slavery: Slave Stigmatization and Agitation for Social Inclusion in Niger Delta 1915-1945"

Reflections on the the Abolition of the Slave Trade”

5/19/2008 09:38:00 PM , ,

May 18, 2008


Moolade (Movie Review)
By
Bonny Ibhawoh

Film Review

Moolaadé. 2004. Ousmane Sembéne (Director)

The fact that scholars and practitioners cannot agree on how best to describe the practice is an indication of the controversy and impassioned debates that the topic generates. “Female circumcision,” “female genital mutilation” and “female genital cutting” are all used to describe the practice, common in some African and Moslem communities, of removing varying amounts of the female genitalia, usually in adolescent girls. It is a procedure that causes the death of many girls and women, adversely affects their sexual wellbeing and makes childbirth hazardous. For many decades attempts to stop the practice were framed in terms of women’s health and addressed as such by the World Health Organisation and other advocacy groups but with limited success. With the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) in 1979, the practice began to be framed more as a women’s rights issue. Apart from the human rights dimension, female genital cutting is a topic on which several other themes intersect -- religion, culture, health, sexuality, gender relations, generational tensions and even local politics. These are all issues that veteran Senegalese novelist and film director Ousmane Sembene tackles in the engaging and provocative film Mooladé.

Set in a remote Muslim village in Burkina Faso, Mooladé is the story of Collé, a defiant and strong-willed second wife of an elder in a West African village who refuses to allow four little girls to undergo the traditional circumcision ceremony. After losing two daughters in childbirth due to her own circumcision, Collé had refused to allow her surviving daughter, Amasatou, to face the ordeal of being cut. She is thrust into an unfolding drama of village politics when she offers Mooladé (protection) to the girls who escape the circumcision ceremony. Mooladé is the mystical protection which in the local custom can be invoked to provide asylum. Collé’s interference draws the ire of her deeply patriarchal community which sees her action as an affront on its culture and Islamic religion. Collé can lift the Mooladé with a single word and comes under the intense pressure of the male elders, her husband and some fellow women to do so. Her resolute refusal to lift the Mooladé draws other women and girls to her cause and sets the stage for a standoff with the village elders that erupts in the centre of the village and shatters the tranquility of the community.

Unlike many recent Hollywood made films about Africa, Mooladé is a story about Africa made by Africans from a distinctly local perspective. Yet, it speaks to universal themes of power, oppression and emancipation. In depicting one woman’s struggle to protect others from an oppressive and inhibiting tradition, Sembene brings great sensitivity and nuance to topic that is often discussed from simplistic, patronizing and polarizing standpoints. He deftly explores not only the conflict between local traditional values and the influence of modern ideas, but also the gender and generational tensions within a community largely isolated from the outside world. Although the film obviously seeks to challenge the practice of female genital cutting and raise questions about its legitimacy, it does so with sensitivity to underlying social complexities. It provides a glimpse into the perspective of local African tribesmen who see the practice of female genital cutting as process of “purification” and older women who see it as a necessary rite of passage for their daughters. However disagreeable their positions may appear, Sembene brings their voices to the story in a way that is neither condescending nor patronizing.

Beyond its message, Mooladé is a cinematic delight. Sembene assembles a group of colourful characters that add depth to his portrayal of rural African life and make for a more compelling storyline. Although this film is essentially about the local tribulations of an African village, it still mange to engage the outside world through two intriguing characters -- a local itinerant vendor, nicknamed Mercenaire who previously worked as an aid worker, and a favoured son of the village Chief, Ibrahima, who returns home from his studies in France to take a bride. Both characters having seen the world beyond the village and convinced of the need for change become unlikely allies of Collé and the village women in their struggles to end the practice of female genital cutting. Such unlikely partnerships forged across ethnic, class, gender and generational lines have historically been crucial to the success of human rights struggles. In the campaign against the practice of female genital cutting, they are essential and Mooladé shows us why.

Ultimately, this movie is not simply about oppression and social turmoil or about progressive citizens and regressive traditions. It is more about the resilience of the human spirit and the tenacity of ordinary people determined to change their destinies. It is an excursion into the dilemmas that confront a society caught in the midst of social and cultural change. For the human rights scholar and teacher, it provides a subtle but invaluable resource for raising awareness about the practice of female genital cutting and offers a means of understanding and explaining a controversial topic to an audience unfamiliar with the social and cultural intricacies associated with the practice.

Bonny Ibhawoh
McMaster University, Canada

Moolade (Film Review)

5/18/2008 11:41:00 AM ,

Apr 7, 2008

A story about the McMaster Centre for Peace Studies published in the Hamilton Spectator

TheSpec.com - Opinions -

Peace Centre needs more support
Ray Cunnington

The Hamilton Spectator(Apr 4, 2008)

After five years of fighting, with some 4,000 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, and the loss of so much international prestige, it is worth recognizing the value of alternatives to destructive force.

Hamiltonians can be justly proud that McMaster was one of the first universities in Canada dedicated to the study of peace. At present, the program's first year attracts some 300 students and now leads to a combined Honours B.A.

While many people have heard about the Centre for Peace Studies, few know what goes on, still fewer are aware of the progress that is slowly being made globally in peace research and the science of conflict resolution.

At McMaster, the discipline of Peace Studies began some 25 years ago during the era of "Mutual Assured Destruction" -- the doctrine at the climax of the nuclear arms race between America and Russia.

Appalled by the inability of world leaders to halt the disaster course on which they were headed, some local academics including Hanna and Alan Newcombe, Paul Dekar and Graeme MacQueen decided it was time the university addressed the need to study peace. They realized that the content of many courses already being taught at McMaster included insights on both peace and war.

At that time many professors of physics, chemistry, engineering, social science, religion, and medicine were recognizing the pressing dangers of nuclear annihilation, so an inventory was made of the courses that might logically be brought together to design and create the new discipline of Peace Studies.

While regarding war and certain kinds of violence as problematic, it did not mean that everyone who entered the program had to be a pacifist or condemn all violence or every call to arms. In the 19 years since its inception, the passion of its instructors and associates have achieved extraordinary things with very few resources. The centre was officially established by the university in 1989.

Through its combined Honours B.A. program, its students have studied protracted wars such as in Vietnam and the Palestine/Israeli conflict as well as peace efforts sponsored by the United Nations. By helping to raise funds, the centre has sponsored the annual Bertrand Russell Peace Lectures and the Mahatma Gandhi Lecture on Non-violence.

International teams working with McMaster have studied the effects of war and sanctions on the health of children in war zones; projects which together have brought some $2 million to the university in funding for research and action on war and peacebuilding.
The centre has been able to host two internationally supported medical conferences on teaching Peace through Health.

It has also co-sponsored workshops in Afghanistan that resulted in a Peace Manual translated into both Dari and Pashto languages, and peace education being introduced into the curriculum of Afghan schools. Other McMaster teams have studied conflicts in Sri Lanka, in Gaza and in the war zones of Croatia and Serbia. A Hamilton team also visited India, studying the work of the Shanti Sena, a highly effective women's peace brigade movement started by a follower of Gandhi.

Today's students say no subject is more urgent or more relevant than Peace Studies, reporting that it gives them skills they can apply in their daily lives. Some go on to further education in the department of peace studies at Bradford University in Britain, or teacher's college, or obtain positions in governmental or non-governmental offices.

Two former students, Samantha Nutt and Eric Hoskins, founded War Child Canada, and are among the heroic ones who have made a difference in active war zones. In a world facing climate change, and shortages of oil and water, you might think that peace research would be given a high priority among world leaders. Yet, like the problem of global warming, the study of peacemaking has often been discounted or marginalized. At McMaster, because it operates out of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies, the budget for Peace Studies is difficult to assess.

The centre's new director is Dr. Bonny Ibhawoh, a historian with a warm, engaging personality who brings to his job a wide experience in human rights gained on three continents. While maintaining the high academic traditions of peace studies he accepts the need for town and gown to work together.

To advance its important work the centre needs more support.
It needs public figures to call for a fully funded faculty, and local benefactors like a Michael DeGroote or a David Braley to make the major donations needed to find effective answers to age-old problems. Ordinary citizens are far ahead of their governments in wanting a world without war. With increased support the centre could truly become a leading voice in Canada for transcending conflict.

Ray Cunnington writes on peace issues. He lives in Dundas.

Peace Centre needs more support

4/07/2008 11:30:00 PM ,

Mar 10, 2008




Dr Cynthia Cockburn delivers was the 19th Betrand Russell Peace Lectures organized by the Centre for Peace Studies at McMaster University.

Betrand Russell Peace Lectures 2008

3/10/2008 12:20:00 AM ,

Mar 1, 2008

Bonny Ibhawoh, Imperialism and Human Rights: Colonial Discourses of Rights and Liberties in African History (State University of New Yor Pess, 2007).

Summary

2007 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title

This book looks at the language of rights used by diverse interest groups in British-colonized Nigeria.In this seminal study, Bonny Ibhawoh investigates the links between European imperialism and human rights discourses in African history. Using British-colonized Nigeria as a case study, he examines how diverse interest groups within colonial society deployed the language of rights and liberties to serve varied socioeconomic and political ends. Ibhawoh challenges the linear progressivism that dominates human rights scholarship by arguing that, in the colonial African context, rights discourses were not simple monolithic or progressive narratives. They served both to insulate and legitimize power just as much as they facilitated transformative processes. Drawing extensively on archival material, this book shows how the language of rights, like that of “civilization” and “modernity,” became an important part of the discourses deployed to rationalize and legitimize empire.

“This carefully constructed and well-documented book opens a new chapter in the study of human rights and sets a high standard for others to emulate.” — CHOICE

“It is generally assumed that the present-day human rights revolution began in 1948 with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. While not taking direct issue with the importance of the UDHR, Ibhawoh very effectively shows how the language of rights had already been used (and misused) in British colonial practices in Nigeria. Fascinating and thought-provoking, this book has a great deal of relevance to the major human rights debates that are going on right now.” — Mark Gibney, author of Five Uneasy Pieces: American Ethics in a Globalized World

“In this very interesting volume, Bonny Ibhawoh shows the reader how Africans in colonial Nigeria used the British imperial discourse of rights, and merged it with their own traditional notions of rights and obligations, to negotiate their own interests against their colonial overlords. Using court documents from the time, Ibhawoh investigates property rights in land, civil and political rights, and rights in marriage and the family. Ibhawoh bridges the gap between theoretical analysis of human rights, and analysis of human rights as negotiated terrain, rooted in local struggles.” — Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann, Canada Research Chair in International Human Rights, Wilfrid Laurier UniversityBonny Ibhawoh is Assistant Professor of History at McMaster University, Canada.

Table Of Contents

List of Illustrations Foreword Acknowledgments List of Abbreviations

1. The Subject of Rights and the Rights of Subjects
2. Right, Liberties, and the Imperial World Order
3. Stronger than the Maxim Gun: Law, Rights, and Justice
4. Confronting State Trusteeship: Land Rights Discourses
5. Negotiating Inclusion: Social Rights Discourses
6. Citizens of the World’s Republic: Political and Civil Rights Discourses
7. The Paradox of Rights TalkNotes Bibliography Index

Imperialism and Human Rights

3/01/2008 04:04:00 PM ,

Feb 25, 2008


My talk to the Amnesty International Group at McMaster University about the blood diamond trade in Africa.

Is there bood on your hands!

2/25/2008 12:55:00 PM , ,

Jan 17, 2008

The times seem to be changing as this BBC new story shows. Everywhere one looks, human rights seems to be in retreat...even in the great liberal democracies of the West.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7195276.stm
Canada puts US on 'torture list'

The United States has been listed as a country where prisoners are at risk of torture in a training document produced by the Canadian foreign ministry. It also classifies some US interrogation techniques as torture. The manual - part of a training course on torture awareness for diplomats - also includes Israel, China, Iran and Afghanistan on its watch list. A government spokesman said the manual did not reflect the views of Canada, which is an ally of the US and Israel.

"The training manual is not a policy document and does not reflect the views or policies of this government," said a spokesman for Foreign Minister Maxime Bernier. The manual lists US interrogation techniques such as forced nudity, isolation, sleep deprivation and the blindfolding of prisoners under "definition of torture".

It also refers to the US detention camp at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba where a Canadian man is being held. Critics say it ridicules Ottawa's claims that Omar Khadr is not being mistreated. There was no immediate response from either the US or Israel.

-----------------------------------------------
GIAZILO'S COMMENTARY

When in 2005, Amnesty International’s Secretary-General Irene Khan described the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay as “the gulag of our times,” it made headlines around the world partly because it was unusual for a powerful Western country to be at the receiving end of such strong INGO criticism of its human rights record. Such uncompromising language had traditionally been reserved for communist and Third World nations.

However, the widely reported human rights abuses associated with the U.S war on terror and in Iraq may well signal the beginning of a new era of change. Major INGOs, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch now acknowledge that human rights are in retreat worldwide and that the United States bears most responsibility for this.

Now, the Canadian government had added the US to its list of counties practicing torture. What hope is there for international human rights promotion and protection when the great liberal democracies of the West become complicit on gross human rights violations?.....

Canada puts US on 'torture list'

1/17/2008 11:45:00 PM , ,

Dec 30, 2007

Happy New Year 2008!
Wishing all of God's children and men and women of goodwill everywhere a happy, healthy and prosperous 2008. One of my new year resolutions is to find more time to update my blog.

Happy New Year 2008

12/30/2007 02:57:00 PM

Oct 21, 2007


Inventing Human Rights. By Lynn Hunt. New York, London: W. W. Norton & Company, 2007. 272pp. Index. $29.95. ISBN 0 393 06095 0.

Reviewed by

Bonny Ibhawoh

Contemporary human rights scholarship suffers from two major flaws. First, it is trapped in an intellectual tradition of linear progressivism that tends to hinder proper understanding of the nuances inherent in the idea of human rights. The trend has been to present human rights -- despite frequent setbacks and many contradictions -- as part of the saga of relentless human progress. The second flaw is the overwhelmingly presentist character of human rights scholarship, reflected in an inordinate preoccupation with the here and now.

Lynn Hunt’s Inventing Human Rights addresses both flaws. It marks an important addition to the growing body of scholarly works that seek to bring distinctly historical perspectives to the subject of human rights. Focusing on the American and French Revolutions and the Declarations they inspired, Hunt traces the impact of Enlightenment ideas on the social and political expansion of human rights. The equality, universality and naturalness of rights gained direct political expression for the first time in the American Declaration of Independence of 1776 and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789. These developments underscore a ‘sudden crystallization of human rights claims at the end of the eighteenth century’ (p. 20).

What this book so eloquently reminds us of are the tensions and contradictions that have historically underlined ideas about human rights. Those who confidently declared rights to be universal in the eighteenth century turned out to have something much less all-inclusive in mind. They excluded those without property, slaves, women, and religious minorities from full participation in the political process. Hunt takes the position that while we should not forget these glaring restrictions placed on rights by eighteenth century men, we should not stop there. The book explores how these men, living in societies built on slavery, subordination, and seemingly natural subservience, came to imagine men (and sometimes, women) not at all like them as equals. This, the author argues, is crucial to the history of human rights.

One of the most interesting contributions of this study is the connection that it makes between changes in social attitudes and the expansion of human rights. Drawing on Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities (1991), Hunt argues that ‘imagined empathy’ served as the foundations of the social and political transformations that revolutionised the notion of human rights. The notions of bodily integrity and empathetic selfhood have histories not unlike those of human rights, to which they are intimately related (p. 30). Learning to empathize, along with new concern for the human body led to the public rejection of judicial torture that opened the path to human rights.

While most of Hunt’s argument are convincing some seem far fetched. One example is her suggestion that reading of accounts of torture had ‘physical effects that translated into brain changes and came back out as new concepts about the organisations of social and political life’ (p. 33). This claim appears to dabble into the realm of psychoanalysis that is hardly the province of the historian. Another shortcoming that some will find with this book is that it is decidedly Eurocentric. By limiting a discussion on the ‘Invention of Human Rights’ to the history of the Western world, Hunt lends credence to the construction of human rights as a something invented in the West and exported to the rest of the world. Unless used figuratively, the term ‘invention’ clearly gets in the way of a full historical understanding of the complex cross-cultural processes by which human rights ideas have evolved. It implies too one sided a happening. In all however, this book brings a welcome and refreshing perspective to human rights scholarship.

Inventing Human Rights

10/21/2007 11:31:00 PM , ,
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