Second day
The meeting focused on the HRE experiences at International Organizations. Mr. Pierre Luisoni, Acting Director IBE-UNESCO, opened the session with a reflection on the aims of education and the role of school vis-à-vis human rights. Mr. Andrés Guerrero, from the Office of Public Partnership-UNICEF Geneva, presented the work that his organization is doing on children’s rights and education through a human rights-based approach to programming. Mr. Lee Swepston presented the work of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and its approach to human rights, with a focus on child labour issues.
The following session of the day focused on the current status of HRE in educational policies. The analysis was made by Mr. Jean Hénaire, Ministry of Educatio, Quebec. He referred to the various definitions of HRE and how this is hampering the lobby in the field of educational policies. He also called for: a) continuous teaching training on HRE ; b) coherence between the HRE plans and their actual implementation; c) developing law competences of university students in education studies; d) resources and synergies to pursue HRE; e) indicators to gauge the effect and scope of HRE. Mr. Hénaire also mentioned the Plan of Action for the World Program on HRE and the limited responses received from governments. With regard to the Human Rights Council, he stressed the need for an effective monitoring mechanism.
Mr. Hénaire also talked about Citizenship Education and its role as the access point to including HRE in the curriculum. However, he acknowledged the risk of citizenship education reinforcing conformism and patriotism. Monique Prindezis mentioned the changes in the work of the Council of Europe, who after the fall of Berlin’s wall progressively abandoned HRE in favour of citizenship education due to the process of European integration.
Another of the aspects tackled during the meeting was education and training to professional groups. Three experts in this field were invited to share their experiences with the participants: Ms. Cristina Sganga, Head of Training and Skills development at the Medical Foundation for the care of victims of torture; Ms. Barbara Bernath, from the Association for the Prevention of torture (APT); and Ms. Cecilia Jimenez, an International Lawyer.
Ms. Sganga stressed the role of professionals as service providers. She argued that psycho-social healing is a human right. It was also pointed out the need for expertise when working with sensitive groups, since inadequate training may cause great damage. Ms. Bernath presented the work of her organization on the prevention of torture through human rights training of police officers and called for the inclusion of HRE as part of their general training. Finally, Ms. Jimenez highlighted the lack of legal human rights education for lawyers and concluded that law should be seen as a tool to change society and promote social justice.
The second day of the seminar concluded with an open discussion facilitated by Yves Lador on the risk of instrumentalising HRE. It was highlighted the central position HRE is getting in the international political arena and the need to be accompanied by a change in the practices, i.e., a change in the way HRE is perceived both at national and international levels, and the way it is used in the international mechanisms of HR monitoring.