Human Rights at Home Blog

New Article: Colonizing Queerness

Jeremiah Ho, Colonizing Queerness, University of Colorado Law Review (forthcoming 2023). Abstract below.

This Article investigates how and why the cultural script of inequality persists for queer identities despite major legal advancements such as marriage, anti-discrimination, and employment protections. By regarding LGBTQ legal advancements as part of the American settler colonial project, I conclude that such victories are not liberatory or empowering but are attempts at colonizing queer identities. American settler colonialism’s structural promotion of a normative sexuality illustrates how our settler colonialist legacy is not just a race project (as settler colonialism is most widely studied) but also a race-gender-sexuality project. Even in apparent strokes of progress, American settler colonialism’s eliminationist motives continually privilege white heteropatriarchal structures that dominate over non-normative sexualities.

Through covert demands upon queer identities to assimilate with the status quo, such settler colonialist motivations are visible in the way Supreme Court gay rights advancements have facilitated a conditional but normative path to mainstream citizenship for queer identities. By employing concepts from critical race theory, queer studies, and settler colonial theory, this Article illuminates on how the Court’s cases are indeed part of American settler colonialism’s sexuality project and answers why such legal advancements always appear monumental, but ultimately remain in the control of a discriminatory status quo. Only if queer legal advancements are accompanied by essential shifts from the normative structures of white settler heteropatriarchy will such victories live up to their liberatory claims. Otherwise, such apparent progress will continually attempt to marginalize—indeed, colonize—queerness.

New Article: Advancing Global Human Rights Locally

Julia Spiegel, Advancing Global Human Rights Locally, Just Security (May 16, 2023). Excerpt below.

International human rights are often viewed as the prerogative of the federal government. But that’s not the law, nor the reality. While U.S. states and localities may not enter into binding agreements with other nations or act contrary to federal law or policy according to legal precedent, U.S. states and localities can – and do – engage in a wide range of human rights policy making. Those policies can complement or fill a void in federal action in important ways.

Consider Russia’s war on Ukraine and the ensuing human rights catastrophe. In the immediate aftermath, several U.S. states issued Executive Orders to amplify, and in some cases build upon, federal sanctions targeting the Russian regime for its violations of human rights and international law. Taken together, these orders – issued by California, Colorado, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Utah, Vermont – terminated or banned contracts with entities doing business in Russia, prohibited purchases of certain Russian goods, required reporting by government contractors of actions they have taken in response to the war, and called for divestment of public pension funds.

The new wave of human rights is local. U.S. state and local leaders can employ swift and wide-ranging tools to advance progress on human rights locally and globally. And more of them should.

New Report: Data on Tap: Realizing Human Rights through Water Utility Reporting Laws

Program on Human Rights and the Global Economy (PHRGE) at Northeastern University School of Law, Data on Tap: Realizing Human Rights through Water Utility Reporting Laws (May 2023). Excerpts below.

Local water utilities’ policies regarding access, pricing, payment schedules, shutoffs, and debt collection have significant impacts on the individuals and communities that these utilities serve. In recent years, a distinct legislative trend towards mandated water policy transparency has been gaining momentum across the country. Simultaneously, an international push for affordable water access has been spearheaded by the United Nations as part of its Sustainable Development Goals. While these laws represent an important movement towards realization of the human right to water, they also work towards securing a less discussed human right: access to government- held information.

The Human Rights Committee guidance noted that Article 2 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) had been previously interpreted by the committee to mean that all persons should receive information from the State regarding their covenant rights. Just a year prior the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution unequivocally stating that water access is essential to the enjoyment of the right to life protected by numerous human rights instruments, including the ICCPR. Thus, as water is a right protected by the ICCPR, there is a right to receive information about water policies from the state. The United States has ratified the ICCPR with no reservations related to Article 19, and as such is obligated to recognize the right to access information embodied within that section.

The human right to information is more expansive. It obligates government to take positive actions to share information. Access to government-held information is often the only way to determine the presence of inequities and inadequacies in a government’s support for human rights. Rising water costs, the Covid-19 pandemic, and the widening income gap in the U.S. have combined to spur a new legislative focus on water accessibility and affordability. Amidst ongoing calls for government responses to racial inequities, some state legislatures began to introduce requirements aimed at collecting data to document the prevalence and geographic spread of service disconnections. As of February 2023, six state legislatures have considered legislation requiring data collection and public reporting by water utilities. Several of these initiatives have resulted in new laws requiring additional reporting and information-sharing with the public.

The introduction and implementation of water utility reporting laws represents an important shift towards greater recognition of the human right to access information. If the promise contained in the UDHR and ICCPR of a right to access information is to be fully realized within the United States, then governments at the federal, state, and local levels must take steps to proactively make critical information available. The enactment of more, and more robust, water utility reporting requirements will ensure that recent progress continues while at the same time further ensuring realization of the human right to water.

Event 6/15: 023 Bringing Human Rights Home Lawyers' Network Symposium, Human Rights Treaty Obligations and the U.S.: The Rocky Road to Rights

Registration for the 2023 Bringing Human Rights Home Lawyers' Network Symposium, Human Rights Treaty Obligations and the U.S.: The Rocky Road to Rights is now open. You can register now by clicking here. The symposium will address current challenges and opportunities for moving a human rights agenda in the United States, with a keynote address by UN Special Rapporteur Meg Satterthwaite. The event will take place on Zoom on June 15th from 1:00 – 4:30 pm EDT.