Minority Rights Summer School

The fourth international summer school on minority rights will take place from 10-16 July in Budapest.

The Tom Lantos Institute (TLI) and the National University of Public Service (NUPS) in cooperation with the Middlesex University London (MU) are organising their fourth international Summer School on Minority Rights with a special focus on the relevance of existing regimes for minority protection.

Recent years have seen an increase in the vulnerability of significant sections of the global community. The agreed human rights frameworks, based on individual rights protection at national, regional and international levels, have appeared inadequate in the face of widespread conflict, grinding poverty and mass exodus in the Middle East, Africa and to some extent reaching the borders of Europe.

Addressing these challenges from an international human rights law perspective requires clarity of vision, the ability to frame policies and to develop comprehensive approaches that offer flexible and creative solutions. Using the framework of international minority rights and drawing on wider socio-legal and policy orientations, this iteration of GMRSS will seek to highlight the importance of strategic action (civic, governmental, intergovernmental, local, national, transnational) in arriving at workable solutions. GMRSS will focus on the extent to which well-designed minority protection norms can be advanced through creative legal, political, socio-economic strategies at national, regional and international levels.

The Summer School will host 30 participants from all over the world and offers a forum to discuss relevant issues related to minorities with leading experts and practitioners in the field of international human rights law, political science, sociology, and history. Lectures include:

• Who is a minority? Theory and practice;
• Anti-discrimination: an adequate framework for minority protection?
• International and regional regimes for the protection of minorities;
• Comparative approaches to minority protection: the cases of China and India, Hungary and South-Tyrol, Nigeria and South Africa;
• Principled activism of minorities;
• A critical assessment of the UN regime of minority protection and of the UN Forum on Minority Issues;
• Strategies of minority rights activists: Conversations between activists for the rights of Afro-descendants, Dalits, Hungarian minorities, Roma and Indigenous Peoples. 

To apply, fill in the application form and return it to applications[at] tomlantosinstitute [dott] hu (subject: Minority%20Rights%20Summer%20School)

Watch the videos of the 2013, 2014 and 2015 Minority Rights Summer Schools.

More information: http://www.tomlantosinstitute.hu/content/call-applications-global-minority-rights-summer-school-2016