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This event is sponsored by: IJM, Bay Area Anti-Trafficking Coalition & the Stanford Program on Human Rights.

For more Information please contact:

Betty Ann Boeving   bettyann@baatc.org

Abstract
Social media and new technology are being harnessed for social benefit in contexts from healthcare, economic development, and sustainable energy to civic engagement and government transparency in California and worldwide. The Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) takes an interdisciplinary approach to addressing these problems and promoting innovation for students, faculty and entrepreneurs. In this talk, I will give a short overview of CITRIS's programs and initiatives, before diving into specific projects in the areas I lead: the Data and Democracy Initiative and the Social Apps Lab.

Camille Crittenden joined the Data and Democracy Initiative as Director in May 2012 and was named Deputy Director of CITRIS in May 2013. Prior to this appointment, she served as Executive Director of the Human Rights Center at Berkeley Law, where she was responsible for overall administration of the Center, including fundraising, communications, and outreach, and helped to develop its program in human rights, technology, and new media. She held previous positions as Assistant Dean for Development in the division of International and Area Studies at UC Berkeley and in development and public relations at University of California Press and San Francisco Opera. She holds a Ph.D. from Duke University.

This event is co-sponsored by the Stanford Center for East Asian Studies.

Abstract: 

Virak Ou will discuss the possibility and demographic underpinnings of a so-called “Cambodian Spring” — and will offer suggestions for what the international community can do to assist Cambodians during this transitional, tense time.   

Speaker Bio: 

Human rights activist and intellectual Virak Ou is the president of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights (CCHR), one of Cambodia’s most prominent human rights organizations. Ou is the recipient of the 2007 Reebok Human Rights Award for his campaign to free activists and decriminalize defamation in Cambodia. He is also the founder of the Alliance for Freedom of Expression in Cambodia, otherwise known as AFEC. He is a survivor of the Cambodian Khmer Rouge era and was a child refugee before settling in the United States in 1989. Ou holds an MA in economics from San Jose State University.   

Cambodia is currently experiencing unprecedented social upheaval, in the wake of the hotly contested elections of last summer. Ou’s CCHR has been at the forefront of advocating for human rights protections and free speech for both sides of the political debate. 

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Speaker Bio:

John Prendergast is Co-founder of the Enough Project, an initiative to end genocide and crimes against humanity. During the Clinton administration, John was involved in a number of peace processes in Africa while he was director of African Affairs at the National Security Council and special advisor at the Department of State. John has also worked for members of Congress, the United Nations, humanitarian aid agencies, human rights organizations, and think tanks.

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Abstract:

Subnational conflict is the most widespread, enduring, and deadly form of conflict in Asia. Over the past 20 years (1992-2012), there have been 26 subnational conflicts in South and Southeast Asia, affecting half of the countries in this region. Concerned about foreign interference, national governments limit external access to conflict areas by journalists, diplomats, and personnel from international development agencies and non-governmental organizations. As a result, many subnational conflict areas are poorly understood by outsiders and easily overshadowed by larger geopolitical issues, bilateral relations, and national development challenges. The interactions between conflict, politics, and aid in subnational conflict areas are a critical blind spot for aid programs. This study was conducted to help improve how development agencies address subnational conflicts.

Speaker Bios:

Ben Oppenheim is a Fellow (non-resident) at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University. His research spans a diverse set of topics, including fragile states, transnational threats (including pandemic disease risks and terrorism), and the strategic coherence and effectiveness of international assistance in fragile and conflict-affected areas.

Oppenheim has consulted for organizations including the World Bank, the United Nations, the Asia Foundation, the Institute for the Future, and the Fritz Institute, on issues including organizational learning, strategy, program design, foresight, and facilitation. In 2009, he served as Advisor to the first global congress on disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration, supported by the World Bank and the UN.

In 2013, Oppenheim was a visiting fellow at the Uppsala University Forum on Democracy, Peace, and Justice. His research has been supported by a Simpson Fellowship, and a fellowship with the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. He was also a research fellow with UC Berkeley's Institute of International Studies, affiliated with the New Era Foreign Policy Project.

Nils Gilman is the Executive Director of Social Science Matrix. He holds a B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. in History from the University of California, Berkeley. Gilman’s first scholarly interest was in American and European intellectual history, with a particular focus on the institutional development of the social sciences, the lateral transfer and translation of ideas across disciplinary boundaries, and the impact of social scientific ideas on politics and policy.

Gilman is the author of Mandarins of the Future: Modernization Theory in Cold War America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004), the co-editor of Staging Growth: Modernization, Development, and the Global Cold War (University of Massachusetts Press, 2003) and Deviant Globalization: Black Market Economy in the 21st Century (Continuum Press, 2011), as well as the founding Co-editor of Humanity: An International Journal of Human Rights, Humanitarianism, and Development. He also blogs and tweets.

Prior to joining Social Science Matrix in September 2013, Gilman was research director at Monitor 360, a San Francisco consultancy that addresses complex, cross-disciplinary global strategic challenges for governments, multinational businesses, and NGOs. He has also worked at a variety of enterprise software companies, including Salesforce.com, BEA Systems, and Plumtree Software. Gilman has taught and lectured at a wide variety of venues, from the Harvard University, Columbia University, and National Defense University, to PopTech, the European Futurists Conference, and the Long Now Foundation.

Bruce Jones is a senior fellow and the director of the Project on International Order and Strategy in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution. He is also the director of the Center on International Cooperation at New York University.

Jones served as the senior external advisor for the World Bank’s 2011 World Development Report, Conflict, Security and Development, and in March 2010 was appointed by the United Nations secretary-general as a member of the senior advisory group to guide the Review of International Civilian Capacities. He is also consulting professor at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University and professor (by courtesy) at New York University’s department of politics.

Jones holds a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics, and was Hamburg fellow in conflict prevention at Stanford University.

He is co-author with Carlos Pascual and Stephen Stedman of Power and Responsibility: Building International Order in an Era of Transnational Threats (Brookings Press, 2009); co-editor with Shepard Forman and Richard Gowan of Cooperating for Peace and Security (Cambridge University Press, 2009); and author of Peacemaking in Rwanda: The Dynamics of Failures(Lynne Reinner, 2001).

Jones served as senior advisor in the office of the secretary-general during the U.N. reform effort leading up to the World Summit 2005, and in the same period was acting secretary of the Secretary-General’s Policy Committee. In 2004-2005, he was deputy research director of the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. From 2000-2002 he was special assistant to and acting chief of staff at the office of the U.N. special coordinator for the Middle East peace process. 

Abstract:
Armed conflict causes profound and widespread adverse consequences for health and human rights. It directly causes death as well as physical and mental disabilities among combatants and increasingly among non-combatants. It damages the health-supporting infrastructure of society, including public health services and medical care. It forces people to leave the safety and security of their homes and communities. It diverts human and financial resources away from activities that benefit society. It leads to further violence. And, in these and other ways, armed conflict violates human rights.  This presentation will provide examples of these adverse consequences of armed conflict and what can be done to minimize these consequences and to prevent armed conflict.

Dr.Barry Levy is a physician and epidemiologist who has edited books, written papers, and spoken widely on these issues. He is an Adjunct Professor of Public Health at Tufts University School of Medicine. Previously, he served as a medical epidemiologist for the CDC, a tenured professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, USAID coordinator for AIDS prevention in Kenya, executive director of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, and in other roles. He is a past president of the American Public Health Association and a recipient of its Sedgwick Memorial Medal. He has written more than 200 published papers and book chapters, many on the adverse effects of war. He has co-edited 17 books, including, with co-editor Dr. Victor Sidel and many contributing authors, two editions each of the books War and Public Health, Terrorism and Public Health, and Social Injustice and Public Health.    

Abstract
The framework of "LGBT rights" can be critiqued as challenging tradition or as culturally specific, yet at the same time, it can be essential to one's sense of identity and justice.  Where can the discourse of "public health" help overcome barriers for LGBT people, both within the right to health and beyond? What are the limits to using public health to talk about human rights, LGBT or otherwise?  What are the dangers of conflating these distinct areas of concern?  We will explore these questions and focus on how academics and activists can most effectively navigate challenges to benefit both public health and LGBT rights.

Jessica Stern is the Executive Director of the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission. As the first researcher on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) human rights at Human Rights Watch, she conducted fact-finding investigations and advocacy around sexual orientation and gender identity in countries including Iran, Kyrgyzstan, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates. As a Ralph Bunche Fellow at Amnesty International, she documented police brutality for what became its landmark report on police brutality in LGBT communities in the U.S., “Stonewalled.” She was a founding collective member and co-coordinator of Bluestockings, then New York’s only women’s bookstore. She has campaigned extensively for women’s rights, LGBT rights, and economic justice with the Center for Constitutional Rights, Control Ciudadano, the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force, and the Urban Justice Center. She holds a masters degree in human rights from the London School of Economics. She is frequently quoted in the Mail & Guardian, Al Jazeera English, the Associated Press, Reuters, Agence France Presse, Deutsche Welle, Voice of America, The Guardian and The BBC.

Hon.Agnes Binagwaho has served as Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health in Rwanda since October 2008. She specialized in emergency pediatrics, neonatology, and the treatment of HIV/AIDS; and she chairs the Rwandan Pediatric Society. From 1986 to 2002, she practiced medicine in public hospitals in Rwanda and several other countries before joining Rwanda's National AIDS Control Commission as Executive Secretary. She is a member of the Editorial Board of Public Library of Science, and the Harvard University Health and Human Rights Journal. Dr. Binagwaho co‐chaired the Millennium Development Goal Project Task Force on HIV/AIDS and Access to Essential Medicines for the Secretary‐General of the United Nations under the leadership of Professor Jeffrey Sachs. She was the global co‐chair of the Joint Learning Initiative on Children and HIV/AIDS. In addition to her medical degree and Master in Peadiatry, she received an Honorary Doctor of Sciences from Dartmouth College. Dr. Binagwaho serves as a visiting lecturer in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine of Harvard Medical School.

Abstract:
The peoples of Burma/Myanmar have faced military rule, human rights violations, and poor health outcomes for decades. The country Is now undergoing a political liberalization, and multiple changes in political, social and economic life. The human rights and health situation of the country's many ethnic nationalities remain challenging, and represent one of the clearest threats to the prospect of successful transition to peace, and to democracy. We will explore the current health and human rights situation in the country, the ongoing threats to peace, and ways forward for this least developed nation as it emerges from 5 decades of military rule.

Chris Beyrer MD, MPH, is a professor of Epidemiology, International Health, and Health, Behavior, and Society at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health. He is the founding Director of the University¹s Center for Public Health and Human Rights, which seeks to bring the tools of population-based sciences to bear on Health and rights threats. Dr. Beyrer also serves as Associate Director of the Johns Hopkins Centers for AIDS Research (CFAR) and of the Center for Global Health. He has been involved in health and human rights work with Burmese populations since 1993. Prof. Beyrer is the author of more than 200 scientific papers, and author or editor of six books, including War in the Blood: Sex, Politics and AIDS in Southeast Asia, and Public Health and Human Rights: Evidence-Based Approaches. He has served as a consultant and adviser to numerous national and international institutions, including the National Institutes of Health, the World Bank, WHO, UNAIDS, the Open Society Foundations, the Walter Reed Army Institute for Research, amfAR The Foundation for AIDS Research, Physicians for Human Rights and Human Rights Watch. Dr. Beyrer received a BA in History from Hobart and Wm. Smith Colleges, his MD from SUNY Downstate in Brooklyn, NY, and completed his residency in Preventive Medicine, public health training, an MPH and a Infectious Diseases Fellowship at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. He received an honorary Doctorate (PhD) in Health Sciences from Chiang Mai University in Thailand, in 2012, in recognition of his 20 years of public health service in Thailand

**** PLEASE NOTE CHANGE OF SPEAKER***

Dr. Susan Kasedde currently serves as Senior Advisor and Team Leader on HIV and Adolescents for UNICEF based in New York since November 2009. In this role, she has contributed towards global level evidence generation, technical guidance development, advocacy, global partnership development, and technical assistance towards the global response towards HIV prevention, treatment and care in adolescents aged 10 - 19. Since 2011, on behalf of UNICEF, Susan has coordinated a series of efforts including documentation of global practices in the care of adolescents living with HIV; mathematical modeling with the Futures Institute to assess the impact and cost of scale up of proven high impact HIV prevention, treatment and care interventions within a holistic response, on new HIV infections and AIDS deaths in adolescents; and a systematic review with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to confirm evidence on effective approaches for programming to reduce HIV infection, illness and death in adolescents. This work has contributed to stronger advocacy and technical guidelines for programming for adolescents, a group of children previously largely neglected. In 2013, the documentation on adolescents living with HIV was a major contribution to the new WHO guidelines on HIV testing and counseling and care in adolescents. The impact modeling and systematic review are among a series of key papers that will be released in a special supplement on HIV prevention, treatment and care in adolescents at the International AIDS Society Conference in Melbourne, Australia in 2014.

 Susan joined UNICEF having served since 2007 as Regional Adviser with the UNAIDS Regional Office for Eastern & Southern Africa. In that role, she was responsible for coordinating analytic work on the epidemic and response and modes of HIV transmission in several high HIV burden countries, working extensively with government teams and partners in the highest HIV burden countries in the world to use an incidence model to predict the next 1000 new HIV infections and assess alignment of national strategies with the national epidemic. Susan has over 18 years of experience working on adolescents sexual and reproductive health of which 16 of those have been focused on HIV in adolescents. Susan holds a doctorate in Epidemiology and Population Health from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, a Masters degree in Public Health from Boston University and Bachelors degrees in Biomedical Science and French. Susan is a national of Uganda and speaks English and French.