Many resource dependent states have to varying degrees, failed to provide for the welfare of their own populations, could threaten global energy markets, and could pose security risks for the United States and other countries.  Many are in Africa, but also Central Asia (Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan), Southeast Asia (Cambodia, Burma, East Timor), and South America (Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador) Some have only recently become – or are about to become – significant resource exporters.  Many have histories of conflict and poor governance.  The recent boom and decline in commodity prices – the largest price shock since the 1970s – will almost certainly cause them special difficulties.  The growing role of India and China, as commodity importers and investors, makes the policy landscape even more challenging.

We believe there is much the new administration can learn from both academic research, and recent global initiatives, about how to address the challenge of poorly governed states that are dependent on oil, gas, and mineral exports.  Over the last eight years there has been a wealth of new research on the special problems that resource dependence can cause in low-income countries – including violent conflict, authoritarian rule, economic volatility, and disappointing growth.  The better we understand the causes of these problems, the more we can learn about how to mitigate them.

There has also been a new set of policy initiatives to address these issues: the Kimberley Process, the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, the World Bank’s new “EITI plus plus,” Norway’s Oil for Development initiative, and the incipient Resource Charter.  NGOs have played an important role in most of these initiatives; key players include Global Witness, the Publish What You Pay campaign, the Revenue Watch Institute, Oxfam America, and an extensive network of civil society organizations in the resource-rich countries themselves.

Some of these initiatives have been remarkably successful.  The campaign against ‘blood diamonds,’ through the Kimberley Process, has reduced the trade in illicit diamonds to a fraction of its former level, and may have helped curtail conflicts in Angola, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.  Many other initiatives are so new they have not been have not been carefully evaluated.

This workshop is designed to bring together people in the academic and policy worlds to identify lessons from this research, and from these policy initiatives, that can inform US policy towards resource-dependent poorly states in the new administration.

In July, Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) will welcome its ninth class of Draper Hills Summer Fellows hailing from 24 countries around the world. The program is an integral part of the CDDRL's effort to train practitioners who are working on the front lines of political change in places where democracy is underdeveloped or at risk.

The 2013 class was selected from over 500 applicants and represents some of the most courageous and innovative democracy leaders around the world. Their experience and track record of success earned them a spot in this highly competitive program.

From Burma to Ukraine, the 2013 fellows are leading organizations and programs - often at tremendous odds - to advance democratic practices, combat corruption and uphold human rights.

For 11 years Zing Mar Aung was a political prisoner in Burma for her involvement in the pro-democracy movement. After her release in 2009, Mar Aung dedicated her energy to building Burmese civil society by co-founding a number of civil society organizations - including the Yangon School of Political Science - to increase civic engagement. In recognition of her contributions, Mar Aung received the International Women of Courage Award in 2012 by former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

As the Russian government tightens its grip on civil society, the country's only independent polling center - the Levada Center - has come under attack. Working as a researcher and public commentator, Denis Volkov frequently publishes opinion pieces on the protest movements and serves as a spokesperson for Levada. Labeled as a "foreign agent" by the Russian government, the Levada Center fears closure for its independent analysis and authoritative voice.

Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi commands a significant online presence with upwards of a quarter million Twitter followers. In the height of the Arab Spring, Al Qassemi - who hails from the United Arab Emirates- became a leading commentator on Arab politics and reform for a growing online audience. In 2011, Time magazine chose Al Qassemi's Twitter feed (@SultanalQassemi) amongst its 140 Best Twitter Feeds list. His analysis is also published in Middle East-based newspapers, as well as Foreign Policy, The Guardian and The Financial Times.

The three-week fellowship program begins on July 22 and is taught by a team of interdisciplinary Stanford faculty members who include leading political scientists, lawyers and economists who are pioneering innovative research in the field of democratic development. 

One of the few programs of its kind in academia, the Draper Hills Summer Fellows Program combines the rich experiences of practitioners with academic training to maximize the impact of their work to advance democratic change.

Fellows live together on the Stanford campus where they connect with peers, exchange experiences and participate in shared activities. The program is funded by the generous support of Bill and Phyllis Draper and Ingrid von Mangoldt Hills.

The program will accept applications to the 2014 program beginning in September.

To learn more about the 2013 Draper Hills Summer Fellows and their innovative work, please click here. 

The Program on Human Rights (PHR) at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law is looking forward to an exciting quarter with a continued focus on human trafficking and human rights education.  We encourage you to read our newsletter below to learn more about our exciting courses, research initiatives, and new staff on board for the spring quarter.  

Human Trafficking:

• • PHR Director Helen Stacy is co-teaching Human Trafficking: Historical, Legal, and Medical Perspectives, an interdisciplinary course that was developed over the last year in consultation with Faculty College. The course will explore all forms of human trafficking including labor and sex trafficking, child soldiers and organ harvesting. Professor Stacy’s office hours this quarter are Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2:30 – 4 p.m. at Encina Hall, room C148.

    

• • PHR has launched a new research project on human trafficking in Asia. The project started over spring break and was rolled out at Stanford’s campus in Beijing, China.  The new research project will focus on cross border trafficking between Burma, Thailand and China.  Look out for more news of this exciting new project in the weeks to come.

Undergraduate Summer Research Fellowship:  PHR has selected four undergraduate fellows at Stanford who will complete internships this summer in Bihar, India (human trafficking education); Ahmedabad, India (the Self Employed Women’s Association-SEWA); Guatemala (KidsAlive International); and Amman, Jordan (Visualizing Justice).  The fellows are currently preparing for their summer positions. Look out for more details on our newest Human Rights Fellows next week!

Stanford Human Rights Education Inititative (SHREI), a partnership with International Comparative Area studies and Stanford Program in Inter-Cultural Education continues this quarter, with the community college fellows preparing their lesson plans.  This year’s topics are human trafficking and the media.  For more information please click here.

New Faces at PHR: The program is excited to welcome Jessie Brunner as the new PHR assistant, carrying out many of the tasks previously undertaken by Nadejda Marques, who departed PHR at the end of Winter quarter.  Following her undergraduate studies in journalism and Spanish at U.C. Berkeley, Brunner spent six years in the professional arena, first as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times and then in public relations/marketing for two nonprofit organizations.  She came to Stanford University this fall to undertake her master’s degree in international policy studies, concentrating in global justice. Her professional pursuits have long been coupled with passionate activism in the arenas of human rights advocacy, conflict resolution in Israel, and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and poverty reduction.  Brunner was an active participant in the winter quarter’s Sanela Diana Jenkins Human Rights Speaker Series: The International Criminal Court: The Next Decade.  Brunner recently returned from a study trip to Rwanda where she delved into issues of human rights, governance, and economic development through meetings with government officials, NGOs, and the business community.     

“The recent news of General Bosco Ntaganda’s surrender to the International Criminal Court where he is standing trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity certainly urges reflection on last quarter’s Sanela Diana Jenkins Human Rights Speaker Series, in which students and community members alike heard from renowned experts both within and outside the Court,” said Brunner.

Brunner can be contacted at jbrunner@stanford.edu.  She will hold office hours on Mondays and Wednesdays from 12 – 2 p.m. at Encina Hall, room C148.

For the latest in human rights news and to learn more about exciting events on campus, please follow us on Facebook.

We’re looking forward to engaging and interacting with you during the spring quarter!

Asia is a major source and destination for victims of human trafficking. The region's booming sex tourism industry, China's appetite for Burmese child-brides, and widespread poverty foster a black market that goes unchecked. Governments often have little incentive to combat the internal and cross-border sale of people, sometimes profiting from revenue generated by sex tourism and a cheap, unregulated shadow labor market.

Helen Stacy, director of the CDDRL Program on Human Rights and a FSI senior fellow, says now is the time to address human trafficking and the mechanisms to fight it in Asia. As U.S. foreign policy pivots toward Asia, human rights issues are becoming integrated into regional discussions on trade and economic development. According to Stacy, regional trade blocs - such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) - are using their collective strength to get serious about human rights and curb trafficking.

Stacy, a lawyer by training, has dedicated a great deal of research to examining the shifting landscape of the international human rights movement. Her 2009 book, Human Rights for the 21st Century: Sovereignty, Civil Society, Culture, highlighted the success of sub-regional organizations in using their economic, political, and security cooperation as a platform to pursue human rights issues.

Stacy points to one of Africa's sub-regional organizations - the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) - as a surprising benchmark in pursuing a collective plan of action against human trafficking. The 15 ECOWAS nations signed harmonized legislation outlining how to enforce laws and punish offenders.

Building off this research and her recent travels to Asia, Stacy is writing a new book that will examine how regional and sub-regional institutions in Africa and Asia are able to successfully enact and enforce human rights agreements. 

Why the emphasis on regional and sub-regional institutions when examining human rights enforcement?

Africa, Europe, Latin America, and Southeast Asia have created regional bodies for country-to-country dialogue in their region. Given the vastness of their population and territory, sub-regional groups are now forming to advance economic and security cooperation. Intriguingly, the African and Southeast Asian sub-regional bodies principle purpose is economic cooperation, which makes their human rights activity very different from either national government or the international level human rights activity. Countries of varying political interests and economic capacity that had no interest in human rights are now negotiating cross-border human rights agreements with their regional neighbors. They are now being swept into a “regional group-think” approach to human rights.

Why focus on Africa and Asia?

Africa and Asia are huge markets for the U.S. and Asia holds China, the other world economic superpower. In Africa, China is consuming resources at a staggering rate but with scant attention to human rights. The U.S. must manage a complicated dance about trade and human rights in its negotiations with China. China is also a huge economic presence in Southeast Asia, and with the U.S. diplomatic “pivot” to Asia, it’s the right time for the U.S. to be focusing on Asian Pacific human rights.

What is ASEAN's role as a sub-regional organization in Southeast Asia?

ASEAN is a free trade organization that has really started to gather its forces since the Asian financial crisis. At the same time, Asian national governments have realized that their relationship with China makes them vulnerable. On the one hand they want China’s investment money; on the other hand they want to assert their own national goals and standards and not be consumed by China’s huge demand for resources. ASEAN understands that it must have institutions of good regional governance if they are to be taken seriously by the ASEAN Plus Three countries (China, Korea and Japan), or beyond to the U.S., Europe, Australia, and New Zealand.

Why does ASEAN care about human trafficking?

There aren't any accurate statistics of the number of victims whose bodies are being sold – that’s just an unfortunate reality of any black market. Global estimates are that 27 million people are enslaved, half of them children. That’s more today than the entire 300-year long Atlantic slave trade. Governments are realizing that if they want to claim national governance credibility they have to at least acknowledge the problem, sign human rights agreements, and start cooperating with their neighbors.

What are the steps ASEAN is taking to combat human trafficking?

ASEAN has committed itself to a trafficking agreement in 2014. They signed their first human rights convention in November 2012. I have been meeting with the country representatives here at Stanford and overseas and this is a serious diplomatic cadre. The U.S. has its own ambassador, which again is all part of its pivot toward Asia. President Obama made a landmark speech about human trafficking in September 2012 and the U.S. Agency for International Development is now incorporating anti-trafficking programming into their agenda. There has never been this level of international understanding of human slavery as a global phenomenon. My interest lies in seeing how the regional and sub-regional organizations respond to this moment.

What are your plans for your next book?

The book is about new actors, markets, and technologies that yield both good and bad human rights outcomes. The number of “deep-pocket” non-governmental groups is growing exponentially: both helpful ones like philanthropic organizations, and worrying ones like black market and underground political organizations. One way or another they have profound influences upon the actions of national governments and regional and sub-regional institutions.

How does human trafficking factor into your research?

Human trafficking is my lens because it provides a unique window into a country and region. It provides information about the status of minorities; levels of health, education, and poverty; and a national government’s commitment to human rights and the rule of law. A trafficking analysis shines light on when regional co-operation, economic aid, and philanthropic assistance improves human rights. It also reveals when corrupt governments profit from predatory black market trade in humans, guns, and drugs. If we understand this better we can guide intelligence professionals, civil society, communications people, and policy-makers in human rights reform.

Stacy will be discussing her evolving research agenda on human trafficking, with a focus on Burma's current human rights challenges, at the weekly CDDRL seminar on Feb. 7. For more information, please click here. 

The Program on Human Rights at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law (CDDRL) is beginning to expand its research to examine the response of regional and sub regional court systems to human trafficking in Asia. Stanford Professor Helen Stacy, a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and director of the CDDRL Program on Human Rights, initiated this new research initiative during a visit to Jakarta, Indonesia in September.

“Regional and sub regional courts are key to dealing with the international issue of human trafficking when governments are unwilling or lack the capacity to modulate trafficking across borders,” said Stacy. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have until very recently moved beyond approaching of human trafficking as an issue of national sovereignty and towards  a regional strategy Trafficking in the region is most widely acknowledged as an issue involving women and children.

While in Jakarta, Stacy met leading activists on the ground as well as court and government officials. This included the ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR), personnel at the U.S. Embassy and activists working for grassroots anti-trafficking NGOs. The ASEAN declaration against trafficking —adopted in November 2004 —is now the primary document against the trafficking of women and children in the region. The AICHR, founded in September 2009, now mediates the regional response to human trafficking.

Personnel from the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta are also working to institutionalize Indonesia’s larger response to human trafficking. The forced labor and trafficking of young boys to fishing platforms off the coasts of many surroundings islands remains a growing concern. Campaigns set up through the U.S. Embassy and local NGOs are now working with local law enforcement to recognize, manage and prevent trafficking using a victim-centered and sensitive approach. 

Groups working on anti-human trafficking in and around Jakarta are gaining growing support from the community. Founded by survivors of sex trafficking, a woman’s empowerment and anti-human trafficking organization campaigns around the capital of Indonesia working with victims and strengthening networks of women.

Stacy’s background in regional and sub regional court systems in both southern and eastern Africa has shaped the platform for a study of such existing systems in ASEAN. Her work now continues in Burma, Thailand and China.