From: Islamic Human Rights Commission

5 February 2018

PRESS RELEASE – UK: IHRC to convene Conference on “American Exceptionalism”

In a heightened era of American Exceptionalism under an overtly chauvinistic President and administration, IHRC is convening a conference to unmask the more systemic problems that undergird US Exceptionalism.

This conference will focus on the Americanisation of human rights, and the praxis of human rights, arguing that they have become a tool of US-led foreign policy rather than a transformative discourse that seeks to liberate individuals, groups and indeed large sections of society who are oppressed by unjust systems.

The conference will be convened in two parts witht he first focussing on the Americanisation of human rights and the second looking at the US as a failed state:

(i) The US Model and Praxis of Human Rights

How has advocacy and narrative changed over the last fifty years?

How does it need to change to tackle manifest injustice in the contemporary era?

Issues for possible discussion:

Institutionalisation of American Exceptionalism in International Organisations e.g UN, Security Council, World Bank, IMF, WTO

The War on Terror

The War(s) on Drugs

The roll-out of COINTELPRO type measures and its impact on global human rights advocacy

Americo-centrism

The Double Standards of American Exceptionalism and the American Discourse of Human Rights

American Exceptionalism as a Domination Policy of Human Rights

American Globalisation of Human Rights

Americanisation of Human Rights

Americanisation, Power, Hate Policy and Human Rights

(ii) The US as a failed state

How and what do current modes of human rights narrative and praxis mask internal injustices, indeed the contradiction at the heart of the US State?

Issues for possible discussion:

The Prison Industrial Complex

Guantanamo and the Guantanamisation of the US

Black, Latina, Indigenous and other Narratives of Oppression and Liberation

Speakers:

Saeid Reza Ameli – Faculty of World Studies, University of Tehran

Tasneem Chopra – Consultant, Author & Activist

Sohail Daulatzai – Documentary Film Maker & Author of Black Star Crescent

Ramon Grosfoguel – University of California, Berkley

Sandew Hira – Founder of International Institute for Scientific Research

Saeed A Khan – Wayne State University, Michigan

Rajeesh Kumar – Institute for Defence Studies & Analyses, New Delhi

Laurens De Rooij – University of Cape Town

Mary Ryan – Virginia Tech, USA

WHEN: Saturday, 10 February from 9.30am – 4.30pm

WHERE: Sarah Fell Room, Friends House, 173-177 Euston Road, London, NW1 2BJ (nearest stations: Euston / Euston Square / King’s Cross / Warren Street)

For media enquiries and further details or to register for the event please email nadia@ihrc.org please call +44 20 8904 4222 or +44 7958 522196 or +44 7426 728074[Ends]

Notes to editors:

[Ends]

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IHRC is an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.

Islamic Human Rights Commission
PO Box 598
Wembley
HA9 7XH
United Kingdom

Telephone (+44) 20 8904 4222
Email: info@ihrc.org
Web: www.ihrc.org
Twitter @ihrc