The Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) hosted an event where Alex Neve, a renowned human rights advocate, spoke about broken promises and the challenges facing universal human rights in a divided world. The event was named after Neve’s book, Universal: Renewing Human Rights in a Fractured World.
The event began with Neve presenting a lecture that covered the five chapters of his novel. Throughout, Neve shared stories from his decades of human rights advocacy. One was centred on Maher Arar and his wife Monia Mazigh, a Syrian-Canadian couple whom Neve advocated for in one of his cases. Arar was detained in the U.S. and deported to Syria, where he was tortured and imprisoned. Mazigh, alongside Amnesty International, played a key role in his release.
Neve used this case to discuss various issues with universal human rights, emphasizing how essential it is to humanize rights by recognizing the real individuals and families behind the violations.
In one of his presentations, Neve called people to “put human rights first, embrace universality and commit to equality, protect human rights defenders and the right to protest, ensure justice, be expansive and believe in and champion human rights,” emphasizing his vision for renewing human rights in a divided world.
The event held a question-and-answer session that allowed the audience to connect with Neve. The event concluded with a book signing, giving the audience a chance for one-on-one conversation with Neve.
Shayna Plaut, the CMHR’s director of research and exhibition development, mentioned the museum wanted to host the event because Neve is internationally recognized as a human rights advocate and an upholder of its principles here in Canada.
He was a strong fit for the event because they “thought that it would be a great convening [of] literary and thought-provoking approaches to international human rights, and to a large variety of audiences here at the museum.”
She said the event aimed to remind audiences of “the importance of holding onto international human rights principles and ideals, particularly in times right now where things are so divisive.” Plaut added, “Being able to hold on to the importance of all people needing to live a life of safety, security and dignity is even more important.”
Plaut encouraged universities to create “more spaces [for] conversation and thinking [about] human rights.” She added, “It’s okay if we don’t all agree. We can learn from […] each other’s experiences […] and we can still walk away stronger in our understanding of human rights.”
“We need to make sure classrooms are a place for learning and conversations. Classrooms need to be able to hold divergent opinions,” said Plaut. According to her, it is also the responsibility of students to learn and hold “respectful space for each other’s divergent opinions, and to really help lift up rather than tear [each other] down.”
Plaut added, “What’s really important is to remember that we can focus so much on human rights violations, but what’s important is to also think about human rights possibilities, and I feel that students often have the space and the creativity to think about what’s possible as opposed to accepting what is.”
