On Tuesday afternoon, Staff Writer Maggie Moran attended a Keynote speech, The State of Human Rights in the World Today, as part of Columbia’s World Leaders Forum. Topics covered included digital ethics, cyber warfare, and polka-dot socks. Sound interesting? Read on to hear more about the event.

Al Hussein and Masri during the Q&A. Not pictured: fun socks.

On Tuesday afternoon, I had the opportunity to hear Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, speak. This event took place in Casa Italiana’s Teatro (that’s Italian for theater), whose Ionic columns and chandeliers are fit for only the worldliest of audiences. President Bollinger introduced Al Hussein sporting an eye-catching emerald green necktie, as if I weren’t already captivated. Fashion choices aside, Bollinger did a great job highlighting Al Hussein’s lengthy and impressive track record. Before becoming the HCHR in 2014, he served as Jordan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, as well as president of the UN’s Security Council. During his tenure as HCHR, he has confronted a variety of social issues at all levels, condemning both domestic and international terrorist groups. He also played a large role in the advancement and negotiation for the International Criminal Court, and has rebuked Donald Trump for his comments regarding the Charlottesville protests.

Al Hussein began by describing the two extremes he experienced when, within 8 days, he went from being in Silicon Valley to visiting Libya, one of the few countries in which the UN has no permanent presence. The difference between peering into the future and being transported into a barbaric past was mind-blowing. His job, in a nutshell, is to promote “a deeper consciousness of rights”. Global politics is putting that mission under much duress today, and although he believes that ending poverty, world hunger, and similar issues plaguing the world today is an achievable goal, many world leaders are turning away from potential solutions.

The focus of this address was the way in which digital technology in particular is introducing new complexities for human rights. Data streams can be used for such purposes as tracking modern slavery and interrupt human trafficking, even if accurate information can be hard to uncover. Research has indicated that bringing internet to all the people who don’t have it would improve economic output and raise hundreds of millions out of poverty. Indeed, the effects that Internet access can have on our social awareness is undeniable. Al Hussein presents the example of China’s Great Firewall to show how censorship prevents citizens from fully participating in political life. Dozens of countries have arrested citizens for merely sharing or liking social media posts. These arrests often do not comply with the UN’s human rights standards; they are not proportionate to threat, overseen by public bodies, or demonstrably necessary, to name a few violations. It is also important to ask if digital space is expanding or becoming more narrow. There are very few major corporations with the power to regulate the Internet today, and they are allowing themselves to become conduits for harassment because they fail to grasp concepts like national and international law. If companies like Facebook and Microsoft could be given more practical guidance on human rights, Al Hussein argues, ethics could be much more easily incorporated into the development of technology.

Data is constantly being monetized and harvested for purposes that users don’t consent to, and often in a way that serves to promote inequalities. For example, the rise of blockchains certainly expedites some digital processes, but can also threaten privacy and justice. It is crucial, then, to strengthen regulatory frameworks and ensure that today’s developers have a solid foundation in fundamental human rights. Fully autonomous weaponry is a growing field that is particularly disturbing, which could eventually yield so-called “killer robots” that are able to determine when to take a human life without any actual human intervention. Progress cannot come at the cost of fundamental freedoms. Al Hussein ended his speech with a call to return to the universal declaration of human rights, and remembrance of why it was necessary in the first place in the aftermath of WWII.

After the address, a Q&A session was moderated by Safwan Masri, the Executive VP of Columbia Global Centers. Several audience members, most of them SIPA students interested in the study of human rights, asked questions on topics ranging from Libya’s use of the RtoP doctrine to the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims. Concerning the latter, Al Hussein expressed disappointment in Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been hesitant to use the term “ethnic cleansing” at the risk of sounding too harsh. He went on to say that if the international community allows this persecution to continue in Myanmar without repercussions, there is no reason that other ethnic minorities won’t be subjected to the same treatment elsewhere. During this portion of the afternoon, Al Hussein also revealed that he had decided to wear polka-dot socks after his daughter asked how long he was going to be a grey bureaucrat. Although the discussion covered many issues of international human rights violations, all of which are to be taken seriously, this was a nice reminder that the person in charge of them doesn’t always have to be. Bringing attention back to the focus of the afternoon, Mr. Zeid closed by saying that, when it comes to the protection of human rights, we all have something to lose, and it’s not something that can be easily regained.

With so much having been covered, I walked away from the afternoon feeling just a little more well-educated on contemporary human rights issues. While I was among the younger members of the audience, and some of the questions posed by grad students were over my head, I also realized the important role that college students play in making the digital realm more conducive to justice. Perhaps more notably, I left with even more animosity towards Mark Zuckerberg than usual. If nothing else, I felt more mindful of how my digital presence could be harming or helping the advancement of human rights, even when it seemed inconsequential to me.

Image via Bwog Staff