NYU Gallatin Global Fellowship in Human Rights Blog

An Unexpected and Dramatic Election

by

Sophie Walker
Court Watch NYC
New York, NY

As the Queens district attorney (DA) election approached, work relating to Tiffany Cabán ramped up. In addition to the work I did with Court Watch, I spent a great deal of time working for and with VOCAL-NY as well as VOCAL-NY Action Fund, the advocacy and political arm that endorsed Cabán for Queens DA. VOCAL-NY and other organizations organized candidate forums and town halls, and VOCAL members met with candidates to discuss policy, personal experiences, and their expectations as constituents. I made lots of calls asking people to canvass, and I spent time before and on election day canvassing. 

As a first-time canvasser, I was not particularly comfortable in the beginning. Knocking on doors and asking for strangers’ time was intrusive and awkward. While I understand that canvassing is an effective tactic (and if one more person votes as a result, it’s a success), I wish our whole system worked differently so that more conversations could happen about leadership and community in a process that is  perhaps more meaningful. More importantly, barriers to voting, including accessibility, bureaucracy, and discrimination against undocumented people and formerly and currently incarcerated people, continue to exist and prevent many communities from engaging in electoral politics.

I had great conversations with people of many ages and backgrounds, including a high school student who wasn’t eligible to vote yet. She had registered in school but hadn’t turned 18, and yet was happy to talk about the election. Universally, I met people who were thrilled that DA Richard Brown’s longtime run was over. Throughout his 28 years, he had a great impact on communities not only in Queens but all of those connected to Queens throughout New York City and the world.

I met lots of Cabán supporters and lots of Katz supporters while canvassing in different neighborhoods (Jamaica, Corona, Elmhurst, and Jackson Heights), and while I assumed Katz would win because she was the established candidate, it was clear Cabán had significant support. As the polls were closing on election day and votes were reported, the results yo-yo’d: Cabán was in the lead by a few hundred votes, then behind by a few hundred, and so on. Any change was incremental.

On my way over to the Cabán election night party at 10:45, it was still unclear whether it would be a gathering for victory or defeat. But by 11 pm, Cabán declared victory; all the precincts had reported, and she was up by around 1,100 votes. On the screen in the packed and energized club, Melinda Katz called for a recount, said she was not conceding, and said something about the beauty of democracy and how justice prevails. 

But Cabán and her staff, organizers, and supporters were celebrating. There was music, drinks, and posters and cards with her face lining the entrance. Her speech and the speeches of organizers on her campaign were moving, and it was thrilling to be there. It felt historical, that a queer Latina public defender would be the Queens DA and would work to de-carcerate Queens, protect immigrants and sex workers, and end cash bail.

The work of the recount quickly began and it was clear that Cabán would not win easily. As it went on, it was clear she would not win at all.

Highlights & Final Thoughts on My Time at Medica Gjakova

by

Viktoria Pashtriku
Women’s Association Medica Gjakova
Gjakova, Kosovo

My time at Medica Gjakova has come to an end and I am reflecting back on the ways in which this experience has propelled my academic and professional goals. From learning the importance of different human rights to rural women, to getting to meet people working on postwar trauma and collective memory in Kosovo, I have not only gained a richer understanding of the role women and human rights have in the transitional justice process, but have also clarified my master’s thesis topic and established next steps after graduation. 

a few houses scattered in grassy area
A remote village in the Gjakova municipality of Kosovo, where I assisted in holding a women’s human rights workshop.

Here are some highlights of opportunities I was able to have this summer while at Medica Gjakova: 

  • Assisting in holding women’s human rights workshops in remote villages throughout Kosovo to teach rural women about the resources, rights, and opportunities available to them. These workshops were not only beneficial for the women, but allowed me to get a better sense of the varying cultures and mindsets in the villages and understand which rights and opportunities women found most valuable and which didn’t interest them as much. For example, rural women were particularly interested in their rights to inheritance and property. 
  • Attending the Interdisciplinary Conference: “War Trauma, Collective Memory, and Transitional Justice” at the University of Prishtina in Prishtina, Kosovo. We heard various academics and professionals discuss how they are engaging with and helping survivors of wartime trauma in Kosovo. This opportunity allowed me to network with various people in the fields of my own personal, academic, and professional interests, as well as discover different individuals and organizations in Kosovo that are working with survivors of wartime sexual violence. 
  • Learning about some of the other ways Medica Gjakova helps survivors of wartime sexual violence that are not directly related to my work. For example, Medica Gjakova has a store in Gjakova that sells handmade crafts and agricultural products made by survivors. They also offer training programs for the hair-styling, cooking, and seamstress professions and provide small business startup resources.
  • Administering English-language tutoring sessions to team members at Medica Gjakova who wanted to get more comfortable speaking and improving their English language comprehension. 

Most importantly, I’ve come to think that the best way to enact social change is through a combined and balanced effort between a top-down and bottom-up approach. For example, while Medica Gjakova created a training manual based off of their twenty years working directly with survivors of wartime sexual violence, understanding their needs, and recognizing the ways in which the medical field typically fails them, by partnering with governmental organizations, Medica Gjakova will be able to implement their training in the public health care system. Merging grassroots knowledge with governing power in a fair way is challenging and difficult, but I believe that when accomplished, can generate top results.  

Human Rights and the Left in Syria: Some Final Reflections

by

Robin Jones
Al-Jumhuriya
Beirut, Lebanon

“You know, most leftists in Syria do not support the idea of human rights.” A Syrian human rights lawyer, who I interviewed during research for my thesis on the history of the Syrian left, made this claim when we met, almost immediately upon hearing about my project topic.

Coming from a family of leftists himself, this lawyer has charted a different course than his siblings, who joined opposition communist parties and faced lengthy jail sentences for their activism. He expressed critical views of leftist politics and arguably, of political parties and grand ideologies more generally, as he understood them as being inherently inclined toward authoritarianism and the erosion of individual rights.

Tracing the rise of Amnesty International, the scholar Jessica Whyte claims that “two very different political movements” emerged at roughly the same time: the anti-war movement, based on leftist political commitments to global solidarity, and the human rights movement, which avoided structural questions and operated outside of the leftist political milieu.

There is indeed a tension between the left and human rights, as noted by my interviewee. Yet, as we discussed in the same interview, many Syrian human rights activists come from a communist or former communist background. The history of the human rights movement and its interactions with the left may differ outside of the Western context that forms the focus of Whyte’s writing.

For the last week of my internship, I traveled to Berlin, where some members of the al-Jumhuriya collective are based, to meet them and begin preliminary interviews for my masters thesis. This gave me a glimpse of another side of life in the Syrian diaspora as well as an opportunity to reflect on my work throughout the summer and how it might feed into my broader academic trajectory.

This interview in particular seemed to encompass many of the questions and issues that I have been grappling with, regarding whether collective projects of liberation are compatible with an approach based on the rights of the individual. Given the ruling Syrian Baath Party’s longstanding use of the rhetoric of anti-colonial nationalism and Arab socialism toward the violent repression of its own population, are these ideas so tainted that Syrian adherents of social justice should retreat to a defense of liberal individual rights alone?

When I posed this question to one of al-Jumhuriya’s founders, who also expresses criticisms of the response of the international left to the Syrian revolution, his answer was no. He argued that liberalism has little currency among the poor and the working class because it fails to seriously address socioeconomic inequality. He suggested instead that new paradigms are needed–as I understood it, ones that enable us to learn from the mistakes of the left in the 20th century and that embrace a humanist approach. It is through grassroots struggles such as the 2011 revolution in Syria that such paradigms will be forged.

Hindu mythological roots of domestic violence in the South Asian region

by

Ayman Mukerji Househam
Sakhi
USA

The issue of domestic violence exists in all cultures. As a Hindu woman of South Asian origin, I have always been curious to find the Hindu mythological roots of domestic violence in my country.  I am hopeful that by digging deeper, perhaps we will find an answer to the question, “How can we end domestic violence in South Asian communities?”

Mythological Hindu female characters such as Sita and Savitri may date as far back as the seventh century BC or even earlier. These characters were and perhaps are still considered traditional female role models, due to their chastity and devotion to their husbands. Interestingly, during the seventh century BC, the Indian subcontinent occupied most, if not all, of present-day South Asia. The South Asian woman traditionally honored by the society is the caregiver devoted to her husband in silence, subjugation, and tolerance, akin to the glorified religious and mythological characters. Such social values may leave the question of intentionality in creating a social order, perhaps to support a traditional gender hierarchy. A woman’s position in the hierarchy of Indian society can be traced as far back as 1500 BC, when Manu, the ancient Indian sage, prescribed unmitigated subservience of women to men in his code of laws known as Manusmriti.

While Sita and Savitri are often considered role models for Indian women, Hindus worship goddesses such as Kali and Durga, who represent stri-shakti (or woman power) in the form of fierce warriors. Devi Mahatmya (Sanskrit for “Glory of the Goddess”) is an ancient Indian text that was composed in Sanskrit around 400-600 CE. Rita M. Gross (2009) shares the accounts of Indian men marveling at the stories of the powerful warrior goddesses. This seems contradictory to the prevalent cultural models of female meekness, subordination, and obedience in the Sita-Savitri paradigm.

Perhaps this incongruity in the Indian patriarchy could be explained as a community where there is a distinction between authority, which is held by men, and power, which both men and women maintain. The Indian woman therefore takes control of situations–within the allowed societal constraints–that matter the most to her, often with a goddess as her patron.

An alternate explanation of this apparent contradiction between the ancient matriarchal mythological and the contemporary patriarchal societal beliefs is the “deprivation theory” suggested by I.M. Lewis (1971), wherein the losing status of the Indian woman is compensated by a consolation prize of her mythological prowess. Collins (2000) takes a more balanced view of the ambivalent role of the Indian female by referring back to the Indian philosophical text, Samkhya, written in the seventh century BC. The Samkhya distinguishes between the self or purusha (literally, “male”) and the prakriti or the nuanced feminine world of psychoid matters. The Samkhya describes a dualistic societal role for prakriti: that of a submissive wife and one who liberates purusha by challenging his ego.

Collins’ (2000) interpretation of the Indian philosophical and mythological views may present us with the underlying dilemma that still persists in the South Asian society: the role of a woman as a powerful necessity for a man to reach his full potential. 

In conclusion, the mythology of patriarchy in South Asian countries is a curious study of contrasts between the fierce goddess and the submissive goddess; between the ideology of a powerful goddess and the practical convenience of the care-giving wife; between power and authority, and so on. With the inherent cultural complexity of this region comes a very complex origin of domestic violence. While this deeper dive did not really give me a solution to the ages-old problem, it did help me understand part of the deep roots of the issue.

drawing of Indian goddess surrounded by dead men and body parts
Goddess Kali (Source: Wikipedia)

References:

Gross, R. M. (2009). A garland of feminist reflections: forty years of religious exploration. Univ. of California Press.

Lewis IM. (1971). Ecstatic religion: An anthropological study of spirit possession and shamanism. Penguin (Non-Classics). 

Collins A. (2000). Dancing with Prakriti: The Samkhyan Goddess as Pativrata and Guru. “Is the Goddess a Feminist?: The Politics of South Asian Goddesses,” 2000:52-67.

 

The Recognition and Verification of the Status of Sexual Violence Victim During the Kosovo Liberation War

by

Viktoria Pashtriku
Women’s Association Medica Gjakova
Gjakova, Kosovo

On December 30, 2015, the Republic of Kosovo passed “The Recognition and Verification of the Status of Sexual Violence Victim During the Kosovo Liberation War” (Regulation [GRK] No. 22/2015 – Decision No. 16/67). The initiative went into effect in January 2018. Unlike its kind anywhere in the world, this program is essential in recognizing the trauma of wartime sexual violence in a post-conflict society, fighting stigma of wartime sexual violence by legally legitimizing survivor’s experiences, and encouraging the public/survivors themselves to perceive survivors of wartime sexual violence with the same respect and dignity as war veterans.

This is particularly important, as survivors of wartime sexual violence were kept out of the law passed in 2011, “Status and the Rights of the Martyrs, Invalids, Veterans, Members of Kosova Liberation Army, Civilian Victims of War and Their Families” (Law No. 04/L-054), and the law passed in 2012, which recognizes the official status of “Kosovo Liberation Army War Veterans” (Law No. 04/L-261).

Monument with "Heroinat" written below relief of woman's face
Among the monuments in Kosovo honoring many male resistance fighters and political leaders, there is the “Heroinat” (Heroine) memorial in Prishtina, Kosovo, created to honor the role of women during the Kosovo Liberation War. Image from molosgroup.com
rows of gold coins imprinted with relief of woman's face
The relief of the “Heroinat” memorial is composed of 20,000 gold medals—20,000 for the estimated number of people raped during the Kosovo Liberation War. The number was determined by a 1998 Human Rights Watch report. Image from molosgroup.com

What is most important about this decision is that once an individual has been verified as a sexual violence victim, this individual will then receive a personal pension of 230 euros a month. This pension is vital in giving survivors the financial means to seek out medical and psychological assistance if needed, to take care of themselves and their families, to launch business initiatives, and much more. 

I was able to provide administrative assistance for the application by reviewing it for errors and inconsistencies, making photocopies, and helping ensure that all parts of the application are gathered. The applications are evaluated according to the following criteria: (1) Medical Report, (2) Psycho-social Report, (3) Legal Report, (4) Witness Statement, and (5) Other. All parts are crucial in order to ensure a successful application.

Papers on a desk
Taking the time to read the legal code in order to best understand the process for status recognition.

My main interest when arriving to Kosovo was to better understand this recognition and the verification process. While observing the psycho-social staff at Medica Gjakova prepare and put together several of these applications (as well as asking a never-ending amount of questions), there were some issues I noticed and that were revealed to me about the application process:

  1. Although both men and women were raped during the Kosovo Liberation War, men experience more stigma about being a survivor of wartime sexual violence and are significantly less likely to apply.
  2. Women in villages are more likely to seek out services from Medica Gjakova and apply because they have a greater sense of privacy. Meanwhile, women from the cities are less likely to seek out services and apply because they are connected to a larger social circle and thus have more fear of getting “discovered” as survivors.
  3. The program was initially approved for five years with an end date of January 2023, after which individuals will  no longer be able to apply. This is challenging, as many women wait until their husbands have passed away before seeking help, while others simply need more time to come forward with their experiences. 
  4. There is anxiety in the public consciousness that women will lie about being survivors of wartime sexual violence in order to receive the pension, particularly in such a poor society. This mentality is only furthered by the public controversy caused when it was discovered that despite there only being up to 13,000 war veterans, a far larger number (53,000, as of 2016) have been registered and are receiving pensions. 
  5. Despite the fact that survivors of trauma often struggle with remembering specific facts and details consistently (Herman 1992), any inconsistencies within the application and during the interview is perceived as grounds of lying and survivors are denied the status recognition. 

Regardless of these issues, however, the initiative has indeed helped many survivors, and thousands of women have already been registered.

 

Works Cited
Herman, J. (2015). Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence–From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror. New York, NY: Basic Books.

Human Rights Watch. (1998). Humanitarian Law Violations in Kosovo. New York, NY: Human Rights Watch.

Helping to Prepare the Trauma-Sensitive Training Manual

by

Viktoria Pashtriku
Women’s Association Medica Gjakova
Gjakova, Kosovo

Perhaps one of the biggest challenges survivors of wartime sexual violence face is interacting with professionals in the various structures of society who are not equipped and informed enough to understand the trauma of wartime sexual violence and the sensitivities needed in order to properly engage and help survivors. In doing so, these professionals can often evoke harmful and hateful behaviors that violate the rights of survivors, preventing them from getting or seeking out the services they need.

As a response to this struggle, Medica Gjakova is launching an initiative to properly train medical professionals around Kosovo. I’ve assisted in this initiative by conducting research, gathering data/information, and selecting training exercises for Medica Gjakova’s “Training Manual: Stress- and Trauma-Sensitive Approach for Health Professionals to Support Survivors of Gender Based Violence.”

Office room with three desks
The office where I do my work. A desk was set up for me alongside those for the legal adviser and project manager.

My research included reading fundamental books on trauma, such as Judith Herman’s Trauma and Recovery and Bessel van der Kolk’s The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, as well as reading medical and psycho-social materials on specific topics such as symptoms of sexual violence survivors, dissociative disorders, the impact on family and children of survivors, and the self-care of professionals. In addition, I looked over the training manuals created by Medica Zenica (Bosnia-Herzegovina) and Medica Afghanistan last year.

Medica Gjakova, Medica Zenica, and Medica Afghanistan are partner organizations of the German women’s human rights organization, medica mondiale, which provides support to women in conflict zones. Alongside Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Afghanistan, this medical training initiative is also being implemented in Iraq.

A book on an outdoor table
Taking advantage of the warm weather outside while reading Bosnia-Herzegovina’s training manual, prepared last year as part of my research.

The training manual will be used to initially train a select group of 16 medical professionals from various institutions throughout the Gjakova and Prizren municipalities in Kosovo. Those individuals will then be given manuals and training materials in order to go back to their home institutions and train other medical professionals, properly equipping another 100 medical professionals with the proper knowledge and skills to provide targeted resources to survivors of sexual- and gender-based violence.

Open doorway showing a house beyond and organization sign on wall
The main entrance of Medica Gjakova, leading to the administrative, medical, and psycho-social sectors of the organization. A house was selected in lieu of office space in order to make the organization comfortable, familiar, and inviting to women seeking services.
office building seen from parking lot
Another entrance to Medica Gjakova, leading to the economic and legal sectors of the organization. These offices are connected to the house upstairs. The entrance has a humble appearance and the window paneling is always closed, essential to ensuring privacy.

Medica Gjakova is working in collaboration with Kosovo’s Ministry of Health and the Kosovo University Clinical Centre in order to implement the project, with hopes to train all of Kosovo’s public health system. Through this experience, I’ve learned that improving the services available to survivors – be it medical, legal, educational, etc. – is a crucial component of the human rights process.

How are people holding district attorneys accountable (and can they actually be held accountable)?

by

Sophie Walker
Court Watch NYC
New York, NY

During the month of June, I focused mostly on the Queens district attorney (DA) race and the closing of the New York State legislative session—a crash course in elections and New York State legislation as a political newbie. Elected officials are supposed to be accountable to their constituents (the people that elect them), but in practice, it’s complicated, and there are different methods of holding them accountable. 

Political education is a means of engaging and empowering communities, and one way is to remind people to go out and vote when there is an upcoming election. In this vein, I worked with court watchers over a period of three weeks to distribute thousands of copies of an informational booklet written in English, Spanish, and Mandarin at subway stations in Queens (Flushing, Jackson Heights, Long Island City, Jamaica, and Astoria) during rush hour and at the end of the work day.

Two book covers titled "The Power to Transform Criminal Justice Is In Our Hands: 2019 Queens District Attorney Election" in English and Spanish
English and Spanish versions of the booklets, with illustrations of Queens residents

The booklet uses observations from court watchers in Queens to highlight the immense power and discretion of prosecutors. The booklet also stresses the power of the prosecutor: “In criminal court, the prosecutor is referred to as ‘The People.’ The District Attorney’s decisions are being made in our names” (p. 3). The anonymity in the title, The People, perfectly encapsulates the power and discretion that prosecutors hold; because of prosecutorial immunity, in most states, they cannot be subject to civil or criminal lawsuits for misconduct. 

In one of my first weeks with Court Watch, I attended Color of Change’s Prosecutor Accountability Convening. Organizations and individuals from around the country gathered to reflect on how communities can effectively hold the chief law enforcement officer (the most powerful cop in each county) accountable. But is it even possible to do so? There are different answers. In the eyes of prison abolitionists, the prosecutor will always be adversarial, and the goal is to shrink and ultimately abolish the DA position and office entirely. There are also reformists who might want to work in collaboration with the DA’s office, expanding DA resources to make “better” practices. There has been no precedent for transparency or communication in DA offices, and it has been the norm that the same person is the DA for decades. In Queens, for example, Richard Brown was the DA for 28 years, and in Boston, Daniel Conley was the DA 16 years. 

The June 25 Queens DA Democratic primary (essentially the winner, as a Republican will most likely not win in November) was a highly-anticipated local election that received lots of national and international press. The big contenders were two women from Queens: Tiffany Cabán, a queer Puerto Rican public defender, and Melinda Katz (or Melissa, as referred to by Cuomo), a career politician. Katz is also currently the Queens borough president, a former city council member, and a lobbyist for real-estate developers. This election has been highly contested, as noted in two amNew York articles from July 25 and July 17.

Until next time…

Public Charge = Border Wall?

by

Ayman Mukerji Househam
Sakhi
USA

Mrs. X is an Indian (actual nationality masked) wife whose husband invited her to finally live with him in Harlem, NY, after 16 years of marriage. He had visited her three times, so they barely knew each other. As Mrs. X and her three teenage sons landed at JFK airport, she noticed her heart pounding with joy and excitement. Little did she know that the next three months would be filled with rape and drunken rages followed by brutal abuse of their sons and her. In the fall of 2018, her husband finally called it off by (literally!) kicking them out into the frozen streets of Harlem.

This would have become the story of four homeless immigrants, but a Good Samaritan New Yorker spotted the hungry children and their pregnant mother. He helped them find a shelter, which is Mrs. X’s new home, and fortunately, the family got food, thanks to food stamps! When I met the family this year as a social worker, I did not have the heart to tell them that they might soon be cut off from food and shelter. They would be possibly left with one of two choices: to return to their perpetrator or to be deported to their country.

Why, you might ask, would that happen? Well, President Trump has introduced a new set of rules for “public charge.” The Trump administration’s new definition (August 14, 2019) under which immigrants become a “public charge” or a burden to the American society, targets immigrant families that already struggle to make the ends meet. This includes numerous green card applicants and asylum-seekers who are deemed too poor or too young, old, or sick to work. It includes numerous families who are fleeing domestic abuse.

The new public charge assessment will go into effect after October 15, 2019, after which immigrants will face several new risks:

Using public benefits could put immigrants at risk. Immigrants applying for permanent residency and several other adjustments of immigration status will be subjected to the “Public Charge Test” if they avail of the following public benefits after October 15: food stamps, the cash assistance program for income maintenance, public housing, rental assistance, non-emergency Medicaid, and so on. So, if you are an immigrant using or planning to use public benefits, you will be okay at least until October 15.

Immigrants who are simply not capable of working will be targeted. Already-vulnerable populations will be targeted by public charge status as of October 15, 2019. This includes children, seniors, those suffering from debilitating health conditions, and the poor. Interestingly, the US government now has conflicting definitions of poverty, depending on immigration status. An immigrant has to earn at least 125% of the federal poverty level to not be considered a public charge. Simply put, if you are an immigrant with doubtful earning potential and are poorer than a middle-class American, you don’t stand a chance to become one. The new public charge rules challenge the basis of Article 2 (freedom against discrimination) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

This will affect domestic violence victims as well. Many survivors and their children may not qualify for a U visa or permanent resident status. The victims are often poor and still learning basic skills that can help them become financially independent. With the new public charge rules, many survivors will be left with no public assistance and therefore risk becoming homeless and hungry. Such families will face two challenges: fearful of applying for benefits, they may stay with their abuser, or US immigration services may target them for deportation.

You can help. Learn the facts, speak with immigrants, and educate communities and advocates. Ask Congress members to cosponsor HR 3222 (“No Federal Funds for Public Charge”) and to speak out and organize their network against public charge.

protest sign of woman in US-flag hijab with text, "We the people are greater than fear"
Photo Credit: Flickr, Shepard Fairey

Who Should Be Doing this Work?

by

Judy Luo
Centro para la Observación Migratoria y el Desarrollo Social en el Caribe (OBMICA)
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

I am soon to return to New York, marking the end of my time with OBMICA in Santo Domingo. With interviews to film with deportees’ families in New York, hours of footage to edit, and articles to pitch and write, I’m just at the beginning of the work I started over the summer. In addition to learning deeply about life after deportation this summer, I spent an equal amount of time pondering the question: who should be doing this work?

As soon as I landed in Santo Domingo, I knew I was going to have a tough summer ahead. Being a solo Asian woman made my work difficult in many ways. My being in public attracted attention and harassment, and filming in public was even more difficult.

When applying for this fellowship, I was wary of selecting my research topic since I am not directly connected to the community of deported Dominicans. I did not want to reproduce the top-down detached dynamic prevalent among Nonprofit Industrial Complex actors and organizations. I made a commitment to apply the spirit of what I have learned from my grassroots abolition work in New York to my work in Santo Domingo.

I tried my best to engage some of the principles of participatory action research. I had some meaningful conversations with folks I interviewed, where they seemed to emerge more aware of their potential and power to advocate for themselves. I practiced mutual aid in different ways. I made friendships beyond the researcher-subject relationship.

Despite all of this, however, factors such as limited time and my identity inevitably contributed towards reproducing the often exploitative relationship human rights actors have with directly impacted communities. At one point in the summer, I was extremely disillusioned with this reality, to the point where I felt the work that I was doing was meaningless. However, in those rare moments where I felt that the people I was working with recognized their own power—even if for a fleeting moment—I saw that something powerful could emerge in the horizontal alliance of advocates and the people they advocate for, a potential for that very delineation to be blurred.

I look forward to bringing forth the stories of Dominican deportees through my documentary, but I am most excited about the relationships I have built that will facilitate my ally work for the building of their own movement in the future.

Kosovo’s “Be My Voice/Bëhu Zëri Im” Campaign

by

Viktoria Pashtriku
Women’s Association Medica Gjakova
Gjakova, Kosovo

One of the most vital initiatives in Kosovo that seeks to challenge the stigma surrounding survivors of wartime sexual violence is the “Be My Voice/Bëhu Zëri Im” campaign. Launched on June 19, 2018–the United Nation’s International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, as well as the 20th anniversary of the Kosovo War (1998-99)–in collaboration with the Kosovo Rehabilitation Centre for Torture Victims (KRCT), the campaign promotes advocacy work that encourages Kosovo’s public to openly discuss wartime sexual violence. It also raises awareness on the struggles survivors are facing and provides resources and information for the process of applying for the “recognition and verification of the status of sexual violence victims” (a globally pioneering program in Kosovo that offers survivors monthly pensions).

Campaign logo: Yellow flower on purple background with the words "Bëhu Zëri Im" underneath.
The “Be My Voice/Bëhu Zëri Im” campaign logo has become a commonly recognized image around Kosovo. The purple color has a long history of being used by women’s human rights groups/efforts. Originally purple was used in 1908 to symbolize the Women’s Social and Political Union in the UK, and purple is the color for International Women’s Day as well. Image courtesy of Medica Gjakova.

The phrase, “Be My Voice/Bëhu Zëri Im,” was chosen to challenge people to speak up on behalf of survivors of wartime sexual violence who are not ready (and may never be) to speak up for themselves. In doing so, others can be their “voice” instead. Through this campaign, Medica Gjakova consistently produces promotional work such as social media posts and engagement, TV appearances and interviews, urban artwork, informational events and conferences, human rights protests, and more, in order to engage people to participate with the campaign.

Mural painting on wall, "Be My Voice" with the campaign logo painted on.
Campaign artwork on a mural promoting women’s human rights at the Vancouver Convention Centre in Vancouver, Canada, created during the Women Deliver 2019 Conference. Image courtesy of Medica Gjakova.
Wall with three "Be My Voice" campaign logos painted on it.
Promotional campaign artwork found in the center of Prizren, Kosovo. Image taken by author.
Women and men of a choir, with women wearing "Be My Voice" campaign logo patch on their dresses.
Women of the Kosovo Philharmonic wearing the campaign logo during a performance in Paris, France, in solidarity with survivors of wartime sexual violence. Image courtesy of Medica Gjakova.
Women at protest holding up a sign
Leaders in Kosovo with the director of Medica Gjakova (center, dressed in red), during a protest in Prishtina, Kosovo. The sign they are holding up states “Më Trajto Dinjitetshëm,” which translates to “Treat Me With Dignity.” Image courtesy of Medica Gjakova.

I arrived in Kosovo for my fellowship work at Medica Gjakova just in time for this year’s International Day of the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict and the one-year anniversary of the campaign. I was able to gain some indispensable background exposure to the ways Medica Gjakova engages with locals and raises awareness for survivors of sexual violence. This included the creation of digital media posts and a TV interview to discuss how survivors of wartime sexual violence can come to Medica Gjakova for help and assistance. Kosovo’s “Be My Voice/Bëhu Zëri Im” campaign demonstrates that it is not necessary for survivors themselves to speak up about their experiences, that grassroots local engagement can encourage ordinary people to challenge stigma, and that campaign work is capable of going beyond marketing practices in order to establish worthwhile change.