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Author Topic: Contemporary Issues  (Read 5112 times)  Share 

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Kaan709

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Contemporary Issues
« on: April 04, 2017, 06:30:19 pm »
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In Human Rights, our class is doing human trafficking and slavery as our contemporary issue for student dot point 3. Since this dot point carries weight, and would need to be in depth, would you recommend choosing another option if i'm able to intensify my response? During trails, would the test say human trafficking, or just 'one contemporary issue'?

jamonwindeyer

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #1 on: April 04, 2017, 06:49:17 pm »
+1
In Human Rights, our class is doing human trafficking and slavery as our contemporary issue for student dot point 3. Since this dot point carries weight, and would need to be in depth, would you recommend choosing another option if i'm able to intensify my response? During trails, would the test say human trafficking, or just 'one contemporary issue'?

Hey! There is nothing wrong with choosing another option, but only do it if you really need to. The reason being simply that it adds work for you! You can definitely get the depth you need with the human trafficking/slavery option ;D

If you do change, be sure to communicate that with your teacher. It is quite possible, if your school writes your Trial themselves, they could specify :) important to always be open with where you are at (be prepared to justify why you have swapped with your teacher) :)

elysepopplewell

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #2 on: April 04, 2017, 09:07:12 pm »
+1
Also consider the benefit of using human trafficking as a contemporary issue because it leads on from the mandatory dot point about the development of human rights in slavery! :)
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Lachlan Morley

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #3 on: May 20, 2017, 12:35:59 pm »
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I did Slavery for my first term assessment on a contemporary human rights issue and I found just the issue alone there was more than enough information to talk about, if you were do do more than one issue it could lead to a decrease in depth and judgment to your response which is key for Legal

marcusgrahamm

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #4 on: May 23, 2017, 08:15:01 pm »
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I did Genocide and Human Trafficking.

Honestly, I found genocide more relatable and had an immense amount of resources to effectively compile a great response!
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marcusgrahamm

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #5 on: May 23, 2017, 08:31:16 pm »
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Human Rights Investigation: Genocide.

What is it?

The crime of destroying or conspiring to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.

Genocide can be committed in a number of ways, including killing members of a group or causing them serious mental or bodily harm by deliberately initiating conditions that will results in physical destruction or imposing measures on a group to prevent births

Background

The current archetype of contemporary genocide is the holocaust whereby German Nazis starved, tortured, and executed an estimated 6 million Jews, as well as millions of ethnic minorities to develop a ‘master race’. Additionally, the incident that occurred in Rwanda in 1994 was an act of genocide by the Hutus-dominated government seeking to destroy Rwanda’s Tutsi peoples as well as Hutus that opposed the government’s extremist politics.  Political tensions and conflicts in Rwanda as far back as colonial period gave rise to the tension between the Hutus and the Tutsi people. In just over three-months over one-million people were annihilated by the government.  This genocide is regarded as one of the most fastest and vicious genocide in history.

Legislation:

In 1995, the United Nations established the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.  Over seventy suspects were indicted and convicted by the Tribunal. 
Following the exterminations of WWII the UN passed a resolution in an effort to prevent such atrocities to occur again in the forth coming future. This was labelled the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the crime of Genocide (December 9th 1948). Genocide was now recognised as an international crime and provided forits punishment.

In 1945-46 the Nuremberg Trials put top Nazi leaders accountable for their actions. In 1948, when the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted, the UN General Assembly asked the International Law Commission to develop a treaty establishing a court to hear and determine charges of genocide. However, the Cold War put an end to the project. In the 1990s, the UNSC established ad hoc international tribunals in response to the mass killings in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia. In 1998, 160 countries and 200 NGOs participated in a conference resulting in the Rome Statute and the ICC came into being. The ICC finally gave teeth to the Geneva Conventions; previously, the ICRC had to depend on states to prosecute offenders. Individuals can now be prosecuted at the ICC for war crimes under the Geneva Conventions.


On November 4, 1988, the United States passed the Genocide Implementation Act of 1987.

This created:

"a new federal offense that prohibits the commission of acts with the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in substantial part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group; and to provide adequate penalties for such acts"

The International Criminal Tribunals for Former Yugoslavia(ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR) were convened in 1993 in the Hague, the Netherlands, and in 1995 in Arusha,Tanzania, respectively. As the first courts of their type since World War II, their work, which sought to fix personal responsibility for mass murder, continued into the new millennium.
Given the vast scope and complicated nature of trying crimes of genocide, neither body has moved swiftly. Byg2003, the ICTR had indicted 52 people and had completed nine trials stemming from the Rwanda slaughter, also becoming the first international court in history to hand down a conviction for genocide. The ICTY had indicted 87 people and had concluded 23 trials. 


International Response To Protect Human Rights

INTERNATIONAL COURTS

In 1993, in response to massive atrocities in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, the United Nations Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY). It was the first international criminal tribunal since Nuremberg and the first ever mandated to prosecute the crime of genocide.

A year later, in response to devastating violence in Rwanda, the Security Council established the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Nearing the completion of their mandates, both of tribunals have contributed detail, nuance, and precedent to the application of the law of genocide.

In 1998, the Rome Statue of the International Criminal Court (ICC) established the first permanent international criminal court. The Rome Statute’s drafting process and the ICC’s ongoing case against the president of Sudan have added further clarifications to the international law of genocide. In 2007, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which hears cases between states, issued a landmark decision addressing state responsibility to prevent and punish genocide in the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro.








EVOLUTION OF Genocide LAWS

Article I of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:

“The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and punish.”

Significantly, Article 1 of the Convention establishes the crime of genocide in times of war or peace. In 1948, this definition differed considerably from that of crimes against humanity, which only concerned violations against civilians during war—a limitation on the definition that no longer applies.

The 2007 ICJ decision in the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro—which found that Serbia violated its responsibility to prevent and punish genocide at Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina—clarified that a state’s prevention and punishment obligations extend beyond its own borders. The decision asserted that States are obliged to take “all means reasonably available to them, so as to prevent genocide so far as possible.” This obligation exists regardless of whether the state’s efforts to influence the perpetrators changes the outcome.

Article II:
Acts of Genocide

The tribunals have elaborated on the act of “causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.” In the Akayesu case, the ICTR decided that the harm need not be permanent or irremediable and can include torture, be it “bodily or mental, inhumane or degrading treatment, persecution.” The judgment in this case allowed rape to be considered an act of genocide when committed with the intent to destroy a protected group. The tribunals further confirmed that the harm also includes sexual violence that falls short of killing. Important decisions that concern the act of causing serious bodily or mental harm include the ICTR cases against Jean-Paul Akayesu and Laurent Semanza.
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elysepopplewell

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #6 on: May 23, 2017, 09:24:44 pm »
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Human Rights Investigation: Genocide.


Thanks for sharing your notes!
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claudiarosaliaa

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #7 on: July 06, 2017, 09:32:17 pm »
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Hi Elyse, I was wondering what is the best way of tackling a 7 marker on a contemporary human rights issues. How do I structure my response?
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elysepopplewell

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #8 on: July 06, 2017, 11:34:38 pm »
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Hi Elyse, I was wondering what is the best way of tackling a 7 marker on a contemporary human rights issues. How do I structure my response?

Hey Claudia! It really depends on the question type. If it's an "outline the development of" kind of question, then it makes sense to structure your response in a sequential way to match the sequence of events in the development. If it's a more analytical question, you have the choice of structure, but think of it like a really small essay. Essentially, it's half the marks of your crime essay! So it isn't an insignificant question by any means. Give it an introduction if you think it helps rake in your argument, and then do the to-and-fro kind of argument, or the sequence of events approach, or even a flipping structure between "this is effective because of this...but it is ineffective because of this..." It really depends on the type of question you are asked. But remember, it is still a short answer so its not worth being crazy over. BUT, it is still 7 marks, which is almost half of what the crime essay is worth! So it shouldn't be knocked either! :)
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rodero

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #9 on: July 07, 2017, 07:51:12 pm »
+1
Hi Elyse, I was wondering what is the best way of tackling a 7 marker on a contemporary human rights issues. How do I structure my response?

Hey, i'm not Elyse, but I would like to add-on to the answer she has provided :)

Just like Elyse said, your structure will be based on the directive verb - explain (cause + effect), outline (indicate the main features of), assess (make a judgement) etc. Generally speaking, the three verbs that I just provided are what they mainly ask for in this section.

In terms of structure, I personally would NOT do an intro/conclusion (then again keep in mind i'm a current HSC student myself and I have absolutely zero experience answering a 7 marker on a contemporary HR issue). It's just that you literally have one page, half if you exclude the space taken up by the question and the margins, to write your response. For this reason you're better off just getting straight into your argument and using your thesis/linking statements as a substitute to the intro/conclusion.

I'd also like to point out that the contemporary HR issue is usually tagged along with a theme/challenge. So for instance, let's say you're answering the 2013 question.

Explain how changing values have been reflected in the promotion and enforcement of ONE human rights issue.

Here you can see the directive verb - explain, meaning your structure should aim to demonstrate the cause (changing values) and its effect on the promotion of a HR issue. I would assume that for all contemporary issues, changing values have called for the removal of human rights violations.

For the 2010 HSC 7 marker:

Assess the effectiveness of ONE non-legal measure in the promotion of human rights. Use a contemporary example to support your response.

This time, they've only added half of the theme/challenge - They took 'The effectiveness of legal and non-legal measures' and only asked for the non-legal aspect. Also, this is an assess question so you must make a judgement (highly, moderately, limited).

In essence, I would say that your structure should be similar to one body paragraph of an essay. However, if the question asks for a judgement, your paragraph MUST show both sides of the argument. Sure, teachers always foster individual opinion, but you can't deny that there have been successes as well as shortcomings. For this reason, it's safe to argue 'moderately effective' for a holistic evaluation.

Just a friendly reminder: I'm a current HSC student as well so you may want to double-check with more qualified experts  ;)
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georgiia

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #11 on: July 17, 2017, 07:13:00 pm »
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I'm doing asylum seekers, whats the most important/recent things to consider?

elysepopplewell

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Re: Contemporary Issues
« Reply #12 on: July 17, 2017, 07:43:35 pm »
+1
I'm doing asylum seekers, whats the most important/recent things to consider?

When writing your notes: remember that you can make comparisons between the responses of different nations in order to make an evaluation about the effectiveness. So, this is the Aus response, this is the EU response, this is the NZ response, etc. That's a good way of measuring the global cooperation on the issue - which is always important for human rights! :)
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